Thrag
3665
The President is on TV right now speaking about the crisis.
No, not that one, the good one.
Editer
3666
On the protest/COVID-19 issue, that was the biggest concern I had when my kid wanted to attend the protest yesterday. (Along with the possibility of violence, but gven the location that seemed light.)
He wore a mask, didn’t touch anyone, and when I dropped him off I’d say 90%+ of the protesters were wearing masks.
Because I’m in a risk group on COVID (nothing major, but respiratory infections love me), I didn’t like that aspect.
But what I like less is that I don’t have a single African-American friend I’ve talked to who doesn’t have a story about being threatened by the police at some point in their life. Not one. Most have stories throughout their lifetime ranging from being pulled over for “driving while black” to losing a brother who was in police custody. So if my kid wants to support #BlackLivesMatter, I’m gonna take that chance and be proud.
I see calls to defund the police. I don’t think that’s practical. But we need to clean the ranks, re-educate the cops who don’t psychologically test as fascists, and make it so people of any color can call the cops and feel it’s likely they’ll be helped instead of being killed by the police, not just white people.
This is unprecedented. I can’t think of a single instance where a former president is addressing the nation in a time of crisis. That’s the job of the current occupant. But since Shitgibbon is a moral degenerate who has ceded all responsibility, give me some President Obama.
I know that Obama is a gifted orator, capable of soaring rhetoric, but he is just talking to the American people and I feel better listening to him. This being a president business, doesn’t take some rare skill, just some basic humanity.
I don’t want to say “1312” or “ACAB”, which as graffiti topics, have been trending upwards in my city. It may sound glib to say “Not All Cops”, but I think some cities have police departments that are, from the top brass down to the rank and file, caring and conscientious.
As an example, a friend of mine is on the city council in a suburb a little up the Mississippi from Minneapolis. At last night’s council meeting, in the time reserved for Other Business, they were chatting about Minneapolis’ riots and police brutality. The chief of police wasn’t asked to speak at that time, but he was present and asked if he could read a letter that had been sent to him and his response. I thought it was pretty moving:
(It’s about five minutes long, from 2’15" to 2’20".)
KevinC
3673
Oh God, Brits, no. I so appreciate the solidarity but please keep yourselves healthy and safe.
It’s not just solidarity. We have a racist government, racist police, a racist system and racist institutions too
KevinC
3677
Fair enough! Same with the US protests, it just kills me (figuratively speaking, hopefully) to see so many good people who care enough about their fellow man to go out and march packed in together during a pandemic.
Editer
3678
“James Madison wrote in Federalist 14 that “America united with a handful of troops, or without a single soldier, exhibits a more forbidding posture to foreign ambition than America disunited, with a hundred thousand veterans ready for combat.” We do not need to militarize our response to protests. We need to unite around a common purpose. And it starts by guaranteeing that all of us are equal before the law.
Instructions given by the military departments to our troops before the Normandy invasion reminded soldiers that “The Nazi slogan for destroying us…was ‘Divide and Conquer.’ Our American answer is ‘In Union there is Strength.’” We must summon that unity to surmount this crisis—confident that we are better than our politics.
Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort.”
Timex
3680
Kruse called this a day ago, regarding Mattis.
KevinC
3681
Just to clarify (and the clarification doesn’t make it any less bad, just pointing it out) this video is not recent and is from about two years ago. Which is a good demonstration of just how bad policing is in this country.
Timex
3682
Yeah, it’s not from today, it’s just totally fucked up.
