Perspectives on Rittenhouse seem to track perspectives on where one imagines one would be found in that situation.

Do you imagine being a looter or rioter?
Rittenhouse is bad.

Do you imagine being a resident of the street in question?
Rittenhouse is good.

The protest angle is moot, since Rittenhouse didn't go there to interact with protesters.

I personally wouldn't go attack property that doesn't belong to any of the people that ostensibly inspired the protest (the police officers responsible for the shooting). So I am more likely to imagine myself being a simple resident.

If it were the homes of the police officers being looted, then at least the looting would have some logical reason behind it.
I'm actually surprised, that after all these protests, and all the looting, and all the destruction, that nobody has bothered to actually target the people that are responsible. Brings into question sincerity.




Side note, I actually think that police were way in the wrong to shoot, or even bother, Jacob Blake. The man only stopped to break up a fight. Cops (responding to a call, ostensibly about that very fight) just showed up and went after him, without taking any time to assess what was going on. Absolutely reckless cowboy behavior with little regard for the state.

-scheherazade

I believe in English speaking North America, "widely understood" and "correctly understood" are often divergent.
I believe what is widely understood to be Christianity and the actual definition don't resemble each other, so other religions (new or old) have no obligation to be better.
I believe what's good for the goose is good for the gander.
I believe that nothing shown denies the possibility that they actually believe in the biblical "Satan" or another deity so named, just because the public actions are political in nature doesn't deny the possibility of honest belief and the nature of any worship is 100% open to interpretation, so your entire premise is based on assumptions and an unwillingness to apply the same standards across the board, exactly what they're fighting against.

For these reasons, I find your questions moot.....

.....but yes, those are the "widely understood" connotations of the words, just not necessarily the ultimate denotations.
That...or Vicki Vallencourt....Vicki Vallencourt is the devil.

Avoid sun damage and it becomes a moot point.

LOL. I dont know why I even bother.

First of all, I'm not even in the northern hemisphere (again, you're bubble) and have no love for Trump or white-supremacists. In fact I'm half Maori so I guess that makes you're whole argument moot.

I really fear for our future with all the closed minded, bubble living idiots like you coming out of the wood-work now.

Well, looking it up on Google the "Sobriety Test" strictly speaking involves three tests that don't involve the breathalyzer, which usually comes after those first tests. But he does say breathalyzer at 5:33, but if it is really an open and shut case because he refused it then why did he get off?
From the sounds of it the cop had no reason to suspect he was drunk in the first place, which renders the tests moot because he probably wasn't drunk and they knew it. As for why waste time and annoy? From his perspective they were wasting his time and annoying him, so why the hell not.

Ha! Even sifty knows to not listen to you, Bob. ;-)

The kid was a nut...he supports Trump, that's proof positive.

What's funny is lies could be appropriate, since the NRA spokeswoman was lying through her teeth, claiming they support a strong useful national registry and screening system. They do nothing but lobby to obstruct it at every turn. She's a bold faced liar. I used to be a member decades ago.

Nothing he did, even if it had been investigated fully, would have bared him from buying his guns. Blame police and the FBI, but they're powerless to stop known dangers from buying weapons because the NRA ensured they would be, because they exist only to lobby for manufacturers right to sell guns.

The leftist solution is to 1) ban guns from people diagnosed or
being investigated for criminal instability 2) regulate certain guns, modifications, and magazines much more stringently and 3) make private gun sales go through background checks. Without the latter, the rest is moot.

Really? funny, I recall Trump saying the buck stops with him, and blaming Obama when it happened under his watch, don't you? (He also likely claimed mass school shootings were fake news leftist propaganda, his buddy Jones told him so) Now, he blames the investigation of his campaign for the FBI not investigating his internet postings, knowing they aren't connected at all.

How is the cop responsible, specifically?

Dismissive and wrong.
I gave it 2 minutes, he's vastly overstating things.
There are non Lester candidates that don't just make Lesters happy, granted they don't get a level playing field, but they do get to play, and they can win.
When he starts off with that intentional misrepresentation of reality, his talk is moot.

"[I] didn't watch the Ted talk, sorry. Too long to make a point for me."

Then you missed the entire argument.

Everything you said is moot in the face of Lawrence Lessig's talk.

This kind of thinking: "Granted, neither choice is usually good, but one is definitely less bad....and far more sane and rational."Is completely missing the point.

