Matt, this is pretty typical left wing behavior these days.
It was mirrored in the left's characterization of anti-vaxxers as white Trump loving racists when, in reality, a huge chunk of the vaccine wary were black folk.
It's also mirrored in the "pro-lifers are white Nazi Republican scum" when, in this crazy place called reality, a hell of lot of black folk were anti-abortion. They understood that those 19 million black babies that have been aborted since the 70s are just another face of genocide.
As far as guns go, if liberals really care about raped women why aren't they pushing for self defense classes in public schools. Or even gun safety classes since, every year, many rapes are prevented because the woman was packing heat.
Either one of these classroom experiences would benefit kids a hell of a lot more than teaching them that "men can get pregnant too."
At the end of the day I think it is quite obvious that the Dems only want victims as their clientele. Victims seem to be much easier to manipulate for votes.
Team D is the class power of the PMC made manifest.
Various victims and grievance groups represent junior partners in the Team D coalition.
Were Team R to break up, or Team D left as the sole national political party, I suspect that the various groups making up the Team D coalition would quickly discover that they do not have all that much really in common, and in fact do not even like each other all that much.
Something similar could be said for Team R, FWIW, although the members of the coalition are different.
This is so true. Anyone that's ever inadvertently experienced a Team D struggle session can clearly see they don't like each other, at all. It's a purity struggle, i.e., who's cobbled together the most comprehensive hollow abstraction of an ideology?
I would say the Team R is far more likely to kill one another. You have the self righteous evangelicals who can't wait to put women chastity belts while the men on Team R are sleeping with hookers every chance they can get. Team R if filled with the most morally degenerate generation of Americans (personified by Trump) and the most aggressive authoritarian Fundamentalists in the world next to the Jihad loving Muslims ruling the middle east. Good luck trying to get the Trump loving psudo masculine adoring men that lead the R team to live by the rules the way Falwell JR did at his university while he was out whoring around to any woman that was taking the bait.
Oh... and they are all funded by the equally hedonistic Oligarchs ... What could go wrong?
The one and only thing that unites them all is that they consume media daily that tells them that no matter what they need to HATE LIBERALS.
You are 100% correct. They are totally willing to make excuses for anything until they get power. But once they have the power the excuses for the common folk end. Killing Roe is the perfect example.
History shows that the evangelicals will always make excuses for their leaders doing anything they want, morality is irrelevant for their leaders in government or of their churches. But for the common folk, they will rule with an iron fist.
That is where the fight begins.. I don't see most R's rolling around with their semi automatic weapons and "toxic masculinity" being told by the Police to start acting like God Fearing Christians.
We can argue details later (Team D cultists are still making excuses for Obama) but that doesn't mean that an internal civil war is more likely to start in Team R vs Team D.
But it wouldn't matter, as Team R and Team D need each other, or there's no excuse not to give their coalition everything they want, now. Or think of it as sports rivals, and how they feed off the rivalry. You can make a perfectly bankable Batman movie without Robin, but you can't make one without The Joker.
Here is where i am going to give you push back. Team R stands for nothing other than hating team D. Team R is very organized and active at a grass roots level which is very powerful. But deep down they don't stand for anything other than HATING THE LIBS. The grass roots is very well organized because they are funded by the oligarchs like the Koch brothers and the Mercers and more recently Peter Theil and Elon Musk.
The D's are organizing but they don't have the Oligarch funding and organizing. So the D's are going to have to organize by compelling and inspiring action over issues that are truly important to supporters. Whether it was protests of George Floyds murder or union organizing at Starbucks and Amazon the left is slowly starting to organize. It will take them longer than the right. The Tea Party was formed in 2008 and by 2016 they got their guy elected President and took over the Republican Party.
With out the kind of funding from Oligarchs the left will take longer to organize, but it will be more authentic because they are fighting for something real not just "Hating the R's". The only D's who's only world vision is to Hate the R's are the CNN /MSNBC watching, Jan 6th trial loving elderly who are dying off anyway.
You are right there will be a battle. I think the next decade will seem much like the late 60's. The George Floyd protests were just the start.
Well, liberal also used to mean sane and fair policy initiatives. Liberal democracy meant rational and reasonable policies benefitting everyone. It's only the last coupla decades where liberal came to mean what most folks think it does now. Same with Conservative; it used to mean rational, reasonable, incremental adjustments/improvements to policy. Now, it's Ted Cruz wrapping his automatic weapon in bacon or what's her face decrying the separation between church and state.
Exactly. Both terms - "liberal" and "conservative" have become utterly meaningless. They have been reduced to sports teams, and most people either firmly root for one or the other, regardless of how morally bankrupt, ideologically inconsistent and blatantly self-serving those labels have become.
You're right about them being "morally bankrupt" ... we have liberals; conservatives; and both neoliberal and neoconservative (I would say those are the labels for RINOs and DINOs except I refuse to give the trumpdiot any credit for the word salad he regularly vomits) which are nothing more than labels they have made up to explain their nonexistent differences.
Very well said, Kurtocracy. I am a liberal, not a leftist, and my definition mirrors how you describe it here: rational, reasonable, and not wasting good bacon wrapping it around a gun barrel as a red-hat stunt.
Yeah, I know. But nobody, as far as I know, has come to an agreement on a suitable descriptive term . I was just proceeding under the assumption that anyone here would already understand the nuances.
Also, that liberal category may describe the politicians but I think most of their foot soldiers and tweeter warriors completely self identify as progressive left.
The left that you're referring to are now seen by those folk as being little more than Republicans.
This song, and these lines were not written to support the assignation of Malcolm. Quite the contrary. It was meant as a put down on the equivocal morals of liberals who condemn and condone the same acts depending on who the target was.
I don't have a problem with your comment, Joy. We should all condemn political assassinations. But that was not Bill Owen's comment. He said that Malcolm "got what was coming!" Let's be very very clear about this, alright?!
He endorsed the assassination of Malcolm X!
If you agree or disagree, say so...
I won't let anyone on this forum get away with saying that about Malcolm!
Bill was quoting a song by Phil Ochs. Please go have a listen to it, as you clearly have not heard it before and have missed the context entirely. It's called "Love Me, I'm a Liberal." I would link to it but I don't know the policies here. It's a great song, as are all of Phil Ochs and you have a treat ahead of you if you do listen to his songs.
Saying you’re sorry when you’ve made a mistake is the sign of strong character.
Maybe the world would be a better place if more people were willing to say things like “I’m sorry, I was wrong” and “will you forgive me for this mistake?”
Not liberals, but people who identify as liberal. Maybe we can call them transliberals? It kind of works because Matt is clearly a member of the privileged and bigoted cisliberal patriarchy.
It's right wing. Get off that Reagan-era crack pipe.
What you see is the end and slide back down of RIGHT WING SECULARISM.
It's like the equivalent to the right wing religious hey day when that cunt Bill O'Reilly commanded market share.
They're losing their grip, and the right wing religitards are rising -if we let them.
Could be that this just cycles back and forth for eternity, but in the middle we may get some fucking common sense in there to help the common good of the silent majority.
So... will you still call Joe Biden, who is to the right of Henry Kissinger, a "Liberal"? He's obviously not.
If I slapped a rainbow flag label on a bomb and took photo ops or tweeted on behalf of the CIA with pride month platitudes would you call that.... LEFT WING?
Independence is needed once again, from the corruption that has happened to the systems that govern over our lives. What can we do to gain that independence back?
This Independence Day we must shift focus from fighting each other to fixing the corrupted systems that govern over all of our lives. This is something we should all agree on, and being the number one problem we face in America today, there is nothing more important:
LOL! Conservatism is based on victimization, from the rephrasing of the Civil War as a War of Northern Aggression to accusing the media of being biased against conservatives. Victimization is the conservatives go-to whine. The problem with the Dems is that they refuse to fight the enemy, the conservatives as the conservatives fight all things liberal.
Conservatives are the enemy, always have been, from slavery to unconstitutionally nullifying women's rights.
You should learn some more about history. Many, many democrats owned slaves, and Abraham Lincoln was a Republican. The Reoublican party emerged in 1854 to combat the expansion of slavery into American territories. To try to blame your political enemies for slavery is not only ludicrous, it's just wrong. Also, to call Dobbs "unconstitutional" shows a profound ignorance of the substance of the Constitution, no matter what you think of the decision.
You should pay attention to history, the problem is conservatism, not the particular party, but their composition. The Southern Democrats were conservative, supported slavery, then Jim Crow, then Separate But Equal and left the Democratic Party due to the passage of the Civil Rights Act at which point they, the Dixiecrats, moved to the Republican Party because of their "state's rights" platform.
The democrats have once again become the party of privilege. They give lip service to caring about regular people, but their actions prove them to be intolerable hypocrites. I'm not an enormous fan of republicans either, but right now, they have more dissenting voices than the democrats.
LOL! The Democrats are the ones who put up bills to help the low and middle class only to have McConnell keep them from a vote and the GOP passed that pro-wealthy tax cut under Trump. You've got to be fucking kidding.
LOL! Really? That conservatism is illiberal by definition has been debunked? That conservatives do not believe in inherent rights by definition has been debunked? If so, then those "conservatives" are liberals.
Hey ya never know Bissy ol' boy, maybe a new Civil War will come out of this and you can get the chance to fight the good fight from somewhere other than behind your keyboard.
I'm sure you'd love that, eh?
If conservatives are the enemy than liberals like you must be the enema.
After the last time that I stepped in a heaping pile of Biss someone told me that Biss is urban slang for "Bitch." Now there's some poetic justice eh pard.
Your name means bitch, you're a liberal with bunched up panties, all you do is bitch like a little bitch.
There might be a God after all buddy.
Toodles boot'ums!
As always I treasure our time together. Every reeking minute of it.
Thanks for giving the Tucker Carlson talking points on this issue..
1. Blacks are only 5% less likely to be vaccinated than whites and that is entirely related to income not opposition. Poor people have been the last to get vaccinated. And, the vast majority of willingly unvaccinated Americans have been proven to be misinformed on vaccines according to the research done by the Kaiser Family Foundation.
2. Pro Lifers are not "white Nazi Scum" I have never once seen that assertion made. The vast majority of Pro Lifers are Republicans. Their views on abortion come as a political position not a religions position as the bible barely mentions abortion. Matt has argued that the current Republican party is Fascist given it's corporate control but that is not the same as Nazi. I don't suppose you know those things do you?
3. Liberals advocate for a large number of solutions to the out of control gun violence problems that only the US suffers from. The gun control efforts are only one solution. They are also supporters of self defense classes against male rapists. As for woman packing heat to prevent rape you clearly are not aware that 70% of rapes in the US are done by someone the victim already knows.
The Bible doesn’t mention abortion, but it does mention God knowing us as individuals in the womb/before birth “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; before you were born I consecrated you”. Jeremiah 1:5 I’d say that serves as a guidepost for not cravenly killing the unborn.
Matt thank you as always for being intellectually courageous. And for keeping the comment sections a place for discourse!
Independence is needed once again, from the corruption that has happened to the systems that govern over our lives. What can we do to gain that independence back?
This Independence Day we must shift focus from fighting each other to fixing the corrupted systems that govern over all of our lives. This is something we should all agree on, and being the number one problem we face in America today, there is nothing more important:
You can't shift the focus from one another as there are a lot of people who support the Republican Party that has been eroding our rights for decades. Conservatives are the problem and the enemy of freedom as they reject the very concept of rights that liberalism is based on.
The conservative SCOTUS did what it has not power to do, nullify women's rights. Article III provide no such power and Alexander Hamilton stated as much in The Federalist #84. also the Ninth Amendment protects all unenumerated rights, such as a woman's right to control her own life that includes ending a pregnancy without state interference until the fetus' brain develops the capacity for mind, when it becomes a being that has rights too, and the right to privacy, the right to marry who will have you, the right to read the books that you want, to view movies that you want, etc.
To fix the inherent corruption, we need to remove conservatives from office to ensure that rights are secure.
Although I know you're a troll, please tell me how big government, bureaucracy, the administrative state, and limiting freedoms fixes this. And while you're at it, get off my lawn.
LOL! Government is a problem only in that conservatives control it. The conservative court just did something unconstitutional, that it has no authority to do, it nullified a right that women have inherently, that no one has the authority to grant nor nullify. Government's function is to protect rights as explained in the Declaration of Independence:
"That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed"
That government has failed to protect rights is due entirely to conservatives and conservatism. This is a perennial problem that requires conservatives to be removed from power.
Since you even admit that judges don't have the right to legislate (which is conservative, by the way), why didn't Obama's D Congress pass abortion into federal law? They had the power, and this would be the ultimate protection of that 'right,' yet they did not. And literally everyone knew Roe was on shaky ground - or there wouldn't be marches and massive fundraising for abortion rights.
