George Floyd dies after police knelt on his neck (MOD NOTE IN POST #1)

Overheal

2u2me wrote: »

Well you do know who signed "The first step Act" into law?

It seems it had almost entirely bipartisan support. I wish we saw more of this stuff but because orange man did it- it must be bad!

If the poor electorate stop bickering about race and privilege and all this systemic nonsense they could actually make some real change right now.

First Step is an example of something Trump didn’t fcuk up. Now that might sound like TDS, but like most Americans I watched this man slap down bipartisan bills in the past: parties both passed billions to fund the ‘wall,’ and reform immigration law for dreamers, and at the 11th hour Trump said Im not ****ing singing this Because his sympathizers in the media said it would make him look weak, and it resulted in a weeks long government shutdown and economic hurt for lots of people.

That said, I’m glad to see both parties are willing to work together on reform legislation. I’m not aware of any provision in the bill that might become a problem later on. I would still by the end of this decade like to see the abolition of the prison labor exception in the 13th amendment. If Trump wanted to win 2020 he could do it this summer - he won’t, because the prison industrialists would politically assassinate him and everyone in congress, but he could, if they got it ready for ratification. And it would be very dumb if Democrats to oppose such an amendment.

MeMen2_MoRi_

~Rebel~ wrote: »

Yeah, it's a massive shame, and hugely time consuming for us too, as you end up having to look at each story from at least two different sources to be able to form some sort of clear picture of events. Which of course most people don't/can't do, sticking with whichever news-service caters more to their personal/political ideals, meaning the 'great divide' grows ever wider.

There is no two sources, I got my info from wiki. Any time it's brought up, it's not disputed it's fact, the year it was in acted trump cut the funding off the bat. It was a photo op

da_miser

So tonight a black man shot dead in Atlanta by police, the blackest city in the country ,run by a black mayor and the chief of police white woman has resigned, how will BLM and CNN/Left media spin this?
No evil white men in charge, a white female chief of police following orders from a black mayor, in another Dem run crime black spot.

2u2me

MeMen2_MoRi_ wrote: »

The famous first step act, that trump under funded from the get go...

See, bullsh!t like this is were the middle ground is never found.

~Rebel~ wrote: »

Yeah, it's a massive shame, and hugely time consuming for us too, as you end up having to look at each story from at least two different sources to be able to form some sort of clear picture of events. Which of course most people don't/can't do, sticking with whichever news-service caters more to their personal/political ideals, meaning the 'great divide' grows ever wider.

I purposefully posted a vox link about it so people might actually read it(I don't think its possible to go any further to the left). But since you haven't let me print here what it says in that article: Here it is again just in case you missed it the first time.

And the law had support from a wide array of groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the Koch brothers–backed Right on Crime, and other organizations on both the left and right.
But the First Step Act ultimately passed with huge support in both the House and Senate, becoming the most significant criminal justice reform law at the federal level in years.
By and large, it seems local municipalities and states will only embrace federal incentives on criminal justice issues if they actually want to adopt the policies being encouraged

So it's the local states decision not to adopt the act that Trump signed into law, not a fault of the federal government.

MeMen2_MoRi_

Mealy-mouthed words..

It was federal funding of the program, it was estimated at $75m a year, over 4 years.. cut to $14m by trump in the first year, within months of the program being in acted federally.

What better way to snowball a cause, then to have a photo op with "leaders" then to cut funding soon after. 101 politics.

Overheal

da_miser wrote: »

So tonight a black man shot dead in Atlanta by police, the blackest city in the country ,run by a black mayor and the chief of police white woman has resigned, how will BLM and CNN/Left media spin this?
No evil white men in charge, a white female chief of police following orders from a black mayor, in another Dem run crime black spot.

You said it in your own post? Shouldn’t the blackest city in the country have the blackest government in the country?

Shields wasn’t a bad person but another killing under her tenure was never going to be tolerated by the city under the current atmosphere. Not unheard of for public safety officials to have their heads chopped off, metaphorically speaking, when they fail to pacify civil unrest. Entire departments have been fired before and forced to renegotiate their employment.

Shields however will still be employed by the city in another contributive role, TBD.

I don’t know where you get this angle of “Chief following orders from mayor” - what orders from the mayor resulted in the death of Rayshard Brooks?

Overheal

2u2me wrote: »

I purposefully posted a vox link about it so people might actually read it(I don't think its possible to go any further to the left). But since you haven't let me print here what it says in that article: Here it is again just in case you missed it the first time.



