2020 Presidential Election (All Serious POVs Welcome)

[bishnykfan]

I'm not sure what the racial breakdown of the city has to do with riots. Portland is 81% white and is obviously not a republican city. It's being used as one of the main cities of Trump's law and order campaign. But I guess it's easy to blame all of the white nationalist and Nazi police officers in the inner city police departments rather then put any blame on the leaders of those cities that keep hiring these Nazi's year after year. Never mind the policies that those leaders put in place. If the people in charge never have to take any responsibility and can always use the scapegoat of the person below them as the problem, then things will never get fixed, no matter which party leads. Most big cities even in red states do not lean left, they are left. Philadelphia is blue since 1952, Chicago since 1931, why do the leaders of these places allow so many white supremacists on their police force? Even Houston, the biggest city in the biggest red state hasn't had a Republican mayor in almost 40 years. Are the white supremacists that intelligent that they can continually get past all of the screenings to get onto the police force in these cities? Or is it possible that there are some that are just not very good at their job? Maybe some that are poorly trained? Maybe some that have been beaten down by the job? Of course there are some racist police officers, just like there are racist teachers, racist politicians, racist athletes, racist doctors and whatever other profession you want to use. All bad police should be taken off the job. There absolutely needs to be reform. Racism is a real thing. But to say you want to fix the problem of police racism without looking at the people who are in charge of the police...seems disingenuous to me.

Crime, especially violent crime, in the cities is going up. And the "quality of life" crimes are also going up even if they aren't reported as often as they once were for various reasons. There are a lot of reasons for that. The pandemic and the lockdowns for sure is one. The racial tension is another. The media is a big one. And one is absolutely that the police are pulling back in their responsibilities. But, that shouldn't be surprising. Crime will continue to rise if there are no consequences. It's unfortunate and it will get worse before it gets better if local leaders (left or right) don't protect their people.

[Oscirus]

I see a zero convention bump for Trump showing up in new polls

What I see is Biden's nationwide margins holding steady with very mild fluctuations in state polls

And whenever I see Trump now I see a man entering senile dementia. I do not think this guy will be able to handle the debates. Whether it weakens his support, we'll see, but I don't see him gaining ground from those debates.

Not all polls are out but in the one released so far, theres def been a bump which is to be expected

https://www.yahoo.com/news/new-yahoo-news-you-gov-poll-bidens-lead-over-trump-shrinks-to-6-points-after-the-rnc-his-smallest-margin-in-months-164411657.html

Did Biden get a bump from the DNC Convention? Trump seems to have gotten one from the crazies.

At best it was one point from most of the polls i saw.

[Clyde_Style]

I see a zero convention bump for Trump showing up in new polls

What I see is Biden's nationwide margins holding steady with very mild fluctuations in state polls

And whenever I see Trump now I see a man entering senile dementia. I do not think this guy will be able to handle the debates. Whether it weakens his support, we'll see, but I don't see him gaining ground from those debates.

Not all polls are out but in the one released so far, theres def been a bump which is to be expected

https://www.yahoo.com/news/new-yahoo-news-you-gov-poll-bidens-lead-over-trump-shrinks-to-6-points-after-the-rnc-his-smallest-margin-in-months-164411657.html

Did Biden get a bump from the DNC Convention? Trump seems to have gotten one from the crazies.

Not that I could tell. The aggregates tightened up from a 14 point spread to 12 points which can be attributable to pretty much anything, but no hard bounces that I have noticed

[Clyde_Style]

I would suggest using paragraph breaks if you're going to make a large post. I can't speak for everyone else, but I can't read giant blobs of text if they are not broken up

[Pointgod]

I'm not sure what the racial breakdown of the city has to do with riots. Portland is 81% white and is obviously not a republican city. It's being used as one of the main cities of Trump's law and order campaign. But I guess it's easy to blame all of the white nationalist and Nazi police officers in the inner city police departments rather then put any blame on the leaders of those cities that keep hiring these Nazi's year after year. Never mind the policies that those leaders put in place. If the people in charge never have to take any responsibility and can always use the scapegoat of the person below them as the problem, then things will never get fixed, no matter which party leads. Most big cities even in red states do not lean left, they are left. Philadelphia is blue since 1952, Chicago since 1931, why do the leaders of these places allow so many white supremacists on their police force? Even Houston, the biggest city in the biggest red state hasn't had a Republican mayor in almost 40 years. Are the white supremacists that intelligent that they can continually get past all of the screenings to get onto the police force in these cities? Or is it possible that there are some that are just not very good at their job? Maybe some that are poorly trained? Maybe some that have been beaten down by the job? Of course there are some racist police officers, just like there are racist teachers, racist politicians, racist athletes, racist doctors and whatever other profession you want to use. All bad police should be taken off the job. There absolutely needs to be reform. Racism is a real thing. But to say you want to fix the problem of police racism without looking at the people who are in charge of the police...seems disingenuous to me.

