Current or modern politics in the United States

[SanteeFats]

Originally Posted by hound dog

To be honest SF, a good deal of your opinions and arguments on various issues seem to be along the same line as that which Fox news is presenting. You've stated your conservative position many times, and while I wouldn't say you're radical right, I would characterize your positions on most issues as somewhere between moderate right and far right. You may not rely on Fox for your news, but generally speaking you're not that far off from them on some issues.
Just my opinion, but I tend to to get more facts and less propaganda from PBS and BBC when it comes to world news.

Okay I can accept that readily enough. Yes I know I am a conservative in general but, IMO, I am a moderate one. There are issues I am to the right and others where I believe I am more middle of the road. Of course that is just my opinion. Of course with such a right leaning viewpoint it is only natural to appear to line up with Fox from time to time I guess. Of course it is really hard to have a real discussion when we only have the limited format of this thread(s). Face to face talks are always much more productive than such as this.

[Tarkus666]

Originally Posted by hound dog

I was using the two as examples of public officials that we seem to have the most corruption problems with. I can't remember the last time, if ever, I heard of a Fireman, or an EMT technician, that was arrested for on the job criminal behavior.

Let us also not forget that the overwhelmingly majority of police officers will never fire their weapon once in the line of duty over their entire career and somewhere around 40% will never remove their weapon from its holster. America has gotten far too loose and free with the term 'hero' whether it be police officer, firefighter etc. and police forces have begun to believe their own hype. Today the Milwaukee Chief of Police was on CNN and he utterly dismissed the charges against the six officers calling it nothing more than politics to mollify a mob and then he went on to say that anyone who remotely suggests that the Baltimore Police Force does not have an incredibly positive relationship with the public is just race baiting. Someone needs a reality check and that person's title rhymes with beef and his city is the palindrome of Eekluawlim, (yeah it's a word: Eekluawlim; noun, frightened response to being confronted with the scaly small rodent the luawlim, usage: upon noticing the luawlim he was heard to utter "EEK").

How can there be progress when part of the problem doesn't believe that there is even a problem. Like it or there is essentially a mindset that many officers hold that from the time you are handcuffed to the point that you are released that anything that happens to you in that time has NOTHING to do with them.

Originally Posted by hound dog

What seems like common sense to me, would be for police force's across the country to meet and for the chief to say that this is a time of perceived Public Relations trouble, and that they are all under even more scrutiny because of it. If I were a police chief I sure as hell would. I'd tell them they needed to behave as if they were under constant surveillance and to act accordingly. Not to rush in heavy handed, to try to keep all situations as calm and cool as possible. Yet, since Fergusson, it seems to be snowballing more and more out of control. The incidents seem to have increased, and increased substantially, like many just don't care. The notion that it's an us against them scenario needs to be eliminated from policing by what ever means necessary, or the violence, from both the public and police, will just keep getting worse.

Following the G20 in Toronto and then subsequent abuse issues also caught on video Chief Bill Blair put out what has been dubbed the "do not be stupid" message. Essentially it said "people are recording so keep that in mind." It is akin to telling rapists that there is now a Community Watch so be extra careful not to get caught. Once again this context of the police not accepting any responsibility for any of the actions except as to the concern of being caught.

Originally Posted by hound dog

I just came across this quote, by Donald Rumsfeld from 2003 concerning the then looting going on in Iraq:

While no one condones looting, on the other hand, one can understand the pent-up feelings that may result from decades of repression and people who have had members of their family killed by that regime, for them to be taking their feelings out on that regime. And I don't think there's anyone in any of those pictures … [who wouldn't] accept it as part of the price of getting from a repressed regime to freedom.

Well remember that this is the same administration who had Dick Cheney who is now calling Obama a traitor attempting to reduce the sanctions against Iran when in 1999 he called the fact that Halliburton was losing Iranian energy contracts due to sanctions as un-American. Like all politicians there is the reality that reflects their personal needs and then those that affect others.

[Tarkus666]

Originally Posted by SanteeFats

Okay I can accept that readily enough. Yes I know I am a conservative in general but, IMO, I am a moderate one. There are issues I am to the right and others where I believe I am more middle of the road. Of course that is just my opinion. Of course with such a right leaning viewpoint it is only natural to appear to line up with Fox from time to time I guess. Of course it is really hard to have a real discussion when we only have the limited format of this thread(s). Face to face talks are always much more productive than such as this.

Maybe he's referencing your daily show on Fox news "The O'SanteeFats Fucktor"?