If you are continuing to see this this as a partisan problem, you do not grok this issue.

You should not be choosing between "terrible and slightly less terrible." You should be choosing between "good and better."

I reiterate: The roots of this issue in the US go deeper than partisan "Dems vs. Reps" politics. This issue is money in politics.

"I want you to take hold, to grab the issue you care the most about. Climate change is mine, but it might be financial reform or a simpler tax system or inequality. Grab that issue, sit it down in front of you, look straight in its eyes, and tell it there is no Christmas this year. There will never be a Christmas. We will never get your issue solved until we fix this issue first."

Here's a video referencing a Princeton study that backs up Lessig's arguments pretty well.



As an aside, Lawrence Lessig tried to run for president last year...

Way to ignore point one...the illegal hacking of what he hoped contained top secret information by a hostile power at Trump's public direction.

The fact that you would even try to contend that the relationship between the U.S. and Russia is not adversarial makes anything else you say moot, because you have already proven to either be a liar or insanely naive. It is, and since ww2 has been adversarial. Your contention that responding to an illegal-by-treaty Russian military build up and invasion on it's borders with a long term international defence program stoked the Russian invasions of Crimea and the Ukraine shows you bought the Putin propaganda, and your follow up that it's an excuse for them installing their candidate in a hostile nation, as if that's proper, shows you aren't being rational at all. What we were required by treaty to do was protect the Ukraine...all of it...with our full military force, securing their borders....we balked and Russia just walked in.

Really, you think collusion with a foreign power to perform illegal acts against private citizens and the government and the interests of the U.S. isn't a crime? Sorry, but it absolutely is here in the U.S., where he did it.

So far, "he" isn't charged with a crime (only because it's likely he's so incompetent that he actually didn't know his entire staff were covert foreign agents....some have admitted as much when confronted with proof)...what his cabinet is charged with varies but all of them perjured themselves to congress about the crimes, who they work for, who paid them, and who they owe millions... so that's felonious.
Just a few crimes (of many) that the campaign is accused of is working with Russian diplomats for the benefit of Russia and against the interests of the U.S., hiring foreign agents, and hiding tens if not hundreds of millions secretly paid to the managers by Russia.
The campaign managers did directly receive money, all of them it seems, tens of millions...and lied about it over and over. What's more, they have admitted (only after recordings were produced) having subverted government policy by making arrangements with Putin before taking office that were diametrically opposed to the current (at the time) policy...again, that's treason.

Blocked has to do exclusively with it being unavailable to watch in a particular regions/countries of the world when available in others. So notblocked, however if a video is dead (not watchable on the sift) it's kind of a moot point.

Um...that's legislative, judiciary, and executive.
Also, all 3 of those branches DO have oversight, although granted it is weak and highly politically influenced oversight at this point.

That said, public third party oversight of the police is hardly the kind of power that easily corrupts. Any abuse would be easy to spot and halt with some simple and clear rules. Many jurisdictions already have this, and I've never once heard of the powers being used for personal vendettas against a force or officer....or being abused at all for that matter. Usually they only have the power to suggest prosecutions or other actions (I think they need the power to fire officers at the least), and even that's unacceptable to the police.
The other option, the one you seem to prefer, is to allow the police to have all the corrupting power with absolutely no checks (except those they randomly self impose when it suits them) and no possibility of justice because the entire legal system is in cahoots and thoroughly corrupted, meaning any built in safeguards and oversight are made moot.

Funny to me that you start your post with "no need to politicize this with Obama/Trump or whatever" and end by politicizing it with Obama/Trump and whatever.

Maybe more simple would be to observe that from the evangelical interpretation, if you were to go out and kill every person that failed to live up to the law, the global population would be zero. From there it is hardly rational to believe that Jesus was teaching anyone was supposed to go around meting out judgement. I don't find it such a harsh leap of logic then to read the old testament laws stating if person X commits crime Y they must be killed as being admonitions against the crime. I think it's not that bizarre to read them as the act of stoning others as not a law itself, but a sentence, and a sentence that Jesus death rendered moot.

As I've said, it's contradictory.

Jesus's death was hardly the end....there have been innumerable accomplishments since then, so in my mind it can only mean the final apocalypse.