So it's the local states decision not to adopt the act that Trump signed into law, not a fault of the federal government.

“States rights” is a bunt

2u2me

Overheal wrote: »

“States rights” is a punt.

I'm not an expert but this article seems to be implying that if the states adopted these reforms(that the federal government is pushing) it would benefit a larger number of prisoners.

Is this not true; if not how so?

the writer of that article, from vox, German Lopez.(I have written for Vox since it launched in 2014, with a focus on criminal justice and public health.) and yet 2 people jump on my source before they have even read it. Just a sign of our times.

Vox : Overall, we rate Vox Left Biased due to wording and story selection that routinely favors the left. We also rate them Mostly Factual in reporting, rather than High, due to two failed fact checks, with only one offering a correction.

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/vox/

xtal191

https://twitter.com/FromKalen/status/1271709379688087555

Overheal

2u2me wrote: »

I'm not an expert but this article seems to be implying that if the states adopted these reforms(that the federal government is pushing) it would benefit a larger number of prisoners.

Is this not true; if not how so?

the writer of that article, from vox, German Lopez.(I have written for Vox since it launched in 2014, with a focus on criminal justice and public health.) and yet 2 people jump on my source before they have even read it. Just a sign of our times.



https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/vox/

I never said it wasn’t true. I said bunting it to the states is a bunt.

We made animal abuse a federal crime. We didn’t bunt that decision to the states. But needed prison reforms, etc. need a bunt? It’s effectively sweeping reform under the rug. Take my state of South Carolina: iirc the state is a net leech on federal tax dollars, getting more in federal dollars than it collects through taxation. There are many poorer states like this; how are these reforms supposed to happen if they can’t afford the expense and the President has slashed the federal funding amounts that were originally used to gauge how effective the bill was going to be (CBO normally score proposed law to project fiscal impact etc)?

Muahahaha

~Rebel~ wrote: »

Yeah, the prison system is full on insane... 25% of the global prison population is in the US, when it should be less than 5% going by normal projections.

It's just another one where it fails absolutely everybody (minorities even more-so, but it's bad regardless who you are). Like the police structures and methodology, it's just not good for anyone at all. They're bad systems.

Its an interesting topic and worthy of a thread in itself really. But the numbers the US locks up even for minor crimes is truly astonishing. Huge disparity in blacks too, I remember that quote on Ice Ts Body Count album that said there are more black men in prison than there are in college, they literally lock them up for sport.

Im not sure if it is still going on but I think it was in the early 2000s that California introduced the three strikes laws, three crimes would get you something like a mandatory 20 year sentence. I remember reading about a black kid at the time, at 18 he got caught smoking a joint, at 19 he was arrested for being a passenger in a stolen car and at 20 he got caught shoplifting food from a corner store, food he needed for his family. He got 20 years in prison for that.

A quick Google tells me that its costs $81,000 a year to house an inmate in prison in California. Thats a hell of a lot of money over 20 years, $1.62 million dollars to be precise. So under that system a prisoner actually becomes an asset to a private company running the prison. All they have to do is house them in squalid conditions in the desert somewhere and feed them gruel twice a day while they make them do a full days work for a few dollars. House 1,000 people convicted of minor crimes and the private company makes $1.6bn dollars, it is a very lucrative business to be in.

~Rebel~

Muahahaha wrote: »

Its an interesting topic and worthy of a thread in itself really. But the numbers the US locks up even for minor crimes is truly astonishing. Huge disparity in blacks too, I remember that quote on Ice Ts Body Count album that said there are more black men in prison than there are in college, they literally lock them up for sport.

Im not sure if it is still going on but I think it was in the early 2000s that California introduced the three strikes laws, three crimes would get you something like a mandatory 20 year sentence. I remember reading about a black kid at the time, at 18 he got caught smoking a joint, at 19 he was arrested for being a passenger in a stolen car and at 20 he got caught shoplifting food from a corner store, food he needed for his family. He got 20 years in prison for that.

A quick Google tells me that its costs $81,000 a year to house an inmate in prison in California. Thats a hell of a lot of money over 20 years, $1.62 million dollars to be precise. So under that system a prisoner actually becomes an asset to a private company running the prison. All they have to do is house them in squalid conditions in the desert somewhere and feed them gruel twice a day while they make them do a full days work for a few dollars. House 1,000 people convicted of minor crimes and the private company makes $1.6bn dollars, it is a very lucrative business to be in.