I suppose lining up with Fox News might be a function of being a conservative but you may want to reconsider your position as a moderate if it happens too often.

[ubu55]

Tarkus: Today the Milwaukee Chief of Police was on CNN

Unless you've got a different link, believe that was actually the Sheriff of Milwaukee County, David Clarke (who is black), & he was on your favorite channel, Fox News
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/201...man-sacrifice/

and he utterly dismissed the charges against the six officers calling it nothing more than politics to mollify a mob

Yes, and he's dead right about that, isn't he.

David Clarke: “This neophyte prosecutor stood up there and made a political statement, Neil. And I say that because she’s chanting or voicing some of the chants from this angry mob,” he said, before diving into his experience as a veteran homicide detective and calling Marilyn Mosby an inexperienced prosecutor. “I’m not going to silently stand by and watch my brother officers offered up as human sacrifices thrown like red meat to an angry mob, just to appease this angry mob.”

Tarkus: Someone needs a reality check and that person's title rhymes with beef and his city is the palindrome of Eekluawlim, (yeah it's a word: Eekluawlim; noun, frightened response to being confronted with the scaly small rodent the luawlim, usage: upon noticing the luawlim he was heard to utter "EEK").

You, couldn't even get his title right, and of course "Eekluawlim" isn't a real word.... & it's not a palindrome either,

A palindrome is a word, phrase, number, or other sequence of characters which reads the same backward or forward. Allowances may be made for adjustments to capital letters, punctuation, and word dividers.

But it's a cool idea making up snappy insults like that! Your own appropriate title, BTW, rhymes with the element "Boron".

Originally Posted by Tarkus666

Let us also not forget that the overwhelmingly majority of police officers will never fire their weapon once in the line of duty over their entire career and somewhere around 40% will never remove their weapon from its holster. America has gotten far too loose and free with the term 'hero' whether it be police officer, firefighter etc.

So... for you, the fact that most police officers never kill anybody, & seldom fire or have to pull their guns means it's impossible for them to be "heroes"? You think working 30 years on the street & never letting matters reach the point you have to shoot somebody is a sign of poor policing? How'd you like to be a policeman making a traffic stop in a city like Baltimore where there were 211 murders last year(of which only 45% were solved)? Or answering a domestic dispute call, one of the most potentially dangerous confrontational situations? Or not have the cops protect your sorry, pimply little ass if you get mugged, or beaten nearly to death in a race riot, like Reginald Denny?

... and police forces have begun to believe their own hype.

Yeah, kinda like crackpot, soap-box liberals in love with the sound of their own squealing rants.

The 211 Baltimore murders (including 15 children, one of them a 3 year-old girl shot in a drive-by) are actually a decrease, from 235 in 2013.

"Mayor Rawlings-Blake and police attributed much of the drop to the return of Operation Ceasefire, a data-driven program in which police and prosecutors monitor ex-offenders who have been linked to repeated violence."

Goodness, hope none of them were black, sounds like it might be profiling!

Always amused how you, hound dog and jumbo prawns attack SanteeFats (& anyone else who disagrees with you) as Republican, Fox News-watching Nazis.
Your own rhetoric on Freddie Gray is amazingly close to that Bob Avakian, chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party is spewing!
http://revcom.us/a/384/the-police-mu...e-gray-en.html

So you three amigos must be communists, Right?

[Tarkus666]

Quick aside here. I know you like to dissect single sentences and that is fine by me however for most people who did not write the message may have trouble maintaining a continuity so for example when you take my original post of

Tarkus: Today the Milwaukee Chief of Police was on CNN and he utterly dismissed the charges against the six officers calling it nothing more than politics to mollify a mob
Is it really necessary separate a single sentence into multiple segments when you could just as easily take the bulk of the paragraph and respond as a whole. The fact he is a Sheriff versus a Chief of Police is not germane to the topic as a whole when anyone can clearly identify the fact that he is in a leadership role for policing in Milwaulkee which gives the context of his position. Continue on as you will but while I have no problem knowing what you are referencing unless other viewers have the original post opened in another window you make it very difficult for them to know what you are replying to.

So back to your response.

Originally Posted by ubu55

Unless you've got a different link, believe that was actually the Sheriff of Milwaukee County, David Clarke (who is black), & he was on your favorite channel, Fox News

Yes you are correct in that he is the Sheriff and not the Chief of Police but .. see above for important context rather than title. Given that three of the charged officers are black I am not entirely certain what specific importance there is regarding Clarke being black as well. Is he more objective because he is black? Is he an example of how the paradigm of the blue shield can blind some to their perception? Seems like a diffferent discussion point.