I'd say government's function is to serve the people and not encroach on the rights that are enumerated in the Constitution specifically to limit government, but tomato-tomahto.
You need to read The Federalist #84 to see why I am correct about the unconstitutionality of the SCOTUS' decision and the Ninth Amendment that protects all unenumerated rights.
As a member of the feline community, cats and Bastet Herself would approve very much of cat worship.
At least Muslims as a rule are fond of cats. So are Russian people, for whatever reason. Feeding and caring for random cats was seen as a civic duty, and girls would capture and domesticate kittens each spring.
The media has been trying to shove two narratives on minorities at the same time (well, really all of us, but at the moment I'm focusing on minorities):
(1) The government along with all other American institutions are systemically racist and out to kill innocent minorities in droves simply for being minorities
AND
(2) You can trust the government to take care of you if you give up your guns.
1. There is empirical evidence of systemic racism in the US. The evidence does not show that "all institutions are racists". That is just your hyperbole. Are you saying that the media should hide the irrefutable emperical evidence of systemic racism in the US? Is that what you are saying?
2. 10 out of 10 of the nations ranked highest from Freedom on the Freedom Index have gun laws far more strict than in the US. So in 2022 there is no link what so ever to Freedom and gun ownership. If the people in countries that are ranked higher for FREEDOM than the US can trust their democratically elected governments the US should too. If you don't trust government stop voting for leaders that can't be trusted. Guns wont protect you from the government. Voting will.
Here's a good read with that proof of systemic racism: "Deep Roots: How Slavery Still Shapes Southern Politics" by Avidit Acharya, Matthew Blackwell and Maya Sen.
As for gun rights, that so many Americans consider guns so central to life is an indication of the rot in this country. People need to understand that Canada and Australia won their freedom without firing a shot and that when we won ours, the founders refused to grant to their black property and Indians the same rights that they fought for! America is founded on hypocrisy and idiocy.
I agree, it is rather stunning to watch Americans that don't want to believe that their is systemic racism in the country just ignore the facts.
I have to say it is delicious watching so many of these "systemic racisms does not exist" people posting on the Substack of a writer who wrote one of the best books i have ever read on systemic racism right in New York City..
Every country was founded on some form of idiocy.. That is what evolution is for, to weed it out. No?
"I have to say it is delicious watching so many of these "systemic racisms does not exist" people posting on the Substack of a writer who wrote one of the best books i have ever read on systemic racism right in New York City."
Spot on! I was very surprised to see so many conspiracy theorists and right wingers, conservatives and Trumpers here on a site of a journalist who actually does due diligence in his reporting and from my observations of his articles and interviews is a progressive liberal if not more specific, a progressive libertarian. Matt can correct me, of course, but that's my take on him.
If only evolution would weed out conservatives who've outlived their usefulness, if they ever had a usefulness.
We are destroying it all, wildlife populations have been in decline since humans started agriculture and we're heading to an extinction event that will rival any of the past ones due to climate change. We won't be here to rebuild though.
Even those who cry "systemic racism" can't really define it. It often comes across as things that one group pins entirely as a matter of race that could just as easily be construed as matters of economics, but regardless, when the media pushes "systemic racism," they are saying the *white* government is out to get you, and you need to defend yourself.
And then in the next breath they say "If you don't trust government stop voting for leaders that can't be trusted. Guns wont protect you from the government. Voting will." Because governments with an unarmed population are so trustworthy when it comes to not abusing their power. (I had to type that slowly because anybody with any knowledge of history would find that thought hysterical.) Ask yourselves, what two things did the slave owners in the south made sure the slaves could never do: have weapons and read.
As for the "Freedom" Index, statistics can be spun a million different ways but beyond that we've been living in a country that for the last two years at least has been telling people that to have "freedom" we have to give up rights or that "freedom" is a threat to "our democracy." Forgive me if anything those people put out that has "freedom" in the title like the "Freedom Index" I am a bit skeptical about. You only maintain your freedom if you can keep the government in its place. You don't really do that with paper and pen. The threat of chaos and violence is the ultimate bulwark against foul play by the greedy people in government if they take too much for themselves. You remove that bulwark and you might as well wipe your backside with the ballots because that's as much good as they will do you.
So tell me: if Kamala Harris, Barack Obama, or Ketanji Jackson Brown were white, would they have gotten where they did? If George Floyd had been white would his death have been even remarked upon? And would Chauvin have been prosecuted? (I can answer that one because a white man in Texas was killed under almost exactly the same circumstances at around the same time and even I can't remember his name.)
So if you really want to discuss "systemic racism," let's discuss "systemic racism." But you don't. If "systemic racism" exists in this country, it is the use of race to essentialize people to the color of their skin and turn them into a label for the benefit of those in power. That's not a subject that either you or "Piketty" want to broach.
I was working with a head hunter who told me of a job opportunity on Chicago's south side, but I wasn't interested in 100 mile round trip commute so I told him of some friends on the south side that I worked with who might be. He told me that his client wasn't interested in "people like that", if I knew what he meant. I did. Things have improved in the US since the signing of the Civil Rights Act but that doesn't mean that thee still is not systemic racism that can be identified and fixed, such as:
Also, read that "Deep Roots" book that I referenced previously.
I know of no one claiming that it exists who does not recognize that things have improved and some of the systemic issues are definitely not overt, but they are systemic, such as this:
Yes, it does. You're on an article discussing how black 2A advocates who occasionally march with "white supremacists/anarchists" (the Bugaloo Boys) are blowing a hole in the "gun control" narrative and all you can do is harass *another white person* about "systemic racism" to display how enlightened you are and how backward I am. Maybe go read the article and come back with an intelligent discussion that shows you learned something from it.
I remember when guns were an issue when blacks had them, as this article discusses. Then there's the reality of blacks having the same rights but having different outcomes as discussed here:
Why is it so difficult to admit that we still have problems with race? Understanding them only helps to fix them, ignoring and discounting them allows them to fester to no one's benefit.
Yeah, the problem is whether one agrees or not, people generally have a definition of what it is that they are referring to especially as "systemic racism" is treated as the subject in critical race theory. Lilia needs to read "Deep Roots: How Slavery Still Shapes Southern Politics" to see what social scientists do to verify their hypothesis.
<<Even those who cry "systemic racism" can't really define it.>>
Not true, Not even close. There are very clear forms of well defined and documented systemic racism. Even Harvard has identified numerous forms of clearly defined systematic racism in both housing and employment. I know of no academic studies on systemic racism that claim "the white government" is out to get you. Where did you get that notion, Rush Limbaugh?
<<Because governments with an unarmed population are so trustworthy when it comes to not abusing their power.>>
It is 2022 not 1822. In 2022 there are democracies all over the world that are ranked FAR higher than the US in the Freedom index and that have far stricter gun laws than the USA... In 2022 there is no correlation between freedom and citizen gun ownership. Allowing over 4,000 children per year, including kids sitting in their class rooms, being murdered by gun toting lunatics is not more freedom it is less freedom.
There is no evidence that the World Freedom index was invented to discourage gun laws in America. It has nothing to do with gun laws. It has to do with the globally defined terms of freedom across the board. The US leads industrialized democracies with gun ownership and gun violence but lags horrible in basic freedoms. Freedom to own a gun is not the only measure of freedom and when the gun owner uses it to shoot innocent people that gun ownership takes away freedom.
Your entire narrative is weak. As i said earlier all you have done is regurgitate talking points from your favorite right wing pundits.
Let me know when you can have a fact based and critical thinking focused dialogue on Freedom and systemic racism because your views on both are the reason the US is failing in how we treat black Americans, their freedom to pursue happiness and my freedom not to worry about my kids or my family being shot. And the government has more control over you and me than ever in history and gun ownership has not stoped that march one step.
We're failing in how we treat everyone in America. If you read people like Matt Taibbi instead of using the comments section to display your white virtue in understanding the "plight of the black man" you would understand that.
And did I say anywhere that the World "Freedom" index was invented to discourage gun laws? It was however invented to define "freedom" in a way that benefits a certain group.
And no having children murdered in a classroom by a lunatic does not make for more freedom, but neither does missing a bunch of signs that said person was a lunatic in an effort to be compassionate and then go after the guns of the general public all while claiming guns are the problem and not a general incompetence or cavalier attitude toward the mentally ill or our throwaway society that breeds violence and a general mental instability in people who feel discarded and at wit's end. The problem has never been the guns.
<We're failing in how we treat everyone in America>>> That may be true. But what does it have to do with systemic racism that you are claiming does not even have a definition?
<< If you read people like Matt Taibbi instead of using the comments section to display your white virtue in understanding the "plight of the black man" you would understand that.>>
Have you read Tiabbi's book "The Divid". It does an excellent job of showing systemic racism in NYC He has no lack of clarity on how to define 'systemic racism" or on the real world consequences to the freedom of young black men suffering from in in NYC. Seems like the only people i have ever heard claim their is no actual definition for system racism also be the ones that deny it.
<<the World "Freedom" index was invented to discourage gun laws? It was however invented to define "freedom" in a way that benefits a certain group.>>.
What "certain group" is that. And does that make the index irrelevant when measuring freedom between nations. Please point me to a better index.
<<And no having children murdered in a classroom by a lunatic does not make for more freedom, but neither does missing a bunch of signs >>
Every country ranking higher than the US on the freedom index has just as many lunatics running around as in the US. But in those countries society missing the signs does not end up with people at a parade or children in a classroom be violently murdered. Guns steal our freedom because too many people have access and there are to few laws around training, usage, mental opacity and responsibility of failures in any of these areas.
The debate on guns in the US is not over freedom, the evidence if irrefutable that in 2022 guns reduce freedom of citizens. It is over corporate profits, propaganda and tribal loyalty. Right?
1. It was black people who spoke out about the injustice that they feel and the media gave them a voice.
2. No one ever argued that, the discussion is about our violence, such as those that legally bought the guns that they used to commit mass murder, but nothing about the fact that most trafficked guns used in crimes are from lax law states, such as Indiana, that provide guns to tougher law states, such as Illinois.
The fact is that conservatives have promoted division since slavery, through Jim Crow through Separate But Equal through their whining about being left behind after the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Why work toward an inclusive society when you have guns?
LOL... conservatives have, huh? You might wanna put that particular schtick out of its misery, cuz that hound just don't hunt no more son.
I've never met a more racist group of people in my life than the liberal democrats in Bensonhurst, Little Odessa, Brighton Beach, The Upper East Side, The Bronx, Staten Island, West LA, Beverly Hills, et.al.
Well, unless you count all the racists in South Central that pull whitey from his car/truck and beat them to death. Hell, even the uberblue California has been voting down affirmative action for decades now everytime it makes it to a ballot (most recently just a couple of years ago while spitting invective at Trump for being racist).
It must be miserable going through life playing the victim, hoping someone will still buy into it anymore
LOL! That hound hunted and dragged out the conservatives, son. Those are conservatives son, they live around liberals and have opposed integration since the Emancipation, son.
You're living in the past boy. The sooner you realize that, the sooner you can stop living your life as a victim full of hate and delusion, and start living it as a productive human being that doesn't need to hustle "white guilt" to get by
Black people, huh? I wonder why most liberals overestimate the number of unarmed black men killed by cops at by about 50 times. Could it be the so-called media they rely on? But to put it bluntly, the message is.cops are dangerous to black people's health and life.
And I've lost track of the number of times I've heard people on the left say no civilian needs semiautomatic weapons (which nearly every gun is). Only cops and the military need those weapons. The implication is that those groups will protect people and not turn on them. So now cops are so trustworthy black people don't need guns and really shouldn't have them.
Explain to me how you make those two ideas work together.
And you do realize the Democrats were the party that tried to preserve slavery. That was literally the reason the party was formed. They were also the party that in the south instituted Jom Crow. You can say we can't judge the current party by its history, and I'd agree, but you show a willful ignorance about Democrats' role in past civil rights abuses against black people.
Actually, Jeff, it wasn't 50 times... The actual # of unarmed black men killed by cops in 2019, was 11. The figure comes courtesy of The Washington Post police shooting database. You know, that right-wing publication, so what do they know? Wait a minute...never mind.
About 44% of liberals think the number is 1000-10,000 a year, and 14% (1/3 of the 44%) put the # at 10,000. Either way, they overestimated by a factor of anywhere from 100-1000X. So, you're right, not 50. Sorry.
What's so perplexing is that this data is readily available on any number of sites, AND the WaPo, yet such a huge % of liberals are SO far off, it's laughable.