Crime, especially violent crime, in the cities is going up. And the "quality of life" crimes are also going up even if they aren't reported as often as they once were for various reasons. There are a lot of reasons for that. The pandemic and the lockdowns for sure is one. The racial tension is another. The media is a big one. And one is absolutely that the police are pulling back in their responsibilities. But, that shouldn't be surprising. Crime will continue to rise if there are no consequences. It's unfortunate and it will get worse before it gets better if local leaders (left or right) don't protect their people.

If I show you proof that White Supremacists have infiltrated law enforcement will you just dismiss the source or will you take in the information? I’m not going to bother finding the research if it’s going to fall on deaf ears. The biggest problem with your logic is that police unions are very powerful and are sometimes openly hostile to the mayor. Look at the police turning their backs on De Blasio for example. Sometimes this is a good thing because you don’t want to centralize power in the hands of a corrupt mayor, but it also leads to out of control police unions that fight any reform and at worst instruct their officers to not do their jobs (you know want the tax payers pay them for)

And show me the stats that support the bolded across the country. 2020 is an outlier but overall crime is down across the country continuing a trend that had started since the 90’s. If you want to talk about specific cities let’s get into it but the American carnage narrative is completely false.

[bishnykfan]

I'm not sure what the racial breakdown of the city has to do with riots. Portland is 81% white and is obviously not a republican city. It's being used as one of the main cities of Trump's law and order campaign. But I guess it's easy to blame all of the white nationalist and Nazi police officers in the inner city police departments rather then put any blame on the leaders of those cities that keep hiring these Nazi's year after year. Never mind the policies that those leaders put in place. If the people in charge never have to take any responsibility and can always use the scapegoat of the person below them as the problem, then things will never get fixed, no matter which party leads. Most big cities even in red states do not lean left, they are left. Philadelphia is blue since 1952, Chicago since 1931, why do the leaders of these places allow so many white supremacists on their police force? Even Houston, the biggest city in the biggest red state hasn't had a Republican mayor in almost 40 years. Are the white supremacists that intelligent that they can continually get past all of the screenings to get onto the police force in these cities? Or is it possible that there are some that are just not very good at their job? Maybe some that are poorly trained? Maybe some that have been beaten down by the job? Of course there are some racist police officers, just like there are racist teachers, racist politicians, racist athletes, racist doctors and whatever other profession you want to use. All bad police should be taken off the job. There absolutely needs to be reform. Racism is a real thing. But to say you want to fix the problem of police racism without looking at the people who are in charge of the police...seems disingenuous to me.

Crime, especially violent crime, in the cities is going up. And the "quality of life" crimes are also going up even if they aren't reported as often as they once were for various reasons. There are a lot of reasons for that. The pandemic and the lockdowns for sure is one. The racial tension is another. The media is a big one. And one is absolutely that the police are pulling back in their responsibilities. But, that shouldn't be surprising. Crime will continue to rise if there are no consequences. It's unfortunate and it will get worse before it gets better if local leaders (left or right) don't protect their people.

If I show you proof that White Supremacists have infiltrated law enforcement will you just dismiss the source or will you take in the information? I’m not going to bother finding the research if it’s going to fall on deaf ears. The biggest problem with your logic is that police unions are very powerful and are sometimes openly hostile to the mayor. Look at the police turning their backs on De Blasio for example. Sometimes this is a good thing because you don’t want to centralize power in the hands of a corrupt mayor, but it also leads to out of control police unions that fight any reform and at worst instruct their officers to not do their jobs (you know want the tax payers pay them for)

And show me the stats that support the bolded across the country. 2020 is an outlier but overall crime is down across the country continuing a trend that had started since the 90’s. If you want to talk about specific cities let’s get into it but the American carnage narrative is completely false.

