Here's the thing: if average citizens didn't have guns, I'd be right pissed if the cops carried them.

I can't speak for the whole of whatever the fuck you think "liberals" encompasses, but here's my take on guns & cops: the constitution allows for guns within well-regulated militias. It was just worded really, really poorly. I mean, read 2A - it's practically authentic frontier gibberish. But the words "well-regulated militia" are definitely in there. And it makes sense - they were trying to secure a bold new type of governance. They needed to be able to defend that, and there was no immediate plan for a standing army. So local, reasonably well-supplied militias, which weren't a bunch of bumblefucks shooting at whatever whenever, were a pretty real need. Where we're at *now* with guns is so fucking far from what the founders could've possibly conceived, that to think they'd approve of it is absurd. I mean, maybe a few of them (they were quite the diverse bunch of white male landowners, in all sincerity), but those with solid military experience likely would've been horrified.

Having said that, it's fantasy-land nonsense to think the prospect of completely eliminating recreational guns in the US in the near term is viable. Hunting armaments will (and perhaps should) remain common for a long while, so be it. I see handguns and non-hunting long arms (or those that are excessive for it) as of significant negative value to society, they can all fuck right off into a metal recycling center or the armory of a well-regulated militia. Perhaps keep some at firing ranges for recreational target practice, with competent professional supervision, and with reasonable regulations in place.

Cops should have firearms in their armory, up until such time as we're living in a Star Trek-like utopia of blissful peace. Humans are largely cool, but some of us are dangerous fucksticks. Have cops pull guns for calls that seem like they'll be needed, and rely on less-lethal options as much as possible. Oh, and stop using the less-lethal options as fucking compliance-obtaining shortcuts. Don't fucking tase or use chemical spray when it isn't needed, they're not for the cops' convenience but to avoid more severe harms from occurring. Officer Friendly should be the order of the day, and any substantial deviation from that should be met with termination and arrest, with consequences no less severe than a non-police citizen would see. No more bad apples, no spoiled bunch.

Hey, thanks for the rant opportunity! Us liberals need to practice our high horsing from time to time. And just like God, we all love you. You specifically, you goddamn sexy hater.

Probably goes through an area where the landowner charges too much to watch.

Waaaaah?

This video gets so many things wrong it is truly cringe-worthy.

The country has been covered by vending machines since the 1960s--long before there were problems with an aging population and birthrates. The primary reason for vending machines being installed everywhere is, surprise, convenience! Who wants to go to the store and stand in line to buy a drink when you can just go downstairs from your apartment and grab one from outside your front door?

Another thing to consider is that Japan late at night basically completely shuts down--even in major cities like Tokyo the trains stop running around 1AM or so and won't start again until 5AM. Nowadays their are 24-hour convenient stores on practically every other urban street corner but back when vending machines first started getting installed nothing was open late besides bars. If you caught the last train home from work and wanted to buy a coke or something on your walk back from the station you were SOL. Vending machines helped solve that problem.

Which brings us to another point--VERY few Japanese people in urban areas commute by car. Mass transit is fast and efficient and a huge number of people just walk/bike everywhere. Since there is so much foot traffic vending machines make total sense, especially in the summer when temperatures are going to rise into the mid-90s (30+ degrees Celsius) with high humidity and people who are walking/biking are going to get thirsty pretty damn quick.

Another thing he gets wrong is that retailers are not the ones primarily profiting off of vending machines: land owners are. Either they purchase and stock the machines themselves (thereby keeping all the profits) or they make a contract with the retail company in which the company stocks and services the machine but compensates the landowner for use of the space.

Oh, almost forgot something not mentioned in the video--the low crime rates. Another reason for the proliferation of vending machines is that whoever puts them out can be reasonably sure they won't be damaged, defaced, or robbed.

Finally, while he is right that credit cards are not as big here as in, say, the U.S., e-money is huge. And all of the newer vending machines produced in the last few years will take either cash or e-money, such as Suica or Pasmo cards.

By the way, all of this information that I've posted here is available from a simple Google search and there have actually been several articles written on vending machines in Japan over the last couple of years. It's like this guy just came over here and tried to guess why there were so many vending machines around....

Sorry to be a kill-joy, but can't say that I would promote this - really ripping the sn*t out of the landscape - their pixelating out the faces of the riders makes me wonder whether they had the permission of the landowners whose property they were tearing around on....

@bcglorf

interesting how you classify the protesters as angry mob and rioters.

see,
this all on tribal land,owned by native americans,who welcomed this "angry mob" and "rioters" and the police are there NOT at the behest of the tribal elders,but DAPL,a private corporation attempting to push a private pipeline,for private profit,through privately owned land.

DAPL had even hired private mercenaries to keep the landowners off their construction site,who used attack dogs,mace,rubber bullets and worked alongside the police.it got so bad at one point that they had pulled police officers from FIVE states to keep those pesky landowner rabble down!

on a good note,those ancillary officer teams bowed out after a few days,saying that it was immoral and they were unwilling to participate.so the "police" you are referring to are most likely private security.