There is a problem with the media in that reporters aren't necessarily competent in their coverage of any given topic, which leads to misinformation, and they are not as thorough in providing support, such as presenting actual data and sources in their stories.
That said, Lillia's mention of what liberals believing something false had nothing to do with my statement of the media providing a forum that discussed how black people felt and perceived events, which most people still don't seem interested in.
With all due respect Jeff...What's your point when you say the number of police shootings is around 1000 a year?
According to the Police Officers Foundation, there are 375 million interactions annually between police and citizens. Assuming even 1000 police shootings, that means that, PRECISELY 99.99973% of police interactions end well. Tragic, of course (but remember, ~989 of those were ARMED), but statistically, that's incredibly safe policing.
"That some liberals believe that more unarmed black men are killed by police than actually are…" LOL. Talk about an understatement of biblical proportions. Not "some" liberals. Nearly HALF overestimate the number by a factor of 100. And the ONLY way that happens is when people get their news from ONE perspective, and that perspective deliberately avoids telling the truth.
And your statement about conservatives believing the crime rate is higher today than the 90s, so what? You're right: crime rates WERE higher then than they are now, but it's a classic strawman argument. I'm not making that comparison, and most people aren't.
But, even if some conservatives are saying that, it's totally besides the point. What matters is that you only have to go back about three years to see a significantly lower crime rate than we have today. And to pretend that crime isn't a FAR greater concern for most city-dwellers these days is burying your head in the sand.
And while I appreciate your acknowledgment that there is a problem in the media, I had to shake my head at your characterization.
Yes there definitely is incompetence and laziness in the progressive media, but to pretend that there isn't an overarching narrative the demands coverage of some stories (i.e., nonstop 24/7 coverage whenever a policeman shoots an unarmed black person), while completely ignoring far more important and tragic trends (i.e., the roughly 7500 to 8000 Black people killed by other Black people annually, which never gets a mention). Do those lives not matter?
By willfully ignoring that far more catastrophic trend trend, who're the real racists here? You mention your statement about "the media providing a forum that discussed how black people felt and perceived events, which most people still don't seem interested in." Really?? How do you think black people "felt and perceived the events" that took 8K of their own lives, at the HANDS of their own? And who wasn't interested in discussing that? Hint: D--m sure wasn't conservatives.
That's quite a characterization there. People who think abortion is evil don't tend to think of single *mothers* as "beneath... contempt." They might - and I say *might* - encourage those women to put their babies up for adoption rather than try to raise them in abject poverty (if that is the single mother's situation), or they might deplore the decision of a woman to have a baby outside a relationship since parents' being in a stable relationship is so important to children's well-being. Or they might think a woman is "beneath... contempt" for some other reason.
But they certainly wouldn't think the woman is "beneath... contempt" for her decision to have the baby rather than aborting it.
I've never heard that said on the "right-wing" media I read, but I agree we should have a contest because often, even in hyperbole, inconsistencies show up. On the right, I would say (1) abortion is evil and (2) everyone is on their own and we don't need to waste money on a social welfare net because with sufficient motivation anyone can succeed or they can get help from private charities. Granted I don't know a lot of anti-abortion/pro-life people (or at least not absolutists), but those I do know don't describe single mothers as trailer trash.
I love it. This morning I'm accused of being a righty because I'm not sufficiently pro-choice and this evening I think I'm accused of being a lefty ("for you in our so-called educated classes," I'm guessing is what you're trying to say, with "so-called educated" meaning Democrats/lefties/liberals/me) because I point out what I've heard frequently coming out of Republican/conservative mouths.
Well, I would like to disagree, but if we're talking the stereotypical "left" and by "trailer trash" mean white working class or white people left without work in the Midwest because factories went overseas . . . you have a point. Their disgust is almost palpable.
Despite the media's selective favoritism for only portraying those '2nd amendment activists' that fit their pre-concocted narrative, we are ALL 2nd amendment activists when we stand up for our Constitutional rights, regardless of skin color. We are one, and we are everywhere.
1. A former Marine, Robert F. Williams, formed a black NRA-sponsored rifle club in North Carolina during the Civil Rights Era. Suffice it to say that when the KKK came calling, the club members had the temerity to actually shoot back. The KKK, who had so often shown themselves to be real heroes when it came to mobbing defenseless people, proved to be less brave on that occasion.
2. The NRA actually supported tightening gun control laws, after Black Panthers started walking around armed in California in the 1960s. Governor Ronald Reagan signed what was then the most restrictive gun control laws in the nation at that time.
Funny how times change.
3. Contrary to MSM reporting, there are quite a few black militia members, sovereign citizens, and the like.
Also interesting to note how many white liberals champion the "Black Lives Matter" movement, but don't think that people of color (or anyone, for that matter) should have the right and ability to protect their own lives.
The underlying principles in this article are twofold:
1. The deterioration of capitalism into oligarchy, with the purposeful weaponized use of race, women's bodies, and economic depression to override the average person's sanity, patience, and ability to cooperate with one another regardless of difference.
2. Amplifying the use of violence as solution to a problem using America's main symbol, the gun. We are going to see a great deal more pissed off people using them in the next few years, but god forbid we start talking about solutions which do not involve violence, force, or "winning" a confrontation.
This should be in a manual somewhere, how to divide and conquer a weary public (most propagandized US population in five decades) by using CRT, US exceptionalism, and the evil boogeyman - Russia, Russia, Russia.
The sooner we acknowledge the problem is an internal one, full of rotten neoliberal and neoconservative elites running the economy, the public domain, and our country into the ground, the better.
Eighty years ago James Burnham wrote the Managerial Revolution - about the split between ownership of capital/corporations and control of them (being vested in a professional managerial class). That PMC is pretty much interchangeable with governmental bureaucracy - and in fact we see that each change of Administration. Wealth inequity is not the driving force in social deterioration, cultural dissolution is. This is a perfect example of that cultural dissolution - where the natural affinity of gun owners, black and white, must be kept from strengthening - by those who exploit fears on BOTH sides of the color barrier.
The left must learn that it can't force everything it wants down people's throats even though they dominate the institutions. Worse, the right must not emulate the left, as it tends to do whenever it sees the left being successful.
MASHPEE, Mass. (AP) _ President Bush suggested today that Saddam Hussein is more barbaric than Adolf Hitler and said he was ″more determined than ever″ to drive the Iraqi leader out of Kuwait.
The White House said Bush’s combative remarks were designed to prepare Americans for ″any eventuality″ in the three-month Persian Gulf standoff. ″We will not rule out the military option,″ spokesman Marlin Fitzwater told reporters.
Bush continued his tough rhetoric against Iraq in campaign appearances here and in the Boston suburb of Burlington, Mass., at the start of a six-day cross-country campaign blitz for endangered Republican candidates.
Bush, speaking to a GOP rally in an elementary school in this Cape Cod village, said Saddam’s detention of some 300 Americans in Iraq and occupied Kuwait is ″in direct contravention of international law.″
″They have committed outrageous acts of barbarism″ (daddy) Bush said of Saddam’s forces."
Should we throw in a few (I hate to call them journalist now) Julian assange, the guy living in Russian because he uploaded sensitive intel can not remember his name.
He's a definite boogeyman - the made up rape charges, assassination attempts in the Ecuadorian embassy, the testing of baby feces among Spanish intelligence --- its hard to really get back to how dangerous he was to the military establishment during this time.
Bradley Manning, torture, Abu Ghraib, Gina Haspel, Francis Fukuyama, and the entire PNAC crazy foreign policy network were having to play defense because Americans were being showed to the world for their actions (not the rhetoric of spreading democracy).
Assange ceased being human, but something the US felt as a real threat to be eliminated. The last few years like something out of a Harry Potter novel --- he's in the middle of a Cruciatus Curse" hanging in painful suspension for the public punishment at the whims of imperial dictates by evil overlords looking to extract revenge and put down a marker for any other truth tellers.
That's a pretty good list, kinda the greatest hits of the past 60 years. Absent a boogeyman, folks would start looking at our legislators and suddenly take real interest in the 2nd Amendment.
Why are Hammarskjold and Lumumba and the Kennedy Brothers and Dr. King on this list?
Otherwise, it is only lacking Mao, Pot Pol, Stalin and Kim Jon-Un's father to be a pretty comprehensive list of the leading killer dictators of the last 75 years.
At one point they were all culturally boogeymen in this society until their deaths where the entire intelligence apparatus changed their tune from neo-McCarthy anti-communism to a more whitewashed humanist (not unlike Biden or recent Ellen DeGeneres or Michelle Obama Bush artworks in whitewash). We see this most with MLK day, where the genuflecting over his legacy is embarrassing by those in power --- while his words still sting to this day over Vietnam, the US war machine and its implications for humanity, poverty, and those all over the world experiencing free trade at the barrel of a gun or debt repayment blackmail at the hands of the World Bank.
If one cannot see how Boogeymen evolve and change within the center of US imperial power, then understanding this list is harder. It's the evolution of our arrangements which creates the boogeyman (full on, half way or john come lately). In fact, most dictators we installed, eventually we then deem them evil. And then vice versa, if you look at how we trained Al Queda for the Balkans wars or in Syria.
Hammarsjkold was more of an internal threat who had great public relations but he still died in a plane crash, shot in the head with the Ace of Spades card put in his collar - and photographed courtesy of Allen Dulles. So, he was a boogeyman but to corporate interests in the Katanga mines (Rockefeller mining interests).
The Wuhan or "Chinese virus" purposeful claims by US officials did a great deal of damage and minimized our own gain of function research (reminding us of the history of these programs starting with testing on US populations different chemicals all the way to the memory hole of anthrax post-9/11).
Some pretty sick stuff to blame an entire country when your own country is neck deep in chemical, biological espionage.
I was in Wuhan in December, 2019, and got stuck in Wuhan and Hubei for another 10 months in 2020. There's a lot to know that is not in any of the popularly flogged idiocies in our media. Proving anything means exposing oneself to stuff no sane person is going to expose themselves to.
Not destroyed - simply recognized as the enemy that they are. The U.S. has been Beijing's bitch for the last 30+ years - and I don't see that getting any better for the next 2 1/2 years. Peaceful coexistence works for me - but I don't think that's on the menu in the long run.
Back during the Rodney King riots, we saw the full measure of what the 2nd amendment was really about. Because it is two parts, both the famous "shall not be infringed" which is infringed every fucking day in this country, but the "well regulated militia." Roof Top Koreans.
And this has been shown all up and down the time line; Said Rooftop Koreans? Militia. BLM? Militia. Kyle Rittenhouse? One man militia. In fact, any group that convenes together to provide for its
defense is a militia, simply because the whole point of the 2nd was to eliminate the gov't monopoly on violence. And each of those things I mentioned, which are but a fraction of the incidences of this need throughout history, are the citizens ensuring their liberty when the gov't has abdicated its claimed responsibility. Here in Oregon, during the battle of Portland and the wellspring of Antifa into the surrounding communities, we saw (you had to really look for any news coverage) streets blocked off by groups of residents. Remember Missouri, and he two lawyers defending their home? That is what this whole thing is about.
When BLM gathers together to protect their communities, as we see above in the videos, they are taking part in a tradition going back to the end of slavery. The point of Well Regulated is simply to say that they aren't a mob, and are acting in concert, however loosely.
I remember during the Ferguson riots what should have been an absolutely iconic photograph-but wasn’t b/c of what this article was about. A multiracial group of tattoo artists were posed in front their shop, protecting it from looters, with an American flag in the window, AR-15s in hand.
It goes against the narrative. As I understand it Democrats worked hard for years to keep blacks disarmed in the South. We all have the right to defend ourselves.
As I recall, Harriet Tubman's most famous image was scrubbed of the gun she was carrying. That which does not comply with The Narrative will be erased or ignored!
"Tubman displayed extraordinary courage, persistence, and iron discipline, which she enforced upon her charges. If anyone decided to turn back—thereby endangering the mission—she reportedly threatened them with a gun and said, “You’ll be free or die.” "
"ARMED NEGROES PROTEST GUN BILL; 30 Black Panthers Invade Sacramento Legislature Lawmakers Startled. With loaded rifles and shotguns in their hands, members of the antiwhite Black Panther party marched into the state Capitol today. A leader announced they were protesting new gun legislation scheduled for consideration by an Assembly committee." - New York Times, May 3, 1967.
Frederick Douglass once stated, “A man’s rights rest in three boxes: the ballot box, the jury box, and the cartridge box.”
I remember reading that sales of guns soared in traditional black cities like Philadelphia following the 2020 BLM riots and protests.
For all the associations with conservative whites, gun ownership remains very real among black Americans too. A nice reminder that we have much more common in our shared diversity than some would like to think.