Like I said, I'm sure that there are white supremacists in the police departments. I'm sure that there are racist people in all walks of life and white supremacists who are all about "power" would naturally be drawn to policing as an occupation. I am not questioning that statement and I concede that to be true. Racist police are the worst part of our society because they are supposed to be the ultimate in public service to all regardless of race.

I also understand that police unions are incredibly powerful. Probably too powerful in our biggest cities. Unions in general are powerful in certain places and occupations. I also said that there needs to be true reform in policing. I don't think you'd find an argument among most people when it comes to that statement.

However, when everyone says they want to look deeper into the "systematic racism" that is prevalent throughout society but then not look at the leaders of that society it feels a little weak. These big cities are all run by democratic mayors mostly in democratic states. They have the power and just as importantly, they've had the time to change things. Has Baltimore improved in the past 68 years? Has Philadelphia gotten better in the past 89? That is an awfully long time to weed out the bad police and change the way that unions operate.

As someone who is independent I look at the job that mayors in NYC, Chicago and Seattle especially are doing and can understand why crime is up. NYC with its bail reform, Chicago with a hypocritical mayor who will let her city burn and citizens get shot by the hundreds each week but not even allow peaceful protests on her own street and Seattle who will allow a portion of her city to be walled off for her "summer of love" experiment are all examples of poor leadership which has hurt their constituents. Not all democratic leadership is bad. Detroit seems to be handling things very well with a democratic mayor and a competent police force. But the majority of the crime people are seeing on their televisions when they turn on their local news each night is happening in liberally run cities. Someone asked how Trump can run on law and order. Like it or not, too many people in the suburbs and many independents, that's the reason.

Crime is down across the country over the past 40 years. I'm only talking about today and what is happening right now in our cities. Crime, especially violent crime is up this year for many reasons. I don't think there is carnage across America and if I implied that I did think that then I apologize. But I do think that violence is an issue. A suburban town councilman actually issued a travel advisory to NYC last month because of the violence. That will have an effect on people.

http://westchester.news12.com/story/42380729/east-fishkill-councilman-issues-travel-advisory-to-nyc-due-to-uptick-in-crime-new-nypd-policies

My main point is that there is no arguing that police reform needs to happen. But can we also look at the leadership of these places that keep hiring and then failing to train these police officers? Many American cities are burning and more important than the actual physical damage being done, the people are suffering. At some point leadership needs to lead.

[Stannis]

I think we might see a 269-269

https://www.270towin.com/maps/yGOm3

Luckily, dems have the house. I see Trump flipping Nevada, Minnesota with his recent democrat endorsements, New Hampshire, and 1 vote from Maine.

I see AZ flipping blue. Georgia and Texas going blue is just unrealistic, especially since they are notorious for voter suppression.

Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania will be scary.

I can see Trump winning if he keeps AZ:

https://www.270towin.com/maps/NnAV0

In this scenario, he won't need NH, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, or Penn

[Jeff Van Gully]

Did Biden get a bump from the DNC Convention? Trump seems to have gotten one from the crazies.

nope. we not doing this. -JVG

[bishnykfan]

I think we might see a 269-269

https://www.270towin.com/maps/yGOm3

Luckily, dems have the house. I see Trump flipping Nevada, Minnesota with his recent democrat endorsements, New Hampshire, and 1 vote from Maine.

I see AZ flipping blue. Georgia and Texas going blue is just unrealistic, especially since they are notorious for voter suppression.

Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania will be scary.

I can see Trump winning if he keeps AZ:

https://www.270towin.com/maps/NnAV0

In this scenario, he won't need NH, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, or Penn

If it ends in a tie my understanding is that each state's house delegation gets one vote.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contingent_election

Do the democrats control more states as well as having more representatives? Or am I not interpreting it right? Can't imagine it coming down to that but it would be fascinating to see how that would play out.

[Jeff Van Gully]

There absolutely needs to be reform. Racism is a real thing. But to say you want to fix the problem of police racism without looking at the people who are in charge of the police...seems disingenuous to me.


...

Crime will continue to rise if there are no consequences. It's unfortunate and it will get worse before it gets better if local leaders (left or right) don't protect their people.

1. who is talking about not looking at people in charge of the police? from my perspective, everyone involved is being taken to task, including mayors of the cities you are fixating on. it sounds like you think democratic mayors are not. i think a closer listen to what people are asking of society right now with regards to policing would lead you to what i'm saying. nothing's a monolith, right?

