The All Things Political Thread (One thread to rule them all and in the darkness bind them)

[rjshae]

2 hours ago, Gfted1 said:

I wonder whats the lifespan of qq-ing about being conquered? Are those that carry Mesopotamian DNA still butthurt about the Assyrian defeat?

Judging by the middle east, it's at least 926 years.

[Malcador]

Heh, so the shooting in Brooklyn Center was down to the cop not knowing where her taser was.  Must be some rigorous hiring standards

 

 

 

 

Edited April 12, 2021 by Malcador

[Gfted1]

31 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

And I am very angry and upset  that the Romans arrived in Britain in 43 AD and colonized my ancestors who use to have their own culture and religions.

I know, right!

I traced my paternal heritage back to 409AD and it turns out we were fabulously wealthy patricians and the invasion changed the entire arc of my family lineage. Imo, the Romanians owe me restitution.

[Elerond]

1 hour ago, ComradeYellow said:

It still is in Russia.  If you're  pro-Soviet and want the Union back, you're considered a right wing reactionary.  Everything is backwards in Russia.  If Australia is upside down land, Russia is backwards land.  Being Communist in the USA is considered "Radical left"

Right wing people who want union back in Russia don't want communism back, they like their money too much. Main thing they want back is USSR's role in world politics

[Guard Dog]

44 minutes ago, BruceVC said:

And I am very angry and upset  that the Romans arrived in Britain in 43 AD and colonized my ancestors who use to have their own culture and religions. We all know about the culture of the Celts and their religious representatives the Druids

I demand redress and the Italians to admit they colonized my ancestors !!!!

So let me see if I’ve got this straight. The Romans invaded Britain and intermarried and procreated with Britons, Celts, and Picts. That means your anscestory INCLUDES Romans!  That means you have to look in the mirror and apologize to yourself! 

[Guard Dog]

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

Well there you go, and all considered they got off pretty lightly.

 

 

Shoot with all the flags and statues around the south you might’ve thought we actually won that war LOL!

[rjshae]

Just now, Guard Dog said:

So let me see if I’ve got this straight. The Romans invaded Britain and intermarried and procreated with Britons, Celts, and Picts. That means your anscestory INCLUDES Romans!  That means you have to look in the mirror and apologize to yourself! 

I've already paid myself reparations.

[ComradeYellow]

24 minutes ago, Elerond said:

Right wing people who want union back in Russia don't want communism back, they like their money too much. Main thing they want back is USSR's role in world politics

Personal experience has taught me a valuable lesson:  You don't have to be rich and be right wing.

A lot of poor and right wing people just want a powerful hierarchal government that throws them gestures in return for loyalty.

[ComradeYellow]

19 minutes ago, Guard Dog said:

Shoot with all the flags and statues around the south you might’ve thought we actually won that war LOL!

Last years protesting didn't alter that setup?  I did see quite a bit of statues come down....

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

38 minutes ago, Malcador said:

Heh, so the shooting in Brooklyn Center was down to the cop not knowing where her taser was.  Must be some rigorous hiring standards

Man I wish I could **** up as much at my job as cops do and just get rewarded for it.

[Guard Dog]

3 minutes ago, ComradeYellow said:

Last years protesting didn't alter that setup?  I did see quite a bit of statues come down....

As we say here in the south

[ComradeYellow]

I'll also add this to the whole "reparations for genocide" argument:

The government responsible for it is still in power, that's the key difference between Romans and Britons and Assyrians and Macedonians Mongols, these are all vanquished entities.  Unless the U.S. government goes to serious lengths to patch this up, it will most certainly come back and bite them later!  I mean just look at how angsty MAGA is lately, it's almost like centuries of dirt burried under the rug and starting to seep through, and they know it...

[Guard Dog]

52 minutes ago, ComradeYellow said:

 

A lot of poor and right wing people just want a powerful hierarchal government that throws them gestures in return for loyalty.

Like a communist government!

[ComradeYellow]

16 minutes ago, Guard Dog said:

Like a communist government!

Oh yes, tell a poor right wing American that you want Communism, I'm dying to see his/her reaction!

[Guard Dog]

Well, if you’re not a fan of brutal, repressive, restrictive and somewhat sadistic government maybe communism isn’t the economic system you want. Because you tend to get all those things with it.

[Elerond]

2 hours ago, ComradeYellow said:

Personal experience has taught me a valuable lesson:  You don't have to be rich and be right wing.

A lot of poor and right wing people just want a powerful hierarchal government that throws them gestures in return for loyalty.