If I was a black citizen living in one of these urban war zones I'd be crazy not to have a loaded shotgun within easy reach.
As many are pointing out here, the lickspittle corporate press has advanced the idea that only black thugs and gang members are armed, not regular black citizens. Demonstrations like the one Taibbi reports on here and the vaporings of the Black Panthers and other black Marxist groups don't help matters since they are highly visible and therefore an easy propaganda tool for both left and right.
I often read/hear comments like "Wait until Black people start arming themselves, then you'll see how fast the U.S. gets strict gun control laws." But...
That one cracks me up because they seem to think it's a gotcha. When I took my gun safety training, it was taught by black people. When I had specialized training - he was Asian. Somehow they live in such a silo, they believe the propoganda. 🤷♀️
So true, Laura. I took some pistol training from the "13 Hours" defenders who survived Benghazi and now are teaching their hard-won skills to civilians. That crew was white, black, and brown. They protected innocent lives in Benghazi because they had weapons and knew how to use them, and now they're teaching the rest of us what they know. My class was 14 people, white, brown, black, Asian, male, and female.
The "gun culture" that MSM so often derides is a safe and friendly place, and my liberality was as welcome as other shooters' MAGAism. We got along fine.
Because you all had a higher purpose of unifying and preserving your liberties and freedoms -from the cunt with the gun or the knife trying to rob and murder your family to the marching Nazi boots of whatever central power happens to be trying to control the people.
Well, California had unrestrictive gun laws, until the Black Panthers started walking around with rifles. Then California (R. Reagan, governor) adopted much stricter gun laws pronto, with the support of the NRA.
That was 55 years ago. To pretend that today's race relations even remotely resemble 1967 is a bogus argument. It would be like me pointing out Dems were the ones pushing Jim Crows laws.
If they had a CC-which means they do not have a felony, and would presumably not wish to lose the CC by committing a felony in the future, I think they would get along well with MAGA types.
It is very important to remind people that Democrats were the primary architects of Jim Crow laws when they now constantly harp about the legacy of slavery and racism and pretend there is a “new Jim Crow” every few months created by Republicans. The Democratic Party is gaslighting and promoting delusional beliefs. Race relations certainly don’t resemble 1967, but the Democratic Party would like their voters to believe that.
I wonder if that's an argument for how quickly the US would ban militant Lefties who are also Black from gun ownership than Black people who are not necessarily militant Lefties.
People keep going on about it meaning a lot when they talk about the NRA in that context, but they had a complete changing of the guard during a leadership "coup" in 1977. At the time the rank and file members were pissed at the organizations support of gun control. Now the organization is just headed by crooks who defraud its members. Oh wait, I almost forgot my obligatory fuck Ronald Regan comment.
those comments are usually made by some upscale urban liberal or a blue-check Twitterati, who never stop talking about black people but don't seem to know any.
Mary Anne Imelda isn't making the argument you think she is. She's suggesting that America is such an irredeemably racist place that as soon as black people and other minorities start openly arming themselves, current gun rights advocates will change their tune.
I don't buy it. No doubt it would be true of some individuals, but it's not 1966 anymore, regardless of what Ibram Kendi says.
Around here, we are arming Hispanics and lesbians and Hispanic lesbians.
Firearms are a great equalizer, particularly for "vulnerable populations." William S. Burroughs wrote a story about a gay man who unapologetically shot some would-be gay bashers in self-defense. I hate that our media would rather have a dead victim than a dead perpetrator.
That is not my argument. I'm pointing out that Black people ARE arming (also, white children ARE dying from guns) and still no significant changes are on the horizon
Change is happening though. Now (as of last week) urban black Americans should enjoy the same legal access to self defense as flyover whites have for decades.
Too much money is being made and too many political careers are being elevated by the “white racism” trope being shoved down America’s throat. The designated scape goat for this madness is the white redneck Trump voter. Anything that confuses or threatens this projected psychosis is suppressed and eliminated from consciousness by the psychosis profiteers.
The Galilean scientific revolution threatened the Church authority which had produced enormous riches, and predictably was suppressed and persecuted by reactionary Church authority. What we have here is no different. Any empirical, fact-based narratives that threaten the current “white racist gun owners” myth is a danger to empowered politicians and the economic/academic/media structures that profit from the madness.
It’s not complicated. It’s a social psychosis that has taken over the cultural operating system and economic institutions the way human sacrifice of war captives took over the Aztec approach to petitioning their Lord with prayer for salvation. Why so many people buy into the bullshit and propagate it — that’s a little more complicated.
Matt, this is pretty typical left wing behavior these days.
It was mirrored in the left's characterization of anti-vaxxers as white Trump loving racists when, in reality, a huge chunk of the vaccine wary were black folk.
It's also mirrored in the "pro-lifers are white Nazi Republican scum" when, in this crazy place called reality, a hell of lot of black folk were anti-abortion. They understood that those 19 million black babies that have been aborted since the 70s are just another face of genocide.
As far as guns go, if liberals really care about raped women why aren't they pushing for self defense classes in public schools. Or even gun safety classes since, every year, many rapes are prevented because the woman was packing heat.
Either one of these classroom experiences would benefit kids a hell of a lot more than teaching them that "men can get pregnant too."
At the end of the day I think it is quite obvious that the Dems only want victims as their clientele. Victims seem to be much easier to manipulate for votes.
Team D is the class power of the PMC made manifest.
Various victims and grievance groups represent junior partners in the Team D coalition.
Were Team R to break up, or Team D left as the sole national political party, I suspect that the various groups making up the Team D coalition would quickly discover that they do not have all that much really in common, and in fact do not even like each other all that much.
Something similar could be said for Team R, FWIW, although the members of the coalition are different.
This is so true. Anyone that's ever inadvertently experienced a Team D struggle session can clearly see they don't like each other, at all. It's a purity struggle, i.e., who's cobbled together the most comprehensive hollow abstraction of an ideology?
"It's a purity struggle, i.e., who's cobbled together the most comprehensive hollow abstraction of an ideology?"
Exactly. The most "out there" theorist invariably wins. That's how we got Gender Identity Theory.
Purity Struggle is spot on. It's not a big tent, it's a big cage. The only logical destination is to eat their own or end up in Jonestown.
I would say the Team R is far more likely to kill one another. You have the self righteous evangelicals who can't wait to put women chastity belts while the men on Team R are sleeping with hookers every chance they can get. Team R if filled with the most morally degenerate generation of Americans (personified by Trump) and the most aggressive authoritarian Fundamentalists in the world next to the Jihad loving Muslims ruling the middle east. Good luck trying to get the Trump loving psudo masculine adoring men that lead the R team to live by the rules the way Falwell JR did at his university while he was out whoring around to any woman that was taking the bait.
Oh... and they are all funded by the equally hedonistic Oligarchs ... What could go wrong?
The one and only thing that unites them all is that they consume media daily that tells them that no matter what they need to HATE LIBERALS.
I dunno, the evangelicals seem plenty willing to make excuses for Trump and others.
FF
You are 100% correct. They are totally willing to make excuses for anything until they get power. But once they have the power the excuses for the common folk end. Killing Roe is the perfect example.
History shows that the evangelicals will always make excuses for their leaders doing anything they want, morality is irrelevant for their leaders in government or of their churches. But for the common folk, they will rule with an iron fist.
That is where the fight begins.. I don't see most R's rolling around with their semi automatic weapons and "toxic masculinity" being told by the Police to start acting like God Fearing Christians.
We can argue details later (Team D cultists are still making excuses for Obama) but that doesn't mean that an internal civil war is more likely to start in Team R vs Team D.
But it wouldn't matter, as Team R and Team D need each other, or there's no excuse not to give their coalition everything they want, now. Or think of it as sports rivals, and how they feed off the rivalry. You can make a perfectly bankable Batman movie without Robin, but you can't make one without The Joker.
Good analysis
Here is where i am going to give you push back. Team R stands for nothing other than hating team D. Team R is very organized and active at a grass roots level which is very powerful. But deep down they don't stand for anything other than HATING THE LIBS. The grass roots is very well organized because they are funded by the oligarchs like the Koch brothers and the Mercers and more recently Peter Theil and Elon Musk.
The D's are organizing but they don't have the Oligarch funding and organizing. So the D's are going to have to organize by compelling and inspiring action over issues that are truly important to supporters. Whether it was protests of George Floyds murder or union organizing at Starbucks and Amazon the left is slowly starting to organize. It will take them longer than the right. The Tea Party was formed in 2008 and by 2016 they got their guy elected President and took over the Republican Party.
With out the kind of funding from Oligarchs the left will take longer to organize, but it will be more authentic because they are fighting for something real not just "Hating the R's". The only D's who's only world vision is to Hate the R's are the CNN /MSNBC watching, Jan 6th trial loving elderly who are dying off anyway.
You are right there will be a battle. I think the next decade will seem much like the late 60's. The George Floyd protests were just the start.
Not left wing, but liberals. Huge difference.
Well, liberal also used to mean sane and fair policy initiatives. Liberal democracy meant rational and reasonable policies benefitting everyone. It's only the last coupla decades where liberal came to mean what most folks think it does now. Same with Conservative; it used to mean rational, reasonable, incremental adjustments/improvements to policy. Now, it's Ted Cruz wrapping his automatic weapon in bacon or what's her face decrying the separation between church and state.
Exactly. Both terms - "liberal" and "conservative" have become utterly meaningless. They have been reduced to sports teams, and most people either firmly root for one or the other, regardless of how morally bankrupt, ideologically inconsistent and blatantly self-serving those labels have become.
It's been a high school/college rivalry sport since 2000. Gone are the days of compromise.
liberty vs tyranny has much more explantory power on a persons position these dsys.
Agreed. Unfortunately both sides engage in a fair bit of the latter these days, while wrapping themselves in jingoism about the former.
They hate and fear anyone not in their party, and view authoritarianism as the only solution.
You're right about them being "morally bankrupt" ... we have liberals; conservatives; and both neoliberal and neoconservative (I would say those are the labels for RINOs and DINOs except I refuse to give the trumpdiot any credit for the word salad he regularly vomits) which are nothing more than labels they have made up to explain their nonexistent differences.
Very well said, Kurtocracy. I am a liberal, not a leftist, and my definition mirrors how you describe it here: rational, reasonable, and not wasting good bacon wrapping it around a gun barrel as a red-hat stunt.
Thnx much.
“Used to” being the the key modifier.
Yeah, I know. But nobody, as far as I know, has come to an agreement on a suitable descriptive term . I was just proceeding under the assumption that anyone here would already understand the nuances.
Also, that liberal category may describe the politicians but I think most of their foot soldiers and tweeter warriors completely self identify as progressive left.
The left that you're referring to are now seen by those folk as being little more than Republicans.
'woke left' seems to hit for many, just enough daylight there to not incriminate everyone
Best description I’ve found.
Words matter.
Labels matter.
And, "define your terms".
The only way forward.
Phil Ochs knew the score!
I cried when they shot mr. kennedy
As though i'd lost a father of mine
But malcolm x got what was coming
https://youtu.be/3cdqQ2BdgOA
Always preferred Woody Guthrie.
"Left wing, right wing, chicken wing. I ain't no red but I've lived in the red most of my life."
At least I think it was Woody Guthrie. I suppose I could google it but I like living on the edge.
Guthrie was a genius. So yeah.
Malcolm was murdered (assassinated) with the help of the police and FBI, Bill. They covered up what happened for many decades.
He did not get "what was coming," unless you endorse those things.
I don't!
This song, and these lines were not written to support the assignation of Malcolm. Quite the contrary. It was meant as a put down on the equivocal morals of liberals who condemn and condone the same acts depending on who the target was.
Exactly. Thank you.
The enduring mystery: Just with whom was Malcolm's assignation?
I don't have a problem with your comment, Joy. We should all condemn political assassinations. But that was not Bill Owen's comment. He said that Malcolm "got what was coming!" Let's be very very clear about this, alright?!
He endorsed the assassination of Malcolm X!
If you agree or disagree, say so...
I won't let anyone on this forum get away with saying that about Malcolm!
Bill was quoting a song by Phil Ochs. Please go have a listen to it, as you clearly have not heard it before and have missed the context entirely. It's called "Love Me, I'm a Liberal." I would link to it but I don't know the policies here. It's a great song, as are all of Phil Ochs and you have a treat ahead of you if you do listen to his songs.
Listen to the song linked.
Hell! You're right. I listened. My deepest apologies, Bill and Joy. I feel pretty stupid right now!
Please, both of you, except my sincerest apologies. I behaved like a dumb jackass!
I'm sorry...
Saying you’re sorry when you’ve made a mistake is the sign of strong character.