Funny how the perspective you tell the story from changes it entirely even while keeping to the overall same facts.....and then add some context.

democracynow has been doing excellent work on this situation,as has countercurrentnews:

https://www.democracynow.org/topics/dakota_access

http://countercurrentnews.com/2016/11/north-dakota-becomes-first-u-s-state-legalize-use-armed-drones-police-defend-illegal-pipeline/

http://countercurrentnews.com/2016/10/ohio-swat-state-police-deployed-north-dakota-crack-dapl-pipeline-protesters/

http://countercurrentnews.com/2016/11/sheriffs-leave-standing-rock-saying-completely-unethical/

and if you wanna berate those hiring the private thugs:

http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-power/dial-a-cop-20161031

You say that but it is true, at least in the States for most. A landowner cannot legally rape your wife, smash the bastard baby against a rock and bury it, then murder her for knowing...so yeah, it kind of is different. But that's why I believe this "socialism", ie., protections we have enforced by the government (sometimes) have made life a little less slave-like.

I'm very pro-nuclear, but the money-where-your-mouth-is test is "what if it was in your backyard?"

My answer to that one is: Sure! Especially if I get free power bills for life, like how landowners with cell towers get $$$ or free cell service, etc...

I'm sorry newt, I have to disagree. He never made a single physical threat, and unfortunately the stand your ground laws apply more to him as a local landowner than the skaters.

What sucks is if he came around the corner and ran over them while they were riding, he'd be the one getting sued.y

What does that even mean? Nobody is blaming America for inventing slavery, just for building a nation on it and insufficiently addressing the inequalities it engendered that remain to this day.

And I hope you're not not implying that it's thanks to white America that slavery is now globally illegal, because fuck man, Wikipedia and all...

"3rd century BC: Ashoka abolishes slave trade and encourages people to treat slaves well but does not abolish slavery itself in the Maurya Empire, covering the majority of India, which was under his rule.
221-206 BC: The Qin Dynasty's measures to eliminate the landowning aristocracy include the abolition of slavery and the establishment of a free peasantry who owed taxes and labor to the state. They also abolished primogeniture and discouraged serfdom. The dynasty was overthrown in 206 BC and many of its laws were overturned.
17: Wang Mang, first and only emperor of the Xin Dynasty, usurped the Chinese throne and instituted a series of sweeping reforms, including the abolition of slavery and radical land reform. After his death in 23 C.E., slavery was reinstituted."

Up until I saw my fellow countrymen (including many I respected) fawning like chimps at a tea party during that whole "jubilee" thing I might have agreed. There seems to be a huge cognitive dissonance for most people when it comes to the royals.

On the one hand most don't really take it very seriously, on the other many (maybe even most) appear to have a sub-conscious desire/need to submit to their natural betters. Our whole national identity is built on the myths of Kings and failed rebellions and I fear for many the Monarchy represents a kind of bizarre political security blanket. We claim to not really care but deep down I think many of us secretly fear loosing our mythical matriarch.

One might liken it to celebrity worship backed by 100's & 1000's of years of religious mythology. The Royal's aren't really human to us, they are more like some closely related parent species born to a life we could only dream of. I realise that when asked directly most people would consciously acknowledge that was silly, but most would also respond the same to say Christian sexual repression. They know sex and nakedness when considered rationally are nothing to be ashamed of, but they still continue to treat their own urges as somehow sinful when they do not fall within rigidly defined social parameters.

We still haven't gotten over such Judeo-Christian self policing because the social structures built up around it are still with us (even if we fool ourselves into thinking we are beyond the reach of such sub-conscious influences). I don't think we will ever get over our master-slave culture while class and unearned privilege are still built into the fabric of our society. Having a Royal family, no matter how symbolic, is the very living embodiment of this kind of backwards ideology.

It's like trying to quit heroin while locked in a room with a big bag of the stuff.

It's true to say most don't take the whole thing very seriously but that to me is almost as concerning. Most people when asked don't believe advertising has a significant effect on their psyche but Coke-a-cola still feels like spending about 3 billion a year on it is worthwhile. One of them is clearly mistaken!

Our royal family here, is to me working in the same way as coke's advertising. It's a focal point for a lot of sub-conscious concepts we are bombarded with our whole lives. Naturally there are many sides to this and it wouldn't work without heavy media manipulation, state indoctrination etc. but it's an intrinsic part of the coercive myth none the less. Monarch's, Emperors and wealthy Dynasties are all poisons to me. No matter the pragmatic details, the sub-conscious effect seems significant and cumulative.

"Dead" symbolisms IMHO can often be the most dangerous. At least one is consciously aware of the devils we see. No one is watching the one's we have forgotten.....

The above is reason enough for me but I have bog all better to do this aft so I'll dive into the rabbithole a bit.....

(We do very quickly start getting into conspiracy theory territory hare so I'll try to keep it as uncontroversial as I can.)