Agreed with all of this - everything about it is insane. Like, on top of being absolutely massively unfair and detrimental to already struggling communities, the private prison system costs the government an absolute fortune. It's bad for every single person and party, and also America as a whole - aside from the prison operators, and the distinct politicians that receive donations from them.

It feels like part of a genuine national implosion, and is one of the things that really makes me fear for the US as a country, because all we've seen on all these issues is just a growing momentum. The cost of education, the lowering of wages against inflation, the municipality/county budget ratio shifting from services to armed police, the growing prison industry, and the rapidly increasing wealth gap are all trending in the wrong direction - getting worse, not better, for all Americans. I genuinely think this is a huge part of why this protest has gathered such widespread attention and support -- everyone under ~45 is pissed off at being treated like fuel for the machine. The changes that are actually required to make the US even just as fair as Ireland are absolutely massive, and perhaps at this stage unattainable.

And yes, the 3 strikes law is still in full operation in California, and is still sending people off to prison for ~25 years for misdemeanors on a daily basis.

2u2me

Overheal wrote: »

Who is abolishing policing?

Tell me how wrote: »

It's not about abolishing all police.

Peregrinus wrote: »

I'm not sure that anybody is calling for the police to be abolished.

KiKi III wrote: »

Listened to some podcasts on “defund/dismantle the police”
It basically means
- redirect some of the police funding into social services, community facilities and mental health services
- restructuring police forces so they are better fit for purpose
- making it mandatory to use deadly force only as a last resort
- banning chokeholds etc

froog wrote: »

they've automatically lost a huge amount of possible support if they can't even articulate what they actually want, and worse confuse people.

Well it seems they were articulating what they wanted, we just weren't listening. They are now attacking the democratic party for trying to smear their narrative. When they say abolish the police they mean abolish the police!

"Yes, we mean literally abolish the police" The NYT.

That opinion piece follows a warning by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, that Democrats and others trying to “repackage” the push to “Defund the Police” As we all know 'repackaging' is counter-revolutionary.

“Enough. We can’t reform the police. The only way to diminish police violence is to reduce contact between the public and the police.”
“We don’t want to just close police departments. We want to make them obsolete.”

https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1270339987914006529?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.foxnews.com%2Fpolitics%2Faoc-dems-repackage-defund-the-police

wandererz

Some of these cities are spending half a billion dollars or more on policing.

If they spend a portion of that on education and educational grants they will better those communities tremendously over the next 10-20 years and hopefully see huge improvement.

Incredible video of the riots https://youtu.be/mHVrx3CT7Cs

Almost makes it look mundane in parts

2u2me

wandererz wrote: »

Some of these cities are spending half a billion dollars or more on policing.

If they spend a portion of that on education and educational grants they will better those communities tremendously over the next 10-20 years and hopefully see huge improvement.

Most of that money though goes in wages, insurance, people, etc.. very much re-invested back into the economy.

Probably there can be money cut from just about every budget everywhere; but really the culture and nature of the whole justice institution needs to change and the only real way of doing this is by changing the rules of the game.

By defunding the police and not addressing the issues I suspect there will largely only be negative consequences. (more police corruption; less police where it's needed; rise of the mafia).

I think back to the times I've need the police in my life, a few times at this stage. I ponder whether I would accept if they only showed up half of those times.

Tell me how

Deleted User wrote: »

Incredible video of the riots https://youtu.be/mHVrx3CT7Cs

Almost makes it look mundane in parts

How many 100's of hours of protests have gone ahead with no violence.

Do you want to stick a percentage on what amount of protests you think are 'riots'?

Tell me how

2u2me wrote: »

Well it seems they were articulating what they wanted, we just weren't listening. They are now attacking the democratic party for trying to smear their narrative. When they say abolish the police they mean abolish the police!

"Yes, we mean literally abolish the police" The NYT.

That opinion piece follows a warning by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, that Democrats and others trying to “repackage” the push to “Defund the Police” As we all know 'repackaging' is counter-revolutionary.

[/YOUTUBE]

It's more nuanced than that according to Time Magazine.

There are three broad and overlapping camps within the vast, decentralized network of activists that make up the movement for racial justice in America. The first advocates for a series of reforms to create more accountability for police departments and strictly regulate the use of force, informed by what has and has not worked in the past. The second is increasingly focused on defunding police departments, directing taxpayer money away from law enforcement and towards social services that benefit black communities. The last also aims to redirect funding away from police departments, but considers it a step towards an ultimate goal of abolishing policing altogether.