Maybe the world would be a better place if more people were willing to say things like “I’m sorry, I was wrong” and “will you forgive me for this mistake?”
No worries. I should have put quotes.
Not every knows that song, nor should they! :)
I was thinking Phil Ochs all the way when reading the comments about liberals and them being leftists.
the reboot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQ8ERBr9yKI
Not liberals, but people who identify as liberal. Maybe we can call them transliberals? It kind of works because Matt is clearly a member of the privileged and bigoted cisliberal patriarchy.
What? How?
Yup. Victim is just another word for prole.
Hmmm...I thought victim was another word for nothin' left to lose.
Also yes.
They can cynically use victims to push a political agenda, but not as much if a would-be victim shoots a perp in self-defense.
It's right wing. Get off that Reagan-era crack pipe.
What you see is the end and slide back down of RIGHT WING SECULARISM.
It's like the equivalent to the right wing religious hey day when that cunt Bill O'Reilly commanded market share.
They're losing their grip, and the right wing religitards are rising -if we let them.
Could be that this just cycles back and forth for eternity, but in the middle we may get some fucking common sense in there to help the common good of the silent majority.
So... will you still call Joe Biden, who is to the right of Henry Kissinger, a "Liberal"? He's obviously not.
If I slapped a rainbow flag label on a bomb and took photo ops or tweeted on behalf of the CIA with pride month platitudes would you call that.... LEFT WING?
I wouldn't.
Again, the left wing you're referring to would be called "right wing" by the left wing that you're calling right wing.
Or we can spin & twirl & do si do reach down low and grab yer big toe.
Personally don't give a shit what "wing" they are. I'm just tired of watching them fly in a tight little circle while they shit on my car.
So what are we going to do about it?
Independence is needed once again, from the corruption that has happened to the systems that govern over our lives. What can we do to gain that independence back?
This Independence Day we must shift focus from fighting each other to fixing the corrupted systems that govern over all of our lives. This is something we should all agree on, and being the number one problem we face in America today, there is nothing more important:
Article: https://joshketry.substack.com/p/happy-independence-day?r=7oa9d&utm_medium=ios
Video/Audio:
https://youtu.be/m_biuzQRtGU
Put down the pipe.
LOL! Conservatism is based on victimization, from the rephrasing of the Civil War as a War of Northern Aggression to accusing the media of being biased against conservatives. Victimization is the conservatives go-to whine. The problem with the Dems is that they refuse to fight the enemy, the conservatives as the conservatives fight all things liberal.
Conservatives are the enemy, always have been, from slavery to unconstitutionally nullifying women's rights.
You should learn some more about history. Many, many democrats owned slaves, and Abraham Lincoln was a Republican. The Reoublican party emerged in 1854 to combat the expansion of slavery into American territories. To try to blame your political enemies for slavery is not only ludicrous, it's just wrong. Also, to call Dobbs "unconstitutional" shows a profound ignorance of the substance of the Constitution, no matter what you think of the decision.
You should pay attention to history, the problem is conservatism, not the particular party, but their composition. The Southern Democrats were conservative, supported slavery, then Jim Crow, then Separate But Equal and left the Democratic Party due to the passage of the Civil Rights Act at which point they, the Dixiecrats, moved to the Republican Party because of their "state's rights" platform.
Conservatism is the enemy. They are illiberal by definition and do not believe in rights, only privilege (https://theimaginativeconservative.org/2020/06/edmund-burke-rights-inherited-owen-edwards.html).
The democrats have once again become the party of privilege. They give lip service to caring about regular people, but their actions prove them to be intolerable hypocrites. I'm not an enormous fan of republicans either, but right now, they have more dissenting voices than the democrats.
LOL! The Democrats are the ones who put up bills to help the low and middle class only to have McConnell keep them from a vote and the GOP passed that pro-wealthy tax cut under Trump. You've got to be fucking kidding.
It must be comforting to believe the partisan bullshit. Have fun with that.
This had been debunked so many times. That's the problem with partisans. They will believe any lie that supports their view.
LOL! Really? That conservatism is illiberal by definition has been debunked? That conservatives do not believe in inherent rights by definition has been debunked? If so, then those "conservatives" are liberals.
Now do liberalism.
Yadda yadda blah blah blah Bissy. I don't care.
Hey ya never know Bissy ol' boy, maybe a new Civil War will come out of this and you can get the chance to fight the good fight from somewhere other than behind your keyboard.
I'm sure you'd love that, eh?
If conservatives are the enemy than liberals like you must be the enema.
After the last time that I stepped in a heaping pile of Biss someone told me that Biss is urban slang for "Bitch." Now there's some poetic justice eh pard.
Your name means bitch, you're a liberal with bunched up panties, all you do is bitch like a little bitch.
There might be a God after all buddy.
Toodles boot'ums!
As always I treasure our time together. Every reeking minute of it.
LOL! The incel doesn't care. Go back to trying to blow yourself.
So Bissy are all of the skank ho-bags in your family bumming large now that they can't murder the little retards that tend to fester in a Biss womb?
I guess you'll have to go back to wearing a condom when you prong the grandkids.
Not to worry you can always just make the bitches blow ya.
From what I've heard all Biss bitches excel at cocksucking.
I'm a gonna leave you with a little Malcolm X wisdom.
"The biggest danger to the American Negro is the white liberal groomer."
So true...so true.
OK, so you can't reach yourself and now you're all pissy. Baby.
Beware steaming horse apples. Ew more Biss on the side of the road
You sound like a college freshman.
OK, so it's too much for you. Sorry, I'll dumb it down next time, just for you.
Spider
Thanks for giving the Tucker Carlson talking points on this issue..
1. Blacks are only 5% less likely to be vaccinated than whites and that is entirely related to income not opposition. Poor people have been the last to get vaccinated. And, the vast majority of willingly unvaccinated Americans have been proven to be misinformed on vaccines according to the research done by the Kaiser Family Foundation.
2. Pro Lifers are not "white Nazi Scum" I have never once seen that assertion made. The vast majority of Pro Lifers are Republicans. Their views on abortion come as a political position not a religions position as the bible barely mentions abortion. Matt has argued that the current Republican party is Fascist given it's corporate control but that is not the same as Nazi. I don't suppose you know those things do you?
3. Liberals advocate for a large number of solutions to the out of control gun violence problems that only the US suffers from. The gun control efforts are only one solution. They are also supporters of self defense classes against male rapists. As for woman packing heat to prevent rape you clearly are not aware that 70% of rapes in the US are done by someone the victim already knows.
get a clue
The Bible doesn’t mention abortion, but it does mention God knowing us as individuals in the womb/before birth “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; before you were born I consecrated you”. Jeremiah 1:5 I’d say that serves as a guidepost for not cravenly killing the unborn.
If Black Lives Matter, maybe they should comment on the statistic that more black babies are aborted in NYC every year than are born alive….
Black Mansions Matter!
Matt thank you as always for being intellectually courageous. And for keeping the comment sections a place for discourse!
Independence is needed once again, from the corruption that has happened to the systems that govern over our lives. What can we do to gain that independence back?
This Independence Day we must shift focus from fighting each other to fixing the corrupted systems that govern over all of our lives. This is something we should all agree on, and being the number one problem we face in America today, there is nothing more important:
Article: https://joshketry.substack.com/p/happy-independence-day?r=7oa9d&utm_medium=ios
Video/Audio:
https://youtu.be/m_biuzQRtGU
Quit advertising under the guise of commenting, yo.
You can't shift the focus from one another as there are a lot of people who support the Republican Party that has been eroding our rights for decades. Conservatives are the problem and the enemy of freedom as they reject the very concept of rights that liberalism is based on.
The conservative SCOTUS did what it has not power to do, nullify women's rights. Article III provide no such power and Alexander Hamilton stated as much in The Federalist #84. also the Ninth Amendment protects all unenumerated rights, such as a woman's right to control her own life that includes ending a pregnancy without state interference until the fetus' brain develops the capacity for mind, when it becomes a being that has rights too, and the right to privacy, the right to marry who will have you, the right to read the books that you want, to view movies that you want, etc.
To fix the inherent corruption, we need to remove conservatives from office to ensure that rights are secure.
Although I know you're a troll, please tell me how big government, bureaucracy, the administrative state, and limiting freedoms fixes this. And while you're at it, get off my lawn.
LOL! Government is a problem only in that conservatives control it. The conservative court just did something unconstitutional, that it has no authority to do, it nullified a right that women have inherently, that no one has the authority to grant nor nullify. Government's function is to protect rights as explained in the Declaration of Independence:
"That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed"
That government has failed to protect rights is due entirely to conservatives and conservatism. This is a perennial problem that requires conservatives to be removed from power.
Again with the LOLs!
Since you even admit that judges don't have the right to legislate (which is conservative, by the way), why didn't Obama's D Congress pass abortion into federal law? They had the power, and this would be the ultimate protection of that 'right,' yet they did not. And literally everyone knew Roe was on shaky ground - or there wouldn't be marches and massive fundraising for abortion rights.
I'd say government's function is to serve the people and not encroach on the rights that are enumerated in the Constitution specifically to limit government, but tomato-tomahto.
You need to read The Federalist #84 to see why I am correct about the unconstitutionality of the SCOTUS' decision and the Ninth Amendment that protects all unenumerated rights.
PS, I'm also saying if no abortion was such a big deal to Rs, they could have codified it with GWB and an R Congress.
So maybe marches and fundraising and "the most important election of our time!!!!!!!!!!" are the point.
This. ☝️☝️
Are you also a cat? Personally, I hate water.
Arizona wants you....:)
Egypt. Ancient Egypt had the right attitude towards cats.
Might as well go back to cat worship. What’s the worst that could happen?
At least cats do useful shit.
As a member of the feline community, cats and Bastet Herself would approve very much of cat worship.
At least Muslims as a rule are fond of cats. So are Russian people, for whatever reason. Feeding and caring for random cats was seen as a civic duty, and girls would capture and domesticate kittens each spring.
The media has been trying to shove two narratives on minorities at the same time (well, really all of us, but at the moment I'm focusing on minorities):
(1) The government along with all other American institutions are systemically racist and out to kill innocent minorities in droves simply for being minorities
AND
(2) You can trust the government to take care of you if you give up your guns.
The messaging doesn't quite work.
Hey.. if god didn't want them sheared, he wouldn't have made them sheep
Will of the sheeple.
This is a Magnificent comment :-)
There are a number of reasons Jesus called us “sheep” and “goats.” They are highly relevant here.
We certainly need a Good Shepherd. We have gone astray, each to their own way.
"What's behind the taboo?" Gee, let's see...
That would be hilarious if it wasn't so pathetic--and from Taibbi?
I can see you were having trouble with the "system error" message too. :-)
It's a rhetorical question.
Lillia
1. There is empirical evidence of systemic racism in the US. The evidence does not show that "all institutions are racists". That is just your hyperbole. Are you saying that the media should hide the irrefutable emperical evidence of systemic racism in the US? Is that what you are saying?
2. 10 out of 10 of the nations ranked highest from Freedom on the Freedom Index have gun laws far more strict than in the US. So in 2022 there is no link what so ever to Freedom and gun ownership. If the people in countries that are ranked higher for FREEDOM than the US can trust their democratically elected governments the US should too. If you don't trust government stop voting for leaders that can't be trusted. Guns wont protect you from the government. Voting will.
Here's a good read with that proof of systemic racism: "Deep Roots: How Slavery Still Shapes Southern Politics" by Avidit Acharya, Matthew Blackwell and Maya Sen.
As for gun rights, that so many Americans consider guns so central to life is an indication of the rot in this country. People need to understand that Canada and Australia won their freedom without firing a shot and that when we won ours, the founders refused to grant to their black property and Indians the same rights that they fought for! America is founded on hypocrisy and idiocy.
JB
I agree, it is rather stunning to watch Americans that don't want to believe that their is systemic racism in the country just ignore the facts.
I have to say it is delicious watching so many of these "systemic racisms does not exist" people posting on the Substack of a writer who wrote one of the best books i have ever read on systemic racism right in New York City..
Every country was founded on some form of idiocy.. That is what evolution is for, to weed it out. No?
"I have to say it is delicious watching so many of these "systemic racisms does not exist" people posting on the Substack of a writer who wrote one of the best books i have ever read on systemic racism right in New York City."
Spot on! I was very surprised to see so many conspiracy theorists and right wingers, conservatives and Trumpers here on a site of a journalist who actually does due diligence in his reporting and from my observations of his articles and interviews is a progressive liberal if not more specific, a progressive libertarian. Matt can correct me, of course, but that's my take on him.
If only evolution would weed out conservatives who've outlived their usefulness, if they ever had a usefulness.
Destroy it all and rebuild---details to follow.