2. you think people commit crimes because there aren't consequences?

i think you're giving your posts a lot of thought and i'd like to beleive you've engaged this discussion in the right spirit. i commend that because i can't say that for everyone. but one of my biggest problems with these conversations is what looks like a desire to oversimplify in pursuit of solutions. there's no easy way to the bottom of any of this.

[Clyde_Style]

I think we might see a 269-269

https://www.270towin.com/maps/yGOm3

Luckily, dems have the house. I see Trump flipping Nevada, Minnesota with his recent democrat endorsements, New Hampshire, and 1 vote from Maine.

I see AZ flipping blue. Georgia and Texas going blue is just unrealistic, especially since they are notorious for voter suppression.

Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania will be scary.

I can see Trump winning if he keeps AZ:

https://www.270towin.com/maps/NnAV0

In this scenario, he won't need NH, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, or Penn

Nostrastannis

[Jeff Van Gully]

However, when everyone says they want to look deeper into the "systematic racism" that is prevalent throughout society but then not look at the leaders of that society it feels a little weak. These big cities are all run by democratic mayors mostly in democratic states. They have the power and just as importantly, they've had the time to change things. Has Baltimore improved in the past 68 years? Has Philadelphia gotten better in the past 89? That is an awfully long time to weed out the bad police and change the way that unions operate.

wow. don't even know where to start with a statement like this. i may start with the assumption the quotation marks mean you don't believe that systemic racism exists, which would be a non-starter for our discussion. not much i can do about that. not in the business of trying to prove that to someone. stop me if i'm wrong. you say you believe in racism, and i haven't seen that in quotations. and i know the term "systemic racism" has become a talking point for conservatives who dismiss hundreds of years of doing because they haven't been undone under duress and from a grave disadvantage in single lifetimes. (please stop me if i've got that wrong about you.)

next, you've set time frames for which the people of color who live in these large cities didn't even have federal civil rights. not even talking about equality, but america saying "black lives matter to the extent they MUST be treated with civility." homie, my MOM was alive when that was signed. it was 17 years before my own birth. for persperctive, that's literally the period of time between the present and 50 cent's "in da club." most of us can tell you what we were doing then.

but that ties directly to the problem i have with your take on democratic mayors not being able to turn big cities into utopias -- like there aren't at least complex, intertwined reasons as to why the parts of these cities you find undesirable exist and persist with varying degrees of improvement. i'm taken aback by that sentiment whenever i encounter it. it ties into a really f-ed up narrative that the people who live in those environments don't care about these problems. once that exists, it's very easy to dehumanize and disregard.

that's all i've got for now, because past that it turns into explaining the concept of oppression, which i'm not going to do.

[HarthorneWingo]

Did Biden get a bump from the DNC Convention? Trump seems to have gotten one from the crazies.

nope. we not doing this. -JVG

Oops. Wrong thread. My bad.

Apologies.

[bishnykfan]

There absolutely needs to be reform. Racism is a real thing. But to say you want to fix the problem of police racism without looking at the people who are in charge of the police...seems disingenuous to me.


...

Crime will continue to rise if there are no consequences. It's unfortunate and it will get worse before it gets better if local leaders (left or right) don't protect their people.

1. who is talking about not looking at people in charge of the police? from my perspective, everyone involved is being taken to task, including mayors of the cities you are fixating on. it sounds like you think democratic mayors are not. i think a closer listen to what people are asking of society right now with regards to policing would lead you to what i'm saying. nothing's a monolith, right?

2. you think people commit crimes because there aren't consequences?

i think you're giving your posts a lot of thought and i'd like to beleive you've engaged this discussion in the right spirit. i commend that because i can't say that for everyone. but one of my biggest problems with these conversations is what looks like a desire to oversimplify in pursuit of solutions. there's no easy way to the bottom of any of this.

I've seen very little regarding the issues with cities leadership throughout these threads albeit I don't follow as closely to them as some on here. The police are the focus and I understand that with all that has happened these past few months. I'm just bringing out what in my opinion is an underlying issue in a lot of these cases. I think reform needs to start from the top down. I don't follow these threads completely so if I missed people discussing the lack of leadership in our cities then I apologize for bringing it up again. This whole line of discussion started because someone asked how Trump can run on law and order. As a non democrat, I tried to give an outsiders viewpoint. That's all.