A. The UK is truly ruled by financial elites not political ones IMHO. "The city" says jump, Whitehall says how high. The Royal family being among the wealthiest landowners and investors in the world (let alone UK) presumably can exert the same kind of influence. Naturally this occurs behind closed doors, but when the ownership class puts it's foot down the government ignores them to their extreme detriment. (It's hard to argue with people who own your economy de-facto and can make or break your career)

B. The queen herself sits on the council on foreign relations & Bilderberg group and she was actually the chairwoman of the "committee of 300" for several years. (and that's not even starting on club of Rome, shares in Goldman Sachs etc.)

C. SIS the uk's intelligence services (MI5/6 etc.), which have been proven to on occasion operate without civilian oversight in the past, are sworn to the crown. This is always going to be a most contentious point as it's incredibly difficult to prove wrongdoings, but I have very strong suspicions based on various incidents (David Kelly, James Andanson, Jill Dando etc.), that if they wanted/needed you dead/threatened that would not be especially difficult to arrange.

D. Jimmy Saville. This one really is tin foil hat territory, but it's no secret he was close to the Royal family. I am of the opinion this is because he was a top level procurer of "things", for which I feel there is a great deal of evidence, but I can't expect people to just go along with that idea. However given the latest "paedogeddon" scandal involving a extremely high level abuse ring (cabinet members, mi5/6, bankers etc.) it certainly would come as little surprise to find royal family members involved.

Points A&B I would stand behind firmly. C&D are drifting into conjecture but still potentially relevant I feel.

But even if we ignore all of them, our culture is built from the ground up upon the idea of privilege of birth. That there are some people born better or more deserving than the rest of us. When I refer to symbolism this is what I mean. Obviously the buck does not stop with the monarchy, England is hopelessly stratified by class all the way through, but the royal family exemplify this to absurd extremes.

At best I feel this hopelessly distorts and corrupts our collective sense of identity on a sub-conscious level. At worst....Well you must have some idea now how paranoid I'm capable of being about the way the world is run. (Not that I necessarily believe it all wholeheartedly, but I'm open to the possibility and inclined to suggest it more likely than the mainstream narrative)


On a pragmatic note: Tourism would be fine without them I think, we still have the history and the castles and the soldiers with silly hats etc. And I think the palaces would make great hotels and museums. They make great zoo exhibits I agree, just maybe not let them continue to own half the zoo and bribe the zoo keepers?


Anyway much love as always. You responded with considered points which is always worthy of respect, regardless of whether I agree with it all.

Hm. A moderately (If I can judge that) historically acurate George Washington vs. the Mel Gibson fantasy of WIlliam Wallace. ERB has certainly done better in the past.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Wallace
"Sir William Wallace (...) was a Scottish landowner (...) a member of the lesser nobility (...)"

Most important, he was not a Highlander an as such did not wear a kilt or paint his face.

And....

"("Braveheart"), however, is a highly fictionalized account of Wallace's life and has been described by some as one of the most historically inaccurate modern films."

I thought my point was clear. obviously not, so let me try to simplify. Landowners are being paid tax payers money (which we can ill afford) for turbines that are not paying for their investment, are not efficient, and have to be turned off in high winds. Not to mention that they are also ugly, noisy, and are harming wild life (birds and bats are being disorientated by the turbulence and flying into them.)
As for your rather rude comment on "BS thinking," regarding solar energy? Well, I wasn't aware we were discussing that.

I can see his point though. Founding fathers were far from perfect..and he's right, they are idolized. If we were to meet the founders right now, I'm sure they'd say some fucked up shit even the most conservative would now think of as barbaric. I think at the very least, they definitely favored landowners over non. They certainly didn't think women should vote. so they certainly weren't strangers to the idea that some people had more rights than others.

We make the same argument about weapons, that the founding fathers never could have foreseen how guns have advanced and proliferated in present day so we routinely argue that the 2nd amendment needs to be revisited. The left focuses on "well regulated" and the right focus on "shall not be infringed" No matter what side of the aisle you're on...it needs to be revised if only for clarity.

By that same token, I don't think the founders could have foreseen how powerful corporations have become or income inequality problem. Gov't used to have the power to revoke a company charter pretty much on whim...that ability is long gone

Any time some moron gets it into their head that their state should secede from the union or just any time someone think states should have more rights, they should watch the video and know that WE ALREADY TRIED TO DO THAT.

Same thing with the 2nd amendment. We already tried giving virtually everyone a firearm, it was called the old west. Guess what? people got sick of the idea that they might die just walking down the street to get milk so they started to put away the guns!

I'd say the biggest problem we have as a Nation is what this video already talked about. the founders understood the balance between too much democracy and too many rich landowners having power and I'd say that that's the problem we're in right now. The rich have far too much influence over our gov't. One could argue that that was the whole reason for the Iraq war. People who get rich off of war wanted more money.

We also need to completely remove private money from our elections.