We are destroying it all, wildlife populations have been in decline since humans started agriculture and we're heading to an extinction event that will rival any of the past ones due to climate change. We won't be here to rebuild though.
Several things wrong with this.
Even those who cry "systemic racism" can't really define it. It often comes across as things that one group pins entirely as a matter of race that could just as easily be construed as matters of economics, but regardless, when the media pushes "systemic racism," they are saying the *white* government is out to get you, and you need to defend yourself.
And then in the next breath they say "If you don't trust government stop voting for leaders that can't be trusted. Guns wont protect you from the government. Voting will." Because governments with an unarmed population are so trustworthy when it comes to not abusing their power. (I had to type that slowly because anybody with any knowledge of history would find that thought hysterical.) Ask yourselves, what two things did the slave owners in the south made sure the slaves could never do: have weapons and read.
As for the "Freedom" Index, statistics can be spun a million different ways but beyond that we've been living in a country that for the last two years at least has been telling people that to have "freedom" we have to give up rights or that "freedom" is a threat to "our democracy." Forgive me if anything those people put out that has "freedom" in the title like the "Freedom Index" I am a bit skeptical about. You only maintain your freedom if you can keep the government in its place. You don't really do that with paper and pen. The threat of chaos and violence is the ultimate bulwark against foul play by the greedy people in government if they take too much for themselves. You remove that bulwark and you might as well wipe your backside with the ballots because that's as much good as they will do you.
"Even those who cry "systemic racism" can't really define it."
Bullshit:
- https://www.thoughtco.com/systemic-racism-3026565
- https://www.today.com/tmrw/what-systemic-racism-t207878
- https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/systemic-racism
So tell me: if Kamala Harris, Barack Obama, or Ketanji Jackson Brown were white, would they have gotten where they did? If George Floyd had been white would his death have been even remarked upon? And would Chauvin have been prosecuted? (I can answer that one because a white man in Texas was killed under almost exactly the same circumstances at around the same time and even I can't remember his name.)
So if you really want to discuss "systemic racism," let's discuss "systemic racism." But you don't. If "systemic racism" exists in this country, it is the use of race to essentialize people to the color of their skin and turn them into a label for the benefit of those in power. That's not a subject that either you or "Piketty" want to broach.
I was working with a head hunter who told me of a job opportunity on Chicago's south side, but I wasn't interested in 100 mile round trip commute so I told him of some friends on the south side that I worked with who might be. He told me that his client wasn't interested in "people like that", if I knew what he meant. I did. Things have improved in the US since the signing of the Civil Rights Act but that doesn't mean that thee still is not systemic racism that can be identified and fixed, such as:
https://cph.osu.edu/news/2020/06/racism-public-health
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/the-evidence-on-systemic-racism-is-complex-and-conservatives-cant-ignore-it
Also, read that "Deep Roots" book that I referenced previously.
I know of no one claiming that it exists who does not recognize that things have improved and some of the systemic issues are definitely not overt, but they are systemic, such as this:
https://www.ibtimes.com/why-more-black-engineers-arent-being-hired-silicon-valley-2178221
Evaluating the situation to identify where it still exists and fixing those instances are necessary for equal opportunity.
JB
That is the kind of throw away line people use when they are merely regurgitating what they heard from a pundit.
But in their mind they truly believe it. Propaganda works! Lillia is a perfect example
Yes, it does. You're on an article discussing how black 2A advocates who occasionally march with "white supremacists/anarchists" (the Bugaloo Boys) are blowing a hole in the "gun control" narrative and all you can do is harass *another white person* about "systemic racism" to display how enlightened you are and how backward I am. Maybe go read the article and come back with an intelligent discussion that shows you learned something from it.
LOL! Oh come on now! I was alive when this went down:
https://www.history.com/news/black-panthers-gun-control-nra-support-mulford-act
I remember when guns were an issue when blacks had them, as this article discusses. Then there's the reality of blacks having the same rights but having different outcomes as discussed here:
https://www.ebony.com/news/gun-rights-black-people/
Why is it so difficult to admit that we still have problems with race? Understanding them only helps to fix them, ignoring and discounting them allows them to fester to no one's benefit.
Yeah, the problem is whether one agrees or not, people generally have a definition of what it is that they are referring to especially as "systemic racism" is treated as the subject in critical race theory. Lilia needs to read "Deep Roots: How Slavery Still Shapes Southern Politics" to see what social scientists do to verify their hypothesis.
Lillia
<<Even those who cry "systemic racism" can't really define it.>>
Not true, Not even close. There are very clear forms of well defined and documented systemic racism. Even Harvard has identified numerous forms of clearly defined systematic racism in both housing and employment. I know of no academic studies on systemic racism that claim "the white government" is out to get you. Where did you get that notion, Rush Limbaugh?
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/population-development/2019/11/07/studies-find-evidence-of-systemic-racial-discrimination-across-multiple-domains-in-the-united-states/
<<Because governments with an unarmed population are so trustworthy when it comes to not abusing their power.>>
It is 2022 not 1822. In 2022 there are democracies all over the world that are ranked FAR higher than the US in the Freedom index and that have far stricter gun laws than the USA... In 2022 there is no correlation between freedom and citizen gun ownership. Allowing over 4,000 children per year, including kids sitting in their class rooms, being murdered by gun toting lunatics is not more freedom it is less freedom.
There is no evidence that the World Freedom index was invented to discourage gun laws in America. It has nothing to do with gun laws. It has to do with the globally defined terms of freedom across the board. The US leads industrialized democracies with gun ownership and gun violence but lags horrible in basic freedoms. Freedom to own a gun is not the only measure of freedom and when the gun owner uses it to shoot innocent people that gun ownership takes away freedom.
Your entire narrative is weak. As i said earlier all you have done is regurgitate talking points from your favorite right wing pundits.
Let me know when you can have a fact based and critical thinking focused dialogue on Freedom and systemic racism because your views on both are the reason the US is failing in how we treat black Americans, their freedom to pursue happiness and my freedom not to worry about my kids or my family being shot. And the government has more control over you and me than ever in history and gun ownership has not stoped that march one step.
We're failing in how we treat everyone in America. If you read people like Matt Taibbi instead of using the comments section to display your white virtue in understanding the "plight of the black man" you would understand that.
And did I say anywhere that the World "Freedom" index was invented to discourage gun laws? It was however invented to define "freedom" in a way that benefits a certain group.
And no having children murdered in a classroom by a lunatic does not make for more freedom, but neither does missing a bunch of signs that said person was a lunatic in an effort to be compassionate and then go after the guns of the general public all while claiming guns are the problem and not a general incompetence or cavalier attitude toward the mentally ill or our throwaway society that breeds violence and a general mental instability in people who feel discarded and at wit's end. The problem has never been the guns.
LG
<We're failing in how we treat everyone in America>>> That may be true. But what does it have to do with systemic racism that you are claiming does not even have a definition?
<< If you read people like Matt Taibbi instead of using the comments section to display your white virtue in understanding the "plight of the black man" you would understand that.>>
Have you read Tiabbi's book "The Divid". It does an excellent job of showing systemic racism in NYC He has no lack of clarity on how to define 'systemic racism" or on the real world consequences to the freedom of young black men suffering from in in NYC. Seems like the only people i have ever heard claim their is no actual definition for system racism also be the ones that deny it.
<<the World "Freedom" index was invented to discourage gun laws? It was however invented to define "freedom" in a way that benefits a certain group.>>.
What "certain group" is that. And does that make the index irrelevant when measuring freedom between nations. Please point me to a better index.
<<And no having children murdered in a classroom by a lunatic does not make for more freedom, but neither does missing a bunch of signs >>
Every country ranking higher than the US on the freedom index has just as many lunatics running around as in the US. But in those countries society missing the signs does not end up with people at a parade or children in a classroom be violently murdered. Guns steal our freedom because too many people have access and there are to few laws around training, usage, mental opacity and responsibility of failures in any of these areas.
The debate on guns in the US is not over freedom, the evidence if irrefutable that in 2022 guns reduce freedom of citizens. It is over corporate profits, propaganda and tribal loyalty. Right?
This is so true. And also (3) allow us to solve all of your problems. We know what’s best.
LOL! Really? The media?
1. It was black people who spoke out about the injustice that they feel and the media gave them a voice.
2. No one ever argued that, the discussion is about our violence, such as those that legally bought the guns that they used to commit mass murder, but nothing about the fact that most trafficked guns used in crimes are from lax law states, such as Indiana, that provide guns to tougher law states, such as Illinois.
The fact is that conservatives have promoted division since slavery, through Jim Crow through Separate But Equal through their whining about being left behind after the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Why work toward an inclusive society when you have guns?
LOL... conservatives have, huh? You might wanna put that particular schtick out of its misery, cuz that hound just don't hunt no more son.
I've never met a more racist group of people in my life than the liberal democrats in Bensonhurst, Little Odessa, Brighton Beach, The Upper East Side, The Bronx, Staten Island, West LA, Beverly Hills, et.al.
Well, unless you count all the racists in South Central that pull whitey from his car/truck and beat them to death. Hell, even the uberblue California has been voting down affirmative action for decades now everytime it makes it to a ballot (most recently just a couple of years ago while spitting invective at Trump for being racist).
It must be miserable going through life playing the victim, hoping someone will still buy into it anymore
Even more miserable being a dogmatic dickhead
You are a dogmatic dickhead!
LOL! That hound hunted and dragged out the conservatives, son. Those are conservatives son, they live around liberals and have opposed integration since the Emancipation, son.
You're living in the past boy. The sooner you realize that, the sooner you can stop living your life as a victim full of hate and delusion, and start living it as a productive human being that doesn't need to hustle "white guilt" to get by
LOL! Oh yeah, the "They won't replace us" and the white supremacist stuff never happened. Conservatives are the enemy, always have been.
Black people, huh? I wonder why most liberals overestimate the number of unarmed black men killed by cops at by about 50 times. Could it be the so-called media they rely on? But to put it bluntly, the message is.cops are dangerous to black people's health and life.
And I've lost track of the number of times I've heard people on the left say no civilian needs semiautomatic weapons (which nearly every gun is). Only cops and the military need those weapons. The implication is that those groups will protect people and not turn on them. So now cops are so trustworthy black people don't need guns and really shouldn't have them.
Explain to me how you make those two ideas work together.
And you do realize the Democrats were the party that tried to preserve slavery. That was literally the reason the party was formed. They were also the party that in the south instituted Jom Crow. You can say we can't judge the current party by its history, and I'd agree, but you show a willful ignorance about Democrats' role in past civil rights abuses against black people.
"And you do realize the Democrats were the party that tried to preserve slavery"
That was the Southern Democrats who were pro-slavery, not the Northern Democrats: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Democratic_Party
" liberals overestimate the number of unarmed black men killed by cops at by about 50 times", really?
Actually, Jeff, it wasn't 50 times... The actual # of unarmed black men killed by cops in 2019, was 11. The figure comes courtesy of The Washington Post police shooting database. You know, that right-wing publication, so what do they know? Wait a minute...never mind.
About 44% of liberals think the number is 1000-10,000 a year, and 14% (1/3 of the 44%) put the # at 10,000. Either way, they overestimated by a factor of anywhere from 100-1000X. So, you're right, not 50. Sorry.
https://trendingpolitics.com/the-data-prove-there-is-no-epidemic-of-unarmed-black-men-shot-by-police-knab/
What's so perplexing is that this data is readily available on any number of sites, AND the WaPo, yet such a huge % of liberals are SO far off, it's laughable.
But the number of police shootings is around 1,000/year (https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/). That some liberals believe that more unarmed black men are killed by police than actually are is no more perplexing than conservatives believing that the crime rate is higher today than in the 90s (see Table 54. Crime Higher or Lower Since 90s Do you think violent crime is higher or lower in the U.S. now than it was in the 1990s? at https://docs.cdn.yougov.com/vjfvegistz/20210715_yahoo_vaccine_tabs.pdf and https://www.statista.com/statistics/191219/reported-violent-crime-rate-in-the-usa-since-1990/).
There is a problem with the media in that reporters aren't necessarily competent in their coverage of any given topic, which leads to misinformation, and they are not as thorough in providing support, such as presenting actual data and sources in their stories.
That said, Lillia's mention of what liberals believing something false had nothing to do with my statement of the media providing a forum that discussed how black people felt and perceived events, which most people still don't seem interested in.
With all due respect Jeff...What's your point when you say the number of police shootings is around 1000 a year?
According to the Police Officers Foundation, there are 375 million interactions annually between police and citizens. Assuming even 1000 police shootings, that means that, PRECISELY 99.99973% of police interactions end well. Tragic, of course (but remember, ~989 of those were ARMED), but statistically, that's incredibly safe policing.