Poor right wing people on Russia aren't ones who want union and old Russian Empire's areas back, because they don't want to lose their jobs for people in those areas. They are pretty much similar to poorer right wing people in EU who make big sunk of people that oppose its expansion.

Have you ever visited in Russia? As you seem to have very american view of it.

[ShadySands]

Will Smith movie 'Emancipation' abandons Georgia over voting restrictions

Was wondering when this was going to happen considering how much gets filmed there nowadays

[Gromnir]

1 hour ago, ArtistFormerlyKnownasKP said:

Man I wish I could **** up as much at my job as cops do and just get rewarded for it.

would hardly surprise us if you do **** up as much as the average cop. lord knows Gromnir were hardly infallible and we were considered to be kinda near the top o' our admitted underpopulated professional specialty. the thing is, we knew that given the volume o' work and time constraints we faced, we needed folks to double and triple check our work, and we still made errors. 

our mistakes were, as far as we know, never fatal. relative high pressure and not near enough resources (typical time were our greatest adversary) led to ordinary and everyday mistakes which were usual minor, but am wondering how perfect we woulda' been in our field if a large % o' our work were done literal under fire, or at least under threat o' immediate lethal retaliation. 

am suspecting most o' us, if we were honest (*snort*) would admit our work errors would increase substantial if we were in the situations US cops face all too often. US population is so well-armed that every adversarial confrontation 'tween cops and public has the potential to get extreme ugly. take any volatile confrontation and add at least one participant who is armed with a lethal weapon. how many is shocked when somebody gets hurt in such situations? nevertheless, we expect cops to be better than ordinary people... which is fine. Gromnir hopes cops is having training enough so that they behave better than the average citizen.  even so, am thinking all too many o' us is expecting improbable infallibility. 

have mentioned before how we did work as part o' a probation department-- juvenile detention facility. counselor? as a counselor, we were security and we made mistakes. am recalling a unit wide fight which happened in a high security portion o' the hall on a day when we were working. hindsight. our first mistake were there were signs o' imminent trouble, and we failed to recognize. serious am not sure how we missed the obvious tells, but we did. not only that, once the fighting started, we had a charlie fox scenario as Gromnir had one pair of handcuffs, pepper spray (which we never used) +20 residents trying to beat each other to death, and at least a couple o' those residents woulda very much enjoyed hurting us. there were only one other counselor with us in the unit when the p00p started and we lost track o' her almost immediate. so we restrained a particular violent resident (not gently we might add) and cuffed him, and then we moved on to another resident who needed restraint. the guy we handcuffed and left sitting on the concrete floor were promptly beat into unconsciousness by multiple other residents. the guy we handcuffed coulda' been killed and for all intents and purposes we were the guy who rendered him defenseless.  probable made other mistakes that day, but sh!t were happening and Gromnir were reacting more than thinking. 

same observations as always:

1) cop training sux.

2) cops, while is never explicit stated in court, near universal punish those who fail the attitude test. so called contempt of cop violations is punished not by courts but street level by cops. 

3) as cop education increases, excessive force complaints tend to decrease.

am knowing people not like to hear the last observation 'cause sounds elitist, but excessive force complaints 'gainst cops drop dramatic as education level o' the cops increase. education is the single best defense 'gainst excessive force complaints. education don't prevent the ordinary and everyday mistakes which all o' us save kp makes, but for cops, education does prevent the most terrifying errors. unfortunately, in spite o' fact cops is well paid, is difficult to hire cops who pass physicals, background checks and psych profiles when education requirements is only high school as the minimum. 

in our juvenile hall situation, we personal exceeded any ordinary minimum requirement for education which woulda' been applied for any police force in the US, and we were not a contempt of cop d-bag neither. it is true our training didn't prepare us for the unit wide bruhaha, but am not sure what training woulda' prepared us for that particular scenario. we made mistakes. period. can't help but wondering how bad we woulda' looked if the entire debacle were caught on video and made it to evening news local and/or national. 

given our admitted limited observations o' board behaviors, am guessing the average cop is no more a mistake magnet than kp, but such a recognition ain't particular significant. cop mistakes has a much higher likelihood o' resulting in lethal results, so is understandable if as a society we demand higher than kp level competence. the thing is, we is near universal unwilling to pay for more competence (education levels) and the contempt of cop and training shortfalls need be changed department by department.