- Re arrest of the police officers as nothing but a means to quell the mob.

Originally Posted by ubu55

Yes, and he's dead right about that, isn't he.

We don't know yet. The case has to go through the process. That is why we have courts and do not let police be both the enforcers and interpreters of law and punishment even though clearly many police and their supporters do not share this view.

If Mosby is found to have charged the officers without the level of evidence necessary level to file charges and an equivalent probable level of success, ie: the Judge accepts the first motion by the defence to throw out the charges, then she will have to answer for this failure. On the other hand just because the accused are police officers should not result in special treatment and as most of the 'neutral lawyers' have pointed out the timing for charging an individual who was not a police officer is exactly within the expected time frame. Obviously by the reaction of the police union and others like Clarke they either believe that they have evidence that Mosby is ignoring or they do believe that even in the case of a fatality they should be exempt from the standards that apply to any other American citizen.

Originally Posted by ubu55

David Clarke: “This neophyte prosecutor stood up there and made a political statement, Neil. And I say that because she’s chanting or voicing some of the chants from this angry mob,” he said, before diving into his experience as a veteran homicide detective and calling Marilyn Mosby an inexperienced prosecutor. “I’m not going to silently stand by and watch my brother officers offered up as human sacrifices thrown like red meat to an angry mob, just to appease this angry mob.”

And that is his opinion except of course that he decries the demands for justice from the angry mob but extolls the same demands for justice from his cohorts. His logic is lazy, biased and false. Clarke has absolutely no insight as to the entirety of the evidence so while his blind faith to the blue shield is no doubt admirable to police rank and file it is no better than the mindless rantings of the mob he wishes to call out. The reality in this issue is pretty straight forward; the police interacted with a suspect and somewhere between restraining him and not quite delivering him to the jail he was so severely injured that he died from the causation of those injuries one week later. Now it is seemingly acceptable in the mind of Clarke that this issue somehow is not relevant to the police officers who were involved. Do you honestly think he would have the same opinion were the six not police officers? It is a self serving approach that whether or not he wants to admit it is indicative of a belief that when people who die in police custody that the action does not meet the legal definition of culpable responsibility. Under the law no one is above the law, even the the police.

Originally Posted by ubu55

Tarkus: Someone needs a reality check and that person's title rhymes with beef and his city is the palindrome of Eekluawlim, (yeah it's a word: Eekluawlim; noun, frightened response to being confronted with the scaly small rodent the luawlim, usage: upon noticing the luawlim he was heard to utter "EEK").

What did you lose your sense of humour in a bad snowboarding accident? And yes Clarke does need a reality check because he is over extending his position without any basis other than 'his team' is accused. He is no better than an anarchist who claims that all police are corrupt.

And if you're smart you come up with a rhyme for Milwaukee! Sheesh. I mean really - Eekluawlim isn't a real word? Et tu Brutus?

Originally Posted by ubu55

So... for you, the fact that most police officers never kill anybody, & seldom fire or have to pull their guns means it's impossible for them to be "heroes"? You think working 30 years on the street & never letting matters reach the point you have to shoot somebody is a sign of poor policing? How'd you like to be a policeman making a traffic stop in a city like Baltimore where there were 211 murders last year(of which only 45% were solved)? Or answering a domestic dispute call, one of the most potentially dangerous confrontational situations? Or not have the cops protect your sorry, pimply little ass if you get mugged, or beaten nearly to death in a race riot, like Reginald Denny?

No I stated that the US seems to be in a state of deeming nearly anyone a hero and just because you are a police officer does not make you a hero because as a rule the vast majority of police officers will never find themselves in the situations that would normally justify such a status. I bring this up merely to point out that we should not view the work of a police officer as an excuse for bad behaviour because they are under this never ending stress of gunfights and merely seconds from their death. Consider Chris Kyle who was killed by Eddie Ray Routh who was in treatment for PTSD due to his combat deployment, (another hero?), except he was never deployed anywhere near a combat situation. Just because you entered a specific field of service does not equate to all things being equal.

When we allow people to assume a role that is not warranted the result is quite often a corruption of action. There have been some studies that consider what is called 'social convergence' where a similar relationship results in rationalizations within a group, ie: if you hang around with criminals your perception of your actions is altered to fit and justify the group you are part of, or people who work for a church or charity find themselves able to justify their stealing because they are worthy due to a greater good. Essentially it speaks to a paradigm shift where a person cognitively alters their perception such that they 'allow themselves' to perform corrupt actions under the false belief that their action is somehow acceptable. This is what we sometimes see with police officers, politicians, military personnel etc. when they required to reflect on past action and why it seems almost unbelievable to the objective observer.