I think people commit crimes for many reasons. But I think the fact that consequences are reduced or eliminated will contribute to more crime. I'm not oversimplifying anything because I don't have the solution. I never pretended to have the solution. If I did know the answer, I wouldn't be writing it on a basketball message board. To me there is no absolute right answer, it's going to take compromise and time and people working across the aisle which is something that will never happen IMO with the current state of things. The rhetoric has been amped up to the point where neither side will give an inch. They will watch the people suffer before giving the other side a win (both parties are guilty of this). And this is the problem which will keep us in this same cycle.

[Clyde_Style]

Blaming unrest on mayors from the Democratic Party is not in the least an objective assertion. It is the ultimate bad faith argument and whether it is a stealth form of support for Trump or not, it basically is a GOP talking point and justification for Trump's already glaring fascist actions. Not worth debating IMO.

[Stannis]

I think we might see a 269-269

https://www.270towin.com/maps/yGOm3

Luckily, dems have the house. I see Trump flipping Nevada, Minnesota with his recent democrat endorsements, New Hampshire, and 1 vote from Maine.

I see AZ flipping blue. Georgia and Texas going blue is just unrealistic, especially since they are notorious for voter suppression.

Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania will be scary.

I can see Trump winning if he keeps AZ:

https://www.270towin.com/maps/NnAV0

In this scenario, he won't need NH, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, or Penn

If it ends in a tie my understanding is that each state's house delegation gets one vote.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contingent_election

Do the democrats control more states as well as having more representatives? Or am I not interpreting it right? Can't imagine it coming down to that but it would be fascinating to see how that would play out.

Looks like you are right. That's get for talking in biased threads in the CA forum.

I suppose dems could get the advantage back if they flip delegations. But I didn't see any races that could net them 4 states.

Anyways, It would be cool to witness history because in over two centuries this has never happened. But I'd like to avoid this. It'd be total chaos. I'm talking protest, riots, recounts, and endless accusations of fraud.

[bishnykfan]

I think we might see a 269-269

https://www.270towin.com/maps/yGOm3

Luckily, dems have the house. I see Trump flipping Nevada, Minnesota with his recent democrat endorsements, New Hampshire, and 1 vote from Maine.

I see AZ flipping blue. Georgia and Texas going blue is just unrealistic, especially since they are notorious for voter suppression.

Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania will be scary.

I can see Trump winning if he keeps AZ:

https://www.270towin.com/maps/NnAV0

In this scenario, he won't need NH, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, or Penn

If it ends in a tie my understanding is that each state's house delegation gets one vote.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contingent_election

Do the democrats control more states as well as having more representatives? Or am I not interpreting it right? Can't imagine it coming down to that but it would be fascinating to see how that would play out.

Looks like you are right. That's get for talking in biased threads in the CA forum.

I suppose dems could get the advantage back if they flip delegations. But I didn't see any races that could net them 4 states.

Anyways, It would be cool to witness history because in over two centuries this has never happened. But I'd like to avoid this. It'd be total chaos. I'm talking protest, riots, recounts, and endless accusations of fraud.

For sure. The country would split and probably never recover. No matter who you support, a tied electoral count would probably be the worst thing for the future of the country. Neither side would accept the loss.

[GONYK]

I think we might see a 269-269

https://www.270towin.com/maps/yGOm3

Luckily, dems have the house. I see Trump flipping Nevada, Minnesota with his recent democrat endorsements, New Hampshire, and 1 vote from Maine.

I see AZ flipping blue. Georgia and Texas going blue is just unrealistic, especially since they are notorious for voter suppression.

Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania will be scary.

I can see Trump winning if he keeps AZ:

https://www.270towin.com/maps/NnAV0

In this scenario, he won't need NH, Nevada, Michigan, Wisconsin, or Penn

Trump hasn't advertised in Michigan since late May. I'm not sure why you believe it's close enough there to be scary.

[Stannis]

I'll say it again, if I'm a Republican, and I put myself Donald's shoes. This is what he is doing right now:

1) He's telling himself and everyone that "Democratic run" cities are burning to the ground because of their poor democratic leaders.
2) He is acknowledging that their businesses and people are suffering
3) He still decides to do nothing but blame them for it and leave them hanging. There is no working relationship between these cities and Trump.

I gotta say, if he thinks there are people who need help and he doesn't want to do anything about it because they have a democratic leader, he's a real POS. That's not Presidential material.

Trump IS in power. He's in the White House. All the stuff he's saying he will do when re-elected is stuff he can do now. I see little to no progress or results. So I find it hard to believe.

