Re: Cops beating on people - mostly people with dark brown skin, and the ridiculousness of pale people thinking they know much of anything about what it's like to live black in white America.
It is bad enough that much of white America sees fit to lecture black people about the proper response to police brutality, economic devastation and perpetual marginality, having ourselves rarely been the targets of any of these. It is bad enough that we deign to instruct black people whose lives we have not lived, whose terrors we have not faced, and whose gauntlets we have not run, about violence; this, even as we enjoy the national bounty over which we currently claim possession solely as a result of violence. I beg to remind you, George Washington was not a practitioner of passive resistance. Neither the early colonists nor the nation's founders fit within the Gandhian tradition. There were no sit-ins at King George's palace, no horseback freedom rides to effect change. There were just guns, lots and lots of guns.
We are here because of blood, and mostly that of others; here because of our insatiable and rapacious desire to take by force the land and labor of those others. We are the last people on Earth with a right to ruminate upon the superior morality of peaceful protest. We have never believed in it and rarely practiced it. Rather, we have always taken what we desire, and when denied it we have turned to means utterly genocidal to make it so.
Finding the occasional straw of truth awash in a great ocean of confusion and bamboozle requires intelligence, vigilance, dedication and courage. But if we don't practice these tough habits of thought, we cannot hope to solve the truly serious problems that face us – and we risk becoming a nation of suckers, up for grabs by the next charlatan who comes along.
One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. it is simply too painful to acknowledge—even to ourselves—that we've been so credulous. (So the old bamboozles tend to persist as the new bamboozles rise.) --Carl Sagan
I think of this quote pretty much every time I hear any "conservative" start to talk about almost anything. Supply Side Economics & Trickle-Down Religion Nicotine isn't addictive and smoking's not really all that bad for ya Tea Party Antonin Scalia Post-Racial America Climate Change is a hoax Tax Cuts boost government revenue Cops aren't fucking us over Freedom of Speech means billionaires should own everything DumFux News We were founded as a christian nation Jade Helm 15
Here's a comparison of mandated Paid Maternity Leave and Protected Maternity Leave in 38 "first world" countries. (I'm thinking you won't be surprised)
New findings from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey reveal that nearly half of women between ages 15-44 were childless in 2014, a 1.1 percent increase from 2012. This is consistent with recent National Center for Health Statistics data showing a six-year decline in U.S. birth rates. The report says America's fertility rates dropped to record lows in 2013 with women ages 15-44 only having 1.86 babies on average. In order to maintain a stable population, the average has to be at least 2.1 children.
Family-Friendly my dyin' ass. This is one of the reasons I find it so hard to resist kicking "conservatives" right in the nuts. Wanna know why "Millennials" aren't buying into the American Dream? They're not convinced there's any future in it for them.
Every time something happens like what happened in Garland TX, I'm reminded that "free speech" is a weapon as much as it is a tool. And that goading some dumb sucker into a fight just so you can make a point (and a pile of cash) is about as craven as it gets.
I'm not suggesting the two dead 'jihadis' deserved anything but bullets in their heads once they started the shit, but let's at least admit their reaction was predictable - and predictable to the point that we can condemn the fact that the provocation has almost nothing to do with Free Speech, and everything to do with making it justifiable (and profitable) to kill Muslims.
Geller's little stunt produced exactly what it was intended to produce, which is Violence As Revenue Opportunity.
Conservatives Really Need You to Care About the Garland Thing
Honestly, conservatives, most of us on the left look at Pamela Geller's stupid ass Mohammed cartoon thing, which was attended by a handful of Fox "news" zombies and more media than it deserved, and think, "Well, if that's what you wanna do." 'Cause, see, we all knew that images of Mohammed piss off loser jihadi-wannabes who need to prove their street cred. So, oh, gee, you mean the deliberately provocative act provoked someone to violence? Well, fuck us all with a surprise stick. Shit, considering the nonsensical conspiracy theories floating around Texas right now, why not say that the two idiot gunmen were promised cash and seven minutes in paradise with Geller to come shoot up the joint in order to justify the whole goddamned effort?