I know there are many who wish to respond with a knee jerk response and immediately find blame with one party over the other but all this achieves is a reinforcement of the underlying problem. Looking at issue with open eyes and weeding out the biased nonsense like Clarke's blind devotion to his brethren is a necessary step in finding out the issue and how to correct rather than merely perpetuating the problem under the guise of "it's just their fault."

Originally Posted by ubu55

Always amused how you, hound dog and jumbo prawns attack SanteeFats (& anyone else who disagrees with you) as Republican, Fox News-watching Nazis.
Your own rhetoric on Freddie Gray is amazingly close to that Bob Avakian, chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party is spewing!

I don't recall suggesting that SanteeFats is a Nazi although admittedly he does like wearing high boots, (some photo forums here are hard to find). I tend to disagree with all sorts of people who lean toward a biased report rather than seeking out variable data sources. As a rule SanteeFats does a pretty good job of checking out his facts but even then we may still disagree. Not sure how that makes me a communist let alone still deeply in the phallic stage. You need to remember that merely because someone disagrees with you does not necessarily constitute that they are anything other than someone holding a contrary opinion.

[scoundrel]

Originally Posted by Tarkus666

I don't recall suggesting that SanteeFats is a Nazi although admittedly he does like wearing high boots, (some photo forums here are hard to find). I tend to disagree with all sorts of people who lean toward a biased report rather than seeking out variable data sources. As a rule SanteeFats does a pretty good job of checking out his facts but even then we may still disagree. Not sure how that makes me a communist let alone still deeply in the phallic stage. You need to remember that merely because someone disagrees with you does not necessarily constitute that they are anything other than someone holding a contrary opinion.

You said you weren't going to mention this if we sent you the $100. It's not our fault that you didn't want one hundred Zimbabwean Dollars.

I must remind all of us that GD&N is basically the chat room of a porn forum (a classy one, admittedly); it doesn't make sense for us to fall out with one another over something as paltry as mere politics, when clearly what really matters is that far too many beautiful and desireable women are wearing clothes. Everyone is allowed to speak his/her mind here, but for that to work we absolutely must be respectful of each other even though we often disagree with our brother/sister members' opinions.

[Tarkus666]

Originally Posted by scoundrel

You said you weren't going to mention this if we sent you the $100. It's not our fault that you didn't want one hundred Zimbabwean Dollars.

I sent the money to SanteeFats so he could complete his costume. All he needs at this point is the suspenders and the Heer Crusher Cap and VEF has its very own Charlotte Rampling from the Night Porter!

[hound dog]

Originally Posted by ubu55

Always amused how you, hound dog and jumbo prawns attack SanteeFats (& anyone else who disagrees with you) as Republican, Fox News-watching Nazis.

Excuse me? I don't see my differences of opinion and the ensuing debate as attacks. I also have never, even in a joke, labeled anyone on this forum a Nazi.

I take Mr. Fats at his word, which he's stated in this forum several times, though he is a conservative he is not necessarily a Republican, and he does not base his opinions on his viewing of Fox network news. Fats is actually one of the few conservatives on this forum I respect. He is able to have a debate on issues with a fairly open mind and doesn't resort to insult when others still disagree with him, a pretty rare trait for a conservative in my experience. I'd say that's the a big reason I tend to debate mostly with him as opposed to other conservatives who post here. Conversations with Fats never end with a ranting post of insults.

[jumbo prawns]

Originally Posted by Tarkus666

Maybe he's referencing your daily show on Fox news "The O'SanteeFats Fucktor"?

I suppose lining up with Fox News might be a function of being a conservative but you may want to reconsider your position as a moderate if it happens too often.

I would add for Mr Fats, that if your "opinion" lines up with any so called news channel on a regular basis, that is a huge red flag that what you are watching isn't news.

News should be:
1) Boring
2) Accurate and Informative and
3) More about facts and less about opinions

I regularly watch Fox news and it fails on all three of those points.

If what your watching doesn't challenge your ideas about the world at least once in a while, then what you are watching is pandering to you.

Some find comfort in that, but those are the same people who were convinced that ACORN stole the election from McCain in '08 and that Romney was way ahead in all the polls in '12. And if they can hoodwink you over something as insignificant as a Presidential Election, you have to ask yourself what other flavor of koolaid have they been given you to drink?

[scoundrel]

Originally Posted by Tarkus666

No Nazi themed porn on VEF.