I swear, it's like Biden is running as the incumbent and Trump is running to beat him. Really makes no sense to me.

If I had to venture a guess... Trump's plan to "fix" this is some sort of Martial Law and labeling BLM a terrorist group. My guess is he doesn't want to do that now because that will kill his re-election. So he's hoping to win then do it. Hopefully people understand that, and vote him out November. At the very least, hopefully dems win the senate where they can impeach him if he tries such a thing.

[Jeff Van Gully]

There absolutely needs to be reform. Racism is a real thing. But to say you want to fix the problem of police racism without looking at the people who are in charge of the police...seems disingenuous to me.


...

Crime will continue to rise if there are no consequences. It's unfortunate and it will get worse before it gets better if local leaders (left or right) don't protect their people.

1. who is talking about not looking at people in charge of the police? from my perspective, everyone involved is being taken to task, including mayors of the cities you are fixating on. it sounds like you think democratic mayors are not. i think a closer listen to what people are asking of society right now with regards to policing would lead you to what i'm saying. nothing's a monolith, right?

2. you think people commit crimes because there aren't consequences?

i think you're giving your posts a lot of thought and i'd like to beleive you've engaged this discussion in the right spirit. i commend that because i can't say that for everyone. but one of my biggest problems with these conversations is what looks like a desire to oversimplify in pursuit of solutions. there's no easy way to the bottom of any of this.

I've seen very little regarding the issues with cities leadership throughout these threads albeit I don't follow as closely to them as some on here. The police are the focus and I understand that with all that has happened these past few months. I'm just bringing out what in my opinion is an underlying issue in a lot of these cases. I think reform needs to start from the top down. I don't follow these threads completely so if I missed people discussing the lack of leadership in our cities then I apologize for bringing it up again. This whole line of discussion started because someone asked how Trump can run on law and order. As a non democrat, I tried to give an outsiders viewpoint. That's all.

I think people commit crimes for many reasons. But I think the fact that consequences are reduced or eliminated will contribute to more crime. I'm not oversimplifying anything because I don't have the solution. I never pretended to have the solution. If I did know the answer, I wouldn't be writing it on a basketball message board. To me there is no absolute right answer, it's going to take compromise and time and people working across the aisle which is something that will never happen IMO with the current state of things. The rhetoric has been amped up to the point where neither side will give an inch. They will watch the people suffer before giving the other side a win (both parties are guilty of this). And this is the problem which will keep us in this same cycle.

a ha. i see. i wasn't talking about in these threads. i was speaking more broadly. i have not been reading all of the recent political threads, so i can't speak to that. i understand if you are asking these members specifically and in earnest. my suggestion remains. there's lots of information about this from tons of organizations. it wouldn't be a legthy pursuit to find if desired.

i don't believe the answer to all crime is harsher penalties. of course there are psychopaths and sociopaths we need protection from. however, when we speak to the criminal ecosystem in cities we are largely talking about problems stemming from living conditions, not that people haven't found the number of years in prison that will end criminal activity. we're usually talking about drug-related crime when talking about cities and POC, so let's start there simply. if someone is addicted to drugs for one reason or another, you are not going to find a prison sentence that will stop that. if someone lacks resources and opportunities and incorrectly tries to mitigate that through participation in the drug trade... you're not going to find a number of years that prevent people from taking those risks. (grave oversimplication of vicious cycles, but an attempt at perspective.) all that's done is put people in cages in greater numbers for longer periods of time. vicious cycles at play. quicksand. people don't always think through larger societal impact when they're trying to survive. on a deeper level, we live in an individualist society that encourages "i got mine. **** you." we also live in a country founded on a violence-based social contract. some political belief systems encourage these ways of thinking more than others. it's honestly a marvel things aren't worse. i'd like to believe that's a testament to the general decency of people and desire for coexistence, but that's just me.

the criminal justice reform you agree needs to take place absolutely has to reevaluate what that looks like. that's generally what people are asking for. those are matters of policy that tell us how society does indeed value the people in these communities we all supposedly care about. [i always point to how charleston, SC has a $55m police budget and a $900k housing and urban development budget, the entirety of which could not house 3 families. but let's gather leaves without of planting or watering.]

not even going into how crime statistics are a function of who is arrested and who is policed to what extent. the need for criminal justice reform (which you agree with) indicates that this isn't handled appropriately or fairly and is in need of reevaluation. right?