But the right really, really needs us to give a shit. They need us to condemn Geller's show. Look at what Erick "Erick" Erickson of the Red State blarg had to say right after the shooting: "Over the next twenty-four hours, we can expect the media to wring its hands about 'Texas gun culture,' the unnecessary provocations of Pamela Gellar [sic], and a host of other issues. They will work very hard to suggest Muslims were somehow the victims and try to distance the story from Islam." Look at that list. One of those things has come true - about Geller being an attention whore who makes real whores think, "Fuck it. I should retire and give her the whole block" - and the rest? No one of any note has said shit about guns in this case (except maybe how the bad guys got the guns). No one has said Muslims were victims, except to say that a bunch of needy fucknuts tried their hardest to get a reaction from Muslims.
Later, Erickson says, "[T]he most telling thing to me is how quickly prominent leftists placed blame on the event organizers for holding than event instead of on a group of Muslims for deciding they can kill because they are offended." No, sweet, pudgy Christ fellater, we are all blaming the dudes with the guns. We can also say, without contradiction, that the event wouldn't have taken place if the threat of violence wasn't built into it, and that shit's reckless. By the way, aren't you the people who think that the problem with rape on college campuses isn't that rapists do it, but that sexy coeds get drunk and are easy targets?
Anyway, you know who some of the loudest voices against Geller are right now? Other conservatives who think Geller's full of shit, which, of course, made Geller screech even louder than usual. (That last link has all the cartoons from the event, and you will forever regret clicking on it.) Skeevier attention whore Donald Trump even said that Geller was "dumb."
Still, people like Rush Limbaugh blubber on about how much eeevil liberals don't give a goddamn about free speech. Meanwhile, most of us real lefties, not the fantasy flesh-eating gorgons conjured by the deranged minds of conservatives, feel about the cartoon display the same way we feel about flag burning: You have the right to do it, but you sure as shit aren't doing it to make people believe in your cause.
It's your right to fuck with people's core beliefs. And it's our right to think your point is worthless.
Average global levels of carbon dioxide stayed above 400 parts per million, or ppm, through all of March 2015 -- the first time that has happened for an entire month since record keeping first began, according to data released this week by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
Scientists with NOAA's Earth System Research Laboratory have called the news a "significant milestone" in the growing scourge of man-made climate change.
“This marks the fact that humans burning fossil fuels have caused global carbon dioxide concentrations to rise more than 120ppm since pre-industrial times,” Pieter Tans, lead scientist of NOAA's greenhouse gas network, told The Guardian on Wednesday. “Half of that rise has occurred since 1980.”
Lotsa people spend lotsa time worrying about and wondering why it seems "The Millennial's" are so self-absorbed and uncaring. If ya get a chance to sit down and talk with a few of 'em, ask a coupla questions about the way we're runnin' the joint and what they think the future holds for them. And then try not to fuck up your knuckles too bad punching the mirror when you get home. They are the way we've taught them to be.
(And Uh-Oh. My guy Martin O'Malley took a bit of a hit there (starting at about 3:45) when Mr Powers slags him for misunderstanding the Broken Windows approach to the point of total FUBAR. I guess I need to figure out a way to ask him about that.)
So, wouldn't it be nice if we could take a hard look at the whole process? Maybe we could start with: Coin-Operated Politicians getting elected partly on Big-Money donations from the Crime-&-Punishment Industries which eventually makes for a very tidy loop of criminalization and recidivism (Bust. Bargain. Jail. Repeat). The cycle of Poverty, Ignorance and Crime isn't a bug in the system - it's a fucking feature.
And as a nice bonus, it gives our returning war heroes some occupational therapy so they can work out those PTSD issues that they don't have and that nobody ever needs to talk about because they couldn't possibly manifest themselves in the worst possible ways at the worst possible times - but like I said, let's not worry about any of that. Ever.
Anyway, concentrating your Zero-Tolerance approach on the "problem areas" almost ensures those problem areas will forever remain problem areas. Which is, again, actually the point. While it's being sold to us as Public Service, law enforcement is being administered as a Profit Center. And the Revenue piece of any good business plan includes Recurring Revenue Opportunities - Returning Clientele, Customer Retention, Repeat Business, pick a buzz phrase, any buzz phrase.
BTW - the people filling our prisons aren't the "customers" of the Crime-&-Punishment Industries; the same as the patients filling our hospitals aren't the "customers" of our Healthcare Industries. The main point there being that a healthy patient is a detriment to somebody's profitability the same as a law-abiding citizen walkin' around free isn't putting money into the pockets of an ever-widening system of interlocking "security" businesses. But weirdly - healthy patients and law-abiding citizens are very good for taxpayers and premium payers and business owners and families and and and. So how come it seems like somebody doesn't want us to be particularly free or particularly healthy? It's a wonderment, ain't it?