"That some liberals believe that more unarmed black men are killed by police than actually are…" LOL. Talk about an understatement of biblical proportions. Not "some" liberals. Nearly HALF overestimate the number by a factor of 100. And the ONLY way that happens is when people get their news from ONE perspective, and that perspective deliberately avoids telling the truth.
And your statement about conservatives believing the crime rate is higher today than the 90s, so what? You're right: crime rates WERE higher then than they are now, but it's a classic strawman argument. I'm not making that comparison, and most people aren't.
But, even if some conservatives are saying that, it's totally besides the point. What matters is that you only have to go back about three years to see a significantly lower crime rate than we have today. And to pretend that crime isn't a FAR greater concern for most city-dwellers these days is burying your head in the sand.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/policing/2021/04/09/violent-crime-surged-across-america-after-police-retreated-column/7137565002/
And while I appreciate your acknowledgment that there is a problem in the media, I had to shake my head at your characterization.
Yes there definitely is incompetence and laziness in the progressive media, but to pretend that there isn't an overarching narrative the demands coverage of some stories (i.e., nonstop 24/7 coverage whenever a policeman shoots an unarmed black person), while completely ignoring far more important and tragic trends (i.e., the roughly 7500 to 8000 Black people killed by other Black people annually, which never gets a mention). Do those lives not matter?
By willfully ignoring that far more catastrophic trend trend, who're the real racists here? You mention your statement about "the media providing a forum that discussed how black people felt and perceived events, which most people still don't seem interested in." Really?? How do you think black people "felt and perceived the events" that took 8K of their own lives, at the HANDS of their own? And who wasn't interested in discussing that? Hint: D--m sure wasn't conservatives.
"What's behind the taboo?" Gee, let's see...
That would be hilarious if it wasn't so pathetic--and from Taibbi?
"What's behind the taboo?" Gee, let's see...
That would be hilarious if it wasn't so pathetic--and from Taibbi?
That's quite a characterization there. People who think abortion is evil don't tend to think of single *mothers* as "beneath... contempt." They might - and I say *might* - encourage those women to put their babies up for adoption rather than try to raise them in abject poverty (if that is the single mother's situation), or they might deplore the decision of a woman to have a baby outside a relationship since parents' being in a stable relationship is so important to children's well-being. Or they might think a woman is "beneath... contempt" for some other reason.
But they certainly wouldn't think the woman is "beneath... contempt" for her decision to have the baby rather than aborting it.
Very good statement. Thank you.
I've never heard that said on the "right-wing" media I read, but I agree we should have a contest because often, even in hyperbole, inconsistencies show up. On the right, I would say (1) abortion is evil and (2) everyone is on their own and we don't need to waste money on a social welfare net because with sufficient motivation anyone can succeed or they can get help from private charities. Granted I don't know a lot of anti-abortion/pro-life people (or at least not absolutists), but those I do know don't describe single mothers as trailer trash.
I think we can agree that the brushstrokes are too broad, but oh so convenient for our so-called educated class
I love it. This morning I'm accused of being a righty because I'm not sufficiently pro-choice and this evening I think I'm accused of being a lefty ("for you in our so-called educated classes," I'm guessing is what you're trying to say, with "so-called educated" meaning Democrats/lefties/liberals/me) because I point out what I've heard frequently coming out of Republican/conservative mouths.
There are smart people on both sides.
When either side talks about freedom.
If we're painting with broad brushes, it's the pro-choicers that really deplore trailer trash. I mean, they say it out loud and everything.
Well, I would like to disagree, but if we're talking the stereotypical "left" and by "trailer trash" mean white working class or white people left without work in the Midwest because factories went overseas . . . you have a point. Their disgust is almost palpable.
Only if they voted trump
That's sort of the definition of "trailer trash" for them, isn't it? White people who voted Trump.
https://twitter.com/DefiantLs
Sane, law-abiding adults (SLAAs) should be encouraged to have guns.
Yahoos should be discouraged.
SLAAs come in all skin shades, as do yahoos.
Same applies to voting, btw :-)
Except voting doesn't really matter... if it did, they wouldn't let us do it.
As has been pointed out before, you are only allowed to vote because They picked the two candidates you are to choose from.
until 2016.
It matters.
The "theys" are the Wizard of Oz, no where near as powerful as they want it to matter.
Yahoos are allowed to vote.
Heck, I'm pretty sure they're mostly the ones that ARE voting.
Yahoos are nearly out of business. Googles are allowed. Don't get me started on Ask Jeeves.
Be Brave and don't DuckDuck anything
And to get guns.
I'd like to change it for both
Do you know any gun owners? All of them I know are SLAA.
I do, including moi. Most of them are SLAA
OTOH I know a few that bought guns and definitely not have been allowed.
"Encouraged" how?
If "yahoos" are citizens with no felony records, they can buy their their guns whether you want them to have them or not.
Discouraged. That would be yahoos should be discouraged from having guns.
FWIW, serve your time you should be a citizen again.
My bad. Same question. How does one go about "discouraging" anyone from arming himself?
That's a good question.
Do you agree in principle that there people to whom guns should not be sold?
Sure. Convicted felons who used guns in the commission of their crimes and children who haven't learned gun safety and maintenance.
Are you OK with children who have learned gun safety being able to buy guns?
Despite the media's selective favoritism for only portraying those '2nd amendment activists' that fit their pre-concocted narrative, we are ALL 2nd amendment activists when we stand up for our Constitutional rights, regardless of skin color. We are one, and we are everywhere.
1. A former Marine, Robert F. Williams, formed a black NRA-sponsored rifle club in North Carolina during the Civil Rights Era. Suffice it to say that when the KKK came calling, the club members had the temerity to actually shoot back. The KKK, who had so often shown themselves to be real heroes when it came to mobbing defenseless people, proved to be less brave on that occasion.
2. The NRA actually supported tightening gun control laws, after Black Panthers started walking around armed in California in the 1960s. Governor Ronald Reagan signed what was then the most restrictive gun control laws in the nation at that time.
Funny how times change.
3. Contrary to MSM reporting, there are quite a few black militia members, sovereign citizens, and the like.
Also interesting to note how many white liberals champion the "Black Lives Matter" movement, but don't think that people of color (or anyone, for that matter) should have the right and ability to protect their own lives.
Clearly the media has narratives they present in lieu of reporting on news. Anything counter to these sacred cows must be ignored at all costs.
heh..love your handle
That’s my actual name.
I’m udderly mooooved by your handle. Keep milking it!
Me too!
The underlying principles in this article are twofold:
1. The deterioration of capitalism into oligarchy, with the purposeful weaponized use of race, women's bodies, and economic depression to override the average person's sanity, patience, and ability to cooperate with one another regardless of difference.
2. Amplifying the use of violence as solution to a problem using America's main symbol, the gun. We are going to see a great deal more pissed off people using them in the next few years, but god forbid we start talking about solutions which do not involve violence, force, or "winning" a confrontation.
This should be in a manual somewhere, how to divide and conquer a weary public (most propagandized US population in five decades) by using CRT, US exceptionalism, and the evil boogeyman - Russia, Russia, Russia.
The sooner we acknowledge the problem is an internal one, full of rotten neoliberal and neoconservative elites running the economy, the public domain, and our country into the ground, the better.
Eighty years ago James Burnham wrote the Managerial Revolution - about the split between ownership of capital/corporations and control of them (being vested in a professional managerial class). That PMC is pretty much interchangeable with governmental bureaucracy - and in fact we see that each change of Administration. Wealth inequity is not the driving force in social deterioration, cultural dissolution is. This is a perfect example of that cultural dissolution - where the natural affinity of gun owners, black and white, must be kept from strengthening - by those who exploit fears on BOTH sides of the color barrier.
The left must learn that it can't force everything it wants down people's throats even though they dominate the institutions. Worse, the right must not emulate the left, as it tends to do whenever it sees the left being successful.
The Woketopians are really just the flipside of Falwell’s Moral Majority, so the imitation cuts both ways.
Who knew that the 2020s Church Lady would be on the Left?
Isn’t that special!
So then, are you saying that the covid isn't a boogeyman anymore?
Anthony "Dr. Frankenstein" Fauci will be so incredibly bummed
I’m not sure COVID was the boogeyman. It was the unvaccinated.
You forgot the other boogeyman, China.
There should be a history of US boogeymen to scare the public, starting with Mossadegh in 52' and ending with Xi and Putin now.
Here's a small list
1. Fidel Castro & Che Guevara
2. Dag Hammarskjold & Lumumba
3. Jocobo Arbenz
4. Gamil Nassar
5. Sukarno
6. Malcolm X & Dr. King
7. The Kennedy Brothers
8. Ayatollah Khomeini
9. Saddam Hussein
10. Mu'ammar Gaddafi
11. Osama Bin Laden (Al Queda - now allies in Syria)
12. Kim Jong-Un
13. Bashar- Al-Assad
14. Ali Khomenei
15. Vladimir Putin
16. Xi
*** I am sure I have forgotten all of the boogeymen - please feel to add as you remember
Forgot Communism....
Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, Marx, Brezhnev, Gorbachev, Yeltsin, Russian Oligarchs and #15.
One ping Vasily, one ping only.
I would’ve liked to have seen Montana.
You have to love the Phisto! Best response ever!
You forgot "Pirates of the Barbary Coast" that was used to create and fund the first actual navy this country ever had.
We got five ships for that scam: The USS United States, The USS Constitution among them.
All the while the "Godless Savages" were being used to expand marching armies and expansionism.
It’s amazing how many ways you can spell “Literally Hitler”.
+10 internets for this post
Hitler and worse!
MASHPEE, Mass. (AP) _ President Bush suggested today that Saddam Hussein is more barbaric than Adolf Hitler and said he was ″more determined than ever″ to drive the Iraqi leader out of Kuwait.
The White House said Bush’s combative remarks were designed to prepare Americans for ″any eventuality″ in the three-month Persian Gulf standoff. ″We will not rule out the military option,″ spokesman Marlin Fitzwater told reporters.
Bush continued his tough rhetoric against Iraq in campaign appearances here and in the Boston suburb of Burlington, Mass., at the start of a six-day cross-country campaign blitz for endangered Republican candidates.
Bush, speaking to a GOP rally in an elementary school in this Cape Cod village, said Saddam’s detention of some 300 Americans in Iraq and occupied Kuwait is ″in direct contravention of international law.″
″They have committed outrageous acts of barbarism″ (daddy) Bush said of Saddam’s forces."
https://apnews.com/article/c456d72625fba6c742d17f1699b18a16
Should we throw in a few (I hate to call them journalist now) Julian assange, the guy living in Russian because he uploaded sensitive intel can not remember his name.
Edward Snowden
He's a definite boogeyman - the made up rape charges, assassination attempts in the Ecuadorian embassy, the testing of baby feces among Spanish intelligence --- its hard to really get back to how dangerous he was to the military establishment during this time.
Bradley Manning, torture, Abu Ghraib, Gina Haspel, Francis Fukuyama, and the entire PNAC crazy foreign policy network were having to play defense because Americans were being showed to the world for their actions (not the rhetoric of spreading democracy).
Assange ceased being human, but something the US felt as a real threat to be eliminated. The last few years like something out of a Harry Potter novel --- he's in the middle of a Cruciatus Curse" hanging in painful suspension for the public punishment at the whims of imperial dictates by evil overlords looking to extract revenge and put down a marker for any other truth tellers.
10 points to your house for the HP reference. JK Rowling is brilliant on so many levels.
That's a pretty good list, kinda the greatest hits of the past 60 years. Absent a boogeyman, folks would start looking at our legislators and suddenly take real interest in the 2nd Amendment.
Imagine that!
Something to look forward to possibly, unified antipathy for our elected leaders and elite financiers.
It’s a start.
Suharto took over from the boogeyman Sukarno and was a right wing dictator for 30 years.
Thank you for the edits and the reminder.
Does Trump belong on this list?
Question: were/are there any "real" boogeymen (boogeyperson?) in US history? Or was it all imaginary? Asking for a friend...
Pakistani nuclear weapons (reasonable lol)
Rap music
Get down, boogie-oogie-oogie!
Why are Hammarskjold and Lumumba and the Kennedy Brothers and Dr. King on this list?
Otherwise, it is only lacking Mao, Pot Pol, Stalin and Kim Jon-Un's father to be a pretty comprehensive list of the leading killer dictators of the last 75 years.