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

the fed can't fix the problem. have tried to explain this many times. the fed is specifically prohibited by the Constitution from interfering in police power o' states and local. the fed can offer additional money to states if those states embrace new hiring or training policies, but the fed capacity to bring 'bout meaningful change is extreme limited. is an understandable mistake, but we do wish media and teachers would do a better job o' educating the public 'bout the limits o' what the federal government can do about state and local police violence and/or mistakes.

oh and the states has somewhat limited practical power to bring about change, particular at the county sheriff level. many sheriffs departments is functional autonomous and do not rely on state dollars for funding. the folks in st. paul can pass all the laws they want and more than a few sheriffs will just ignore such laws. example: would be amusing to see how many county sheriffs public ignored state mask mandates. more than a few. what could state governors do to enforce such mandates at the county level if sheriffs were not supporting? little. welcome to america.

change is gonna come city by city, county by county and state by state. how many people demanding change is happy with such a reality?

oh, and don't point out a specific situation to us and say such n' such example were an unforgivable cop mistake, 'cause chances are we agree with you. ain't how this started. we responded to a silly generalization which ignores certain realities. cops make mistakes. is likely due to experience and training they make far fewer mistakes in high pressure situations than most o' us would be making. nevertheless, there is clear shortfalls in cop education, cop training and cop acceptance o' the complete bs attitude test/contempt of cop punishments. need make changes, but am worried most people have no idea what is the practical obstacles to fixing the all too real problems.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[ShadySands]

I read that the cop who pepper sprayed and threatened the Army LT in VA got fired. That's something, right?

[ComradeYellow]

1 hour ago, Elerond said:

Have you ever visited in Russia? As you seem to have very american view of it.

Am I wrong in saying that it's a conservative/reactionary stance to be pro Soviet in Russia and being more "progressive" means being either alt right or western centric?  This is the impression I'm getting.

If you called yourself a marxist in the U.S. you would get branded as radical leftist and that is quite dangerous in many right wing circles here.  All I'm trying to point out.

Russia:  "I'm a Marxist!"  Response: right wing nutjob!

U.S.A. "I'm a Marxist!" Response:  Left Wing scum!

[Guard Dog]

10 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

I read that the cop who pepper sprayed and threatened the Army LT in VA got fired. That's something, right?

It’s a start. That whole stop was BS. 

[Gromnir]

12 minutes ago, ShadySands said:

I read that the cop who pepper sprayed and threatened the Army LT in VA got fired. That's something, right?

yeah, that was ugly. the army lt did not immediate pull over and did not mindlessly follow all police instructions. cops reflexive see as a contempt of cop situation justifying force? 

serious needs to be an effort from cops to end contempt of cop /attitude test nonsense. until cops see as wrong, am not sure we are gonna see widespread change.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[Elerond]

8 minutes ago, ComradeYellow said:

Am I wrong in saying that it's a conservative/reactionary stance to be pro Soviet in Russia and being more "progressive" means being either alt right or western centric?  This is the impression I'm getting.

If you called yourself a marxist in the U.S. you would get branded as radical leftist and that is quite dangerous in many right wing circles here.  All I'm trying to point out.

Russia:  "I'm a Marxist!"  Response: right wing nutjob!

U.S.A. "I'm a Marxist!" Response:  Left Wing scum!

Yes, 

Russia:  "I'm a Marxist!"  Response: you are loony or westerner idiot and in worst case you end in hospital because people bet you up. 

[Guard Dog]

Based on what I’ve read The worst part about that stop in Minnesota is that kid was pulled over for having an air freshener hanging from his rearview mirror which is apparently illegal in that state. The penalty for which was death in this case. That is some nanny state bull crap right there. That’s the kind of law a cop would be justified in ignoring.

The stop in Virginia was even worse. The cops flat out lied about the whole encounter. They said he had no tag but you could clearly see the paper tag in his rear window. They also said he “attempted to elude” by pulling into a well lit place with witnesses. Then the cop that was fired said he was assaulted as the suspect left the vehicle. His own body cam shows that didn’t happen. Then they threatened him if he reported their misconduct. Firing was a good start but it’s not enough.

It’s become rote to say “Most cops are good but...”. I hope that it true but I’m not sure.  One thing is true though, a good many of them mix a toxic blend of lack of education (I think Gromnir is spot on here) hubris, a complete lack of understanding of the laws they are enforcing, an absence of empathy, and a large helping of sadism. As for the earnest and conscientious civil servants in the profession in whatever percentage of the whole they make up we can only offer our thanks. And our commiseration for being lumped in such low company.

[ShadySands]

Did anyone else get very specific instructions on what to do when you get pulled over by cops in school? They told us to do what the Army guy did and pull over in a well lit area if possible. They also told us to put our license, registration, and insurance on the dash so that we don't have to reach for anything and also to turn on the interior lights and put all the windows down.