Prisoners (like Patients) are both the raw material and the product. This is a strictly Business-to-Business proposition. The customer base consists of corporations which spend lots of time effort and money getting you and me to line up so we can volunteer to get scammed into believing we're buying ourselves a little law and order; some peace of mind; a feeling that we'll be allowed into the powdered wig salon just as soon as we've kissed all the right asses and stepped on all the right fingers - when actually, we're just identifying ourselves as resources for a system that eats people, extracts power and money, shits people back out; and then starts over again.
What, you weren't still thinking Law Enforcement's about enforcing the law, were ya? You're so cute. We live in USAmerica Inc, silly - America's business is business. And business is fucking great.
You're very important to us, so please stay in line - we'll get to you soon enough.
There really was a time (quite a while ago) when Geraldo Rivera was thought to be a journalist.
The very well-practiced frozen smile on Rivera's face is a dead give-away that he suspects just how irrelevant he is; and that he's afraid that that irrelevancy is about to be shown to the world. He desperately wants to be the gutsy plucky reporter he thinks he used to be as he's almost literally running away from that guy.
And the fact that he can't hold a candle to that guy's arguments is great tribute to the simple fact that whenever anybody working for the DumFux News crew ventures outside the bubble, reality short-circuits their closed-loop thinking and the whole program craters in on itself.
To be (kinda) fair, most of the other Press Poodles have run into similar buzz saws - it's just a little more satisfying when I get to watch some schmuck working for the GOP's PR Channel shit himself in public.
I've got just 2 (main) points about the aftermath of the Freddie Gray thing in Baltimore. First - when did we become so totally averse to and repulsed by violence in response to being pushed around - whether it's a real thing or only perception? And in particular, what's with all the pearl-clutching and concern trolling coming in waves from "conservatives"? When did the Right Radicals start being shocked by violence in response to any-fucking-thing at all? Last I checked, most of the people who're all so utterly aghast at the prospect of protests turning to violent confrontation are the same bunch who cheered as a whole army of nutballs stormed into Nevada last year on the off chance they might get to shoot it out with the Federalés. Selective Values Judgement much? And that kinda leads to my second point, which is: C'mon now, guys - this country was founded on armed rebellion in response to an uncaring, disinterested power structure that dealt with common folk in thoroughly hostile and brutalizing ways. We've all been taught that good Americans stand up and fight for what they believe is right; and that there's nothing more noble that standing up to fight against the forces of oppression etc etc etc. Why are we expecting anybody to not behave exactly the way they've been taught to behave from the time they were in 3rd or 4th grade? And BTW: Looting? You fight your revolution and I'll fight mine. Comme ci, comme ça muthuhfuckuh. So anyway, there's only one more question left to ask and it's about something we all know perfectly well (even tho' way too many of us are still too afraid to let the notion filter into our upper cortex), so I'll just say that there're some very real and very obvious differences between Baltimore and the Bundy ranch (eg) but they all boil down to one very real and very obvious aspect. Simply stated, Freddie Gray can expect to be treated very differently by law enforcement than the way Cliven Bundy can expect to be treated by law enforcement, and it's really not so much that I think we're afraid to ask why - I'm pretty sure we know why; at least we can think we know when we contemplate it as an external thing - something to do with bad cops and the dumb way other people think blah blah blah. But I'm afraid the real problem is that we're terrified something really bad will happen to us inside if we hear our own inner voice tell us the answer, because it just might be that we expect Freddie should be treated differently than Bundy. And that grates on our soul.
First of all, Keith is again dancing perilously close to the edge of the abyss. Implicit in the piece is a criticism of ESPN. Big rich companies don't like it when you let "outsiders" peek behind the furniture. And your colleagues don't like being called out for their willingness to devote way more time to their hair and their investment portfolios than they spend on actually doing their jobs as reporters.
Second - substitute "government agency" every time Keith refers to a sports figure or a team or a league. And now we've got the typical (ie: huge fucking) problem of "reporters" acting in the capacity of PR flacks instead of telling us everything we need to know to make well-informed decisions on just about anything.
Wanna know what's killing off our little experiment in self-government? Well, there aren't any simple answers to that, but we could start with this: Press Poodles.