Seems the most is 1/3 of BLM who are pushing for abolishment.

wandererz

Deleted User wrote: »

Incredible video of the riots https://youtu.be/mHVrx3CT7Cs

Almost makes it look mundane in parts

Seems like a great country to live in.

I protested for change and to have Mandela freed. We did not have to resort to this type of ****e.

This is pathetic. Rather than a celebration of his life and spreading of humility & understanding in the wake of his death and in the manner of his death it makes a total mockery of the good message that some people are trying to spread.

2u2me

Deleted User wrote: »

Incredible video of the riots

Almost makes it look mundane in parts

I liked the guy stood outside that salad bar(6mins) shop in an attempt to defend it from looters, alone, wasn't even his shop.

In the face of everything he was going to stand up for what he believed in. Kudos.

US2

RTE headlines on twitter really hammering the 'far right" narrative in the headlines about London today .

Definitely didnt mention "far left" last week..

The majority of people are neither, sickening that our national broadcaster is trying to create division and hate.

wandererz

US2 wrote: »

RTE headlines on twitter really hammering the 'far right" narrative in the headlines about London today .

Definitely didnt mention "far left" last week..

The majority of people are neither, sickening that our national broadcaster is trying to create division and hate.

They are not trying to create division and hate. Stop being so obtuse.
They simply copy other "news copy" and regurgitate it.
They don't think for themselves or provide enlightened option in these cases. Ireland is a neutral country.

Justin Credible Darts

US2 wrote: »

RTE headlines on twitter really hammering the 'far right" narrative in the headlines about London today .

Definitely didnt mention "far left" last week..

The majority of people are neither, sickening that our national broadcaster is trying to create division and hate.

sadly this has spread, to social media, and even here where people are accused of being on one side of the other...usually by people with an agenda,.


The idea that most people dislike the far right and far left seems lost on them.
As I said earlier I am all for peaceful protests but despise violence.
I believe there are racist cops, but think the force is good in general.
I despise both Trump and clinton


There seems to be this insistence by some to make everyone be one or the other, or put people in categories or label people.


The more extreme right or left love to bandy about accusations and each as bad as each other

Green Peter

I think the police should take a few days off in the US and UK and hand law and order over to the black lives matter movement who seem to know more about policing and let's see how things go. Maybe the silent majority might become vocal after the few days off.

NIMAN

wandererz wrote: »

Some of these cities are spending half a billion dollars or more on policing.

If they spend a portion of that on education and educational grants they will better those communities tremendously over the next 10-20 years and hopefully see huge improvement.

To be fair, you can't say the government don't spend money trying to make things better for everyone in the US.

Cal Thomas on the Last Word a couple of weeks ago said so many trillions of dollars (can't quite recall but think it was 24 trillion) have been spent in total trying to help impoverished and needy communities in the US, yet they still have the massive divide.

Whether its being spent right is obviously open to debate, but you can't say it ain't being spent.

2u2me

Sam Harris' recent podcast is a good listen.

There have been calls to defund the police. This may be psychologically understandable when you've been watching videos on twitter of cops beating peaceful protestors. Those videos are infuriating.
But if you think a society without cops is a society you would want to live in; you have lost your mind.
Giving a monopoly on violence to the state is just about the best thing we have ever done as a species. It ranks right up there with keeping our sh1t out of our food.

Danzy

2u2me wrote: »

Sam Harris' recent podcast is a good listen.

It was exceptional. Uncomfortable listening for ideologues though

perfectkama

First post no specific agenda
In Ireland we have thrown resources at a minority group ( €1b) it still is a high crime rate so no guarantee same will happen and the Guards virtually ignore laws that are enforced on the wider community as the arrest is not worth pursuing.
I am sure some will taunt cops by saying you “can’t arrest me”
I think same model will be the result not perfect, policing again with 2 standards

NIMAN

NIMAN wrote: »

Cal Thomas on the Last Word a couple of weeks ago said so many trillions of dollars (can't quite recall but think it was 24 trillion) have been spent in total trying to help impoverished and needy communities in the US, yet they still have the massive divide.

This can't be solved. The future is bleak.

joe40

US2 wrote: »

RTE headlines on twitter really hammering the 'far right" narrative in the headlines about London today .

Definitely didnt mention "far left" last week..

The majority of people are neither, sickening that our national broadcaster is trying to create division and hate.

I saw reports of violence last week on RTE