At one point they were all culturally boogeymen in this society until their deaths where the entire intelligence apparatus changed their tune from neo-McCarthy anti-communism to a more whitewashed humanist (not unlike Biden or recent Ellen DeGeneres or Michelle Obama Bush artworks in whitewash). We see this most with MLK day, where the genuflecting over his legacy is embarrassing by those in power --- while his words still sting to this day over Vietnam, the US war machine and its implications for humanity, poverty, and those all over the world experiencing free trade at the barrel of a gun or debt repayment blackmail at the hands of the World Bank.
If one cannot see how Boogeymen evolve and change within the center of US imperial power, then understanding this list is harder. It's the evolution of our arrangements which creates the boogeyman (full on, half way or john come lately). In fact, most dictators we installed, eventually we then deem them evil. And then vice versa, if you look at how we trained Al Queda for the Balkans wars or in Syria.
Hammarsjkold was more of an internal threat who had great public relations but he still died in a plane crash, shot in the head with the Ace of Spades card put in his collar - and photographed courtesy of Allen Dulles. So, he was a boogeyman but to corporate interests in the Katanga mines (Rockefeller mining interests).
It’s a list of boogeymen, not leading killer dictators.
True, but it seems to have most of the biggest killers there!
Idiot John Birch types equated legit foreign dangerous commies w/ nonexistent domestic commie boogeymen. That’s where they lost their marbles.
So True.
The Wuhan or "Chinese virus" purposeful claims by US officials did a great deal of damage and minimized our own gain of function research (reminding us of the history of these programs starting with testing on US populations different chemicals all the way to the memory hole of anthrax post-9/11).
Some pretty sick stuff to blame an entire country when your own country is neck deep in chemical, biological espionage.
The CCP EARNED their COVID merit badge.
Prove it.
I was in Wuhan in December, 2019, and got stuck in Wuhan and Hubei for another 10 months in 2020. There's a lot to know that is not in any of the popularly flogged idiocies in our media. Proving anything means exposing oneself to stuff no sane person is going to expose themselves to.
Prove they didn't...
Hi.
If you make an assertion it’s your job to prove it.
For example, if I say you’re a dumb ass - I have to prove it.
I don’t get to say prove you’re not a dumbass.
That would make me, well, a dumbass.
On the new and revised list of "Countries to be destroyed"
Not destroyed - simply recognized as the enemy that they are. The U.S. has been Beijing's bitch for the last 30+ years - and I don't see that getting any better for the next 2 1/2 years. Peaceful coexistence works for me - but I don't think that's on the menu in the long run.
Is the NRA not a boogeyman anymore?
I hope we'll divide before being conquered.
Back during the Rodney King riots, we saw the full measure of what the 2nd amendment was really about. Because it is two parts, both the famous "shall not be infringed" which is infringed every fucking day in this country, but the "well regulated militia." Roof Top Koreans.
And this has been shown all up and down the time line; Said Rooftop Koreans? Militia. BLM? Militia. Kyle Rittenhouse? One man militia. In fact, any group that convenes together to provide for its
defense is a militia, simply because the whole point of the 2nd was to eliminate the gov't monopoly on violence. And each of those things I mentioned, which are but a fraction of the incidences of this need throughout history, are the citizens ensuring their liberty when the gov't has abdicated its claimed responsibility. Here in Oregon, during the battle of Portland and the wellspring of Antifa into the surrounding communities, we saw (you had to really look for any news coverage) streets blocked off by groups of residents. Remember Missouri, and he two lawyers defending their home? That is what this whole thing is about.
When BLM gathers together to protect their communities, as we see above in the videos, they are taking part in a tradition going back to the end of slavery. The point of Well Regulated is simply to say that they aren't a mob, and are acting in concert, however loosely.
I remember during the Ferguson riots what should have been an absolutely iconic photograph-but wasn’t b/c of what this article was about. A multiracial group of tattoo artists were posed in front their shop, protecting it from looters, with an American flag in the window, AR-15s in hand.
It goes against the narrative. As I understand it Democrats worked hard for years to keep blacks disarmed in the South. We all have the right to defend ourselves.
Old habits die hard.
As I recall, Harriet Tubman's most famous image was scrubbed of the gun she was carrying. That which does not comply with The Narrative will be erased or ignored!
We are hoping that her image on the new $20 bill will have her holding a gun.
Her major objective was that every black family have a gun with which to protect themselves.
https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2019/mar/25/facebook-posts/no-harriet-tubman-wasnt-gun-toting-republican-who-/
"with gun she used to kill Democrats"
Ah - there's the false part! Now, let's rip apart the assholes at makeupafact-tosuitouragenda!
https://time.com/5715477/harriet-tubman-escape/
https://news.wfsu.org/wfsu-local-news/2013-02-21/harriet-tubman-underground-railroad-artifacts-on-display-in-tally
https://www.wxxinews.org/arts-life/2019-11-15/harriet-tubman-and-western-new-york-get-their-places-in-history
https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Harriet-Tubman/Sarah-H-Bradford/Unabridged-Start-Publishing-LLC/9781625584090
You were just teeing this up for me, right Bill?
Thanks for these helpful references!
Actually, since "Politifact" says it's false, it MUST be true.
Here's what the website devoted to her says:
"Tubman carried a handgun for self protection and urge slaves not to give up."
http://www.harriet-tubman.org/facts/
The Encyclopedia Brittanica says:
"Tubman displayed extraordinary courage, persistence, and iron discipline, which she enforced upon her charges. If anyone decided to turn back—thereby endangering the mission—she reportedly threatened them with a gun and said, “You’ll be free or die.” "
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Harriet-Tubman
And of course she was a Republican. She was a friend of famous Republicans such as Frederick Douglass.
It literally doesn't matter "who said it"
"ARMED NEGROES PROTEST GUN BILL; 30 Black Panthers Invade Sacramento Legislature Lawmakers Startled. With loaded rifles and shotguns in their hands, members of the antiwhite Black Panther party marched into the state Capitol today. A leader announced they were protesting new gun legislation scheduled for consideration by an Assembly committee." - New York Times, May 3, 1967.
Frederick Douglass once stated, “A man’s rights rest in three boxes: the ballot box, the jury box, and the cartridge box.”
I'm with him. Then and now.
Come on, Matt. We know black people don't own guns. Joy Behar said so on The View not two weeks ago.
“Here’s the thing, once Black people get guns in this country, the gun laws will change. Trust me,” Behar said.
I remember reading that sales of guns soared in traditional black cities like Philadelphia following the 2020 BLM riots and protests.
For all the associations with conservative whites, gun ownership remains very real among black Americans too. A nice reminder that we have much more common in our shared diversity than some would like to think.
Mind you, I'm still not thrilled with all the gun violence regardless of the perpetrators. The gun related crimes in urban areas, the increase in random violence (this latest one genuinely scares me: https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/road-rage-shooting-in-delaware-county/3285342/)
Bah.
If I was a black citizen living in one of these urban war zones I'd be crazy not to have a loaded shotgun within easy reach.
As many are pointing out here, the lickspittle corporate press has advanced the idea that only black thugs and gang members are armed, not regular black citizens. Demonstrations like the one Taibbi reports on here and the vaporings of the Black Panthers and other black Marxist groups don't help matters since they are highly visible and therefore an easy propaganda tool for both left and right.
They're ignored because they don't fit current political theory. If the theory doesn't fit the facts, change the facts.
See?!! I always KNEW 2+2 equals 5!!!
They don't fit into the Big Sell.
That is, whatever the big industry who happens to be paying for that air time wants.
I often read/hear comments like "Wait until Black people start arming themselves, then you'll see how fast the U.S. gets strict gun control laws." But...
That one cracks me up because they seem to think it's a gotcha. When I took my gun safety training, it was taught by black people. When I had specialized training - he was Asian. Somehow they live in such a silo, they believe the propoganda. 🤷♀️
So true, Laura. I took some pistol training from the "13 Hours" defenders who survived Benghazi and now are teaching their hard-won skills to civilians. That crew was white, black, and brown. They protected innocent lives in Benghazi because they had weapons and knew how to use them, and now they're teaching the rest of us what they know. My class was 14 people, white, brown, black, Asian, male, and female.
The "gun culture" that MSM so often derides is a safe and friendly place, and my liberality was as welcome as other shooters' MAGAism. We got along fine.
Because you all had a higher purpose of unifying and preserving your liberties and freedoms -from the cunt with the gun or the knife trying to rob and murder your family to the marching Nazi boots of whatever central power happens to be trying to control the people.
Absolutely yes, Scott, thanks. Leave me in peace and you'll never see my gun. Attack me and you will.
Absolutely yes, Scott, thanks. Leave me in peace and you'll never see my gun. Attack me and you will.
We've been arming ourselves, it's just not covered by the media unless it's crime related.
Well, California had unrestrictive gun laws, until the Black Panthers started walking around with rifles. Then California (R. Reagan, governor) adopted much stricter gun laws pronto, with the support of the NRA.
That was 55 years ago. To pretend that today's race relations even remotely resemble 1967 is a bogus argument. It would be like me pointing out Dems were the ones pushing Jim Crows laws.
Plenty of Team R stalwarts bring up Jim Crow laws.
Anyway, my point is that history is complicated, although you can draw your own conclusions as to how a 2022 armed Black Panthers would go over.
If they had a CC-which means they do not have a felony, and would presumably not wish to lose the CC by committing a felony in the future, I think they would get along well with MAGA types.
It is very important to remind people that Democrats were the primary architects of Jim Crow laws when they now constantly harp about the legacy of slavery and racism and pretend there is a “new Jim Crow” every few months created by Republicans. The Democratic Party is gaslighting and promoting delusional beliefs. Race relations certainly don’t resemble 1967, but the Democratic Party would like their voters to believe that.
Yes, but that was over 50 years ago. I do believe racial attitudes have advanced since then.
I wonder if that's an argument for how quickly the US would ban militant Lefties who are also Black from gun ownership than Black people who are not necessarily militant Lefties.
Wait until NY state legislature passes their surveillance Pre-Crime laws.
Then you'll see doors being kicked in and people being stripped of their guns -and it won't be out in Hempstead or on the Hamptons.
It'll be poor people of all colors getting a big sandy dildo up the poop chute.
I saw "Big Sandy Dildo up the Poop Chute" opening for REM at Lollapalooza 1994.
People keep going on about it meaning a lot when they talk about the NRA in that context, but they had a complete changing of the guard during a leadership "coup" in 1977. At the time the rank and file members were pissed at the organizations support of gun control. Now the organization is just headed by crooks who defraud its members. Oh wait, I almost forgot my obligatory fuck Ronald Regan comment.
those comments are usually made by some upscale urban liberal or a blue-check Twitterati, who never stop talking about black people but don't seem to know any.
That argument is the worst. I can't believe they think it's a good argument in favor of gun control. WTF? The unintentional racism is bizarre.
Mary Anne Imelda isn't making the argument you think she is. She's suggesting that America is such an irredeemably racist place that as soon as black people and other minorities start openly arming themselves, current gun rights advocates will change their tune.
I don't buy it. No doubt it would be true of some individuals, but it's not 1966 anymore, regardless of what Ibram Kendi says.
Around here, we are arming Hispanics and lesbians and Hispanic lesbians.
Firearms are a great equalizer, particularly for "vulnerable populations." William S. Burroughs wrote a story about a gay man who unapologetically shot some would-be gay bashers in self-defense. I hate that our media would rather have a dead victim than a dead perpetrator.
Victims are so much more useful for propaganda.
Ever read Preacher?
God gets shot in the face by a man wielding a Colt.
One of my favorite jokes, really.
Garth Ennis is a bit much for my tastes, but Preacher and The Boys both had good moments.
Too much is not enough for me.
Lol.
That is not my argument. I'm pointing out that Black people ARE arming (also, white children ARE dying from guns) and still no significant changes are on the horizon
I apologize for putting words in your mouth.
Change is happening though. Now (as of last week) urban black Americans should enjoy the same legal access to self defense as flyover whites have for decades.
It's okay.
“What’s behind the taboo?”
Too much money is being made and too many political careers are being elevated by the “white racism” trope being shoved down America’s throat. The designated scape goat for this madness is the white redneck Trump voter. Anything that confuses or threatens this projected psychosis is suppressed and eliminated from consciousness by the psychosis profiteers.
The Galilean scientific revolution threatened the Church authority which had produced enormous riches, and predictably was suppressed and persecuted by reactionary Church authority. What we have here is no different. Any empirical, fact-based narratives that threaten the current “white racist gun owners” myth is a danger to empowered politicians and the economic/academic/media structures that profit from the madness.
It’s not complicated. It’s a social psychosis that has taken over the cultural operating system and economic institutions the way human sacrifice of war captives took over the Aztec approach to petitioning their Lord with prayer for salvation. Why so many people buy into the bullshit and propagate it — that’s a little more complicated.