I agree, the entire old testament seems at odds with Jesus's teachings....unless you interpret murder of infidels as somehow loving them to death. That's why his statements about the laws still being in full effect don't jibe with his teachings of love and acceptance, and no where does he, or God, or any prophet say his death erases God's laws that I find, that's pure conjecture and impious wishful thinking on the part of all those self labeled Christians, no?

If you were correct about that interpretation, ALL the old testament is moot and none of the laws/rules are still in effect, no? But no Christian worships that way that I know of....certainly not the WBC types. It's kind of all or nothing, and it's simply not practiced that way. If God hates fags, he also hates oyster eaters and poly blend wearers just the same, no?

Your point is moot though. At any given period of time, everything man does is a product of the civilisation that surrounds him. Nobody lives in a vacuum.

"What has that got to do with this video."
The water supply grid was one of the important "grids" you forgot. It may be trivial in a water rich region of the world, but, for example, living off of the water grid in the middle of Australia is hard work.

" That doesn't mean that he's living some kind of noble 'off the grid life style'".
I'm pretty sure you're the only one who has mentioned this. I think the point of the video is that he's doing something out of the ordinary that he really enjoys. I wouldn't mind living a step up from what he does (access by road). It would be very satisfying.

Do you have an opinion on living like that? Would you do it?

"I don't live on the water supply grid."
Cool! Is it by choice? Do you use the newer poly tanks? What's the annual rainfall you need to stay water positive each year? Do you use filters or a pump? Have you drilled for underground water (we call it "bore water" here in Aus). What region of the world are you in?

@bcglorf
i feel i have to ask you a question,and i feel quite foolish for not thinking of asking it before.

i do not ask this snidely,or with any disrespect.

are you a neo-conservative?

because this "If he was on America soil, I'd agree with you. If he was living in a European apartment, I'd agree with you. Heck, if he was living in Russia I'd agree with you."

is almost verbatim the counter argument that was published,ad nauseum,in the weekly standard.which is a neo-conservative publication.edited by bill-the bloody-kristol.

and it would also explain why we sometimes just simply cannot agree on some issues.

ok,let's unpack your comment above that quoted.i won;t address the rest of your comment,not because i find it unworthy,it is simply a reiteration of your original argument,which we have addressed already.

so...
you find that it is the region,the actual soil that a person is on that makes the difference between legal prosecution..and assassination.

ok,i disagree,but the MCA of 2006 and the NDAA of 2012 actually agree with you and give the president cover to deem an american citizen an "enemy combatant".however,the region where this "enemy combatant" is not the deciding factor,though many have tried to make a different case,the simple fact is that the president CAN deem you an "enemy combatant' and CAN order your assassination by drone,or seal team or any military outlet,or spec-ops...regardless of where you are at that moment.

now you attempt to justify this order of death by "The reality is he was supporting mass killing from within a lawless part of the world were no police or courts would touch him. He was living were the only force capable of serving any manner of arrest warrant was military."

if THIS were a true statement,and the ONLY avenue left was for a drone strike.then how do you explain how this man was able to:foment dissent,organize in such a large capacity to incite others to violence and co-ordinate on such an impressive scale?

anwars al awlaki went to yemen to find refuge..yes,this is true.
but a btter qustion is:was the yemeni government being unreasonable and un-co-operative to a point where legal extradition was no longer a viable option?

well,when we look at what the state department was attempting to do and the yemeni response,which was simply:provide evidence that anwars al awlaki has perpetrated a terrorist attack,and we will release him.it is not like they,and the US government,didn't know where he lived.

this is EXACTLY what happened with afghanistan in regards to osama bin laden.

and BOTH times,the US state department could not provide conclusive evidence that either bin laden,or awlaki had actually perpetrated a terrorist act.

in fact,some people forget that in the days after 9/11 osama actually denied having anything to do with 9/11,though he praised the act.

so here we have the US on one hand.with the largest military on the planet,the largest and most encompassing surveillance system.so vast the stasi would be green with envy.a country whose military and intelligence apparatus is so massive and vast that we pay other countries to house black sites.so when t he president states "america does not torture",he is not lying,we pay OTHER people to torture.

so when i see the counter argument that the US simply cannot adhere to international laws,nevermind their OWN laws,because they cannot "get" their guy.

is bullshit.

it's not that they cannot "find" nor "get" their target.the simple fact is that a sovereign nation has decided to disobey it's master and defy the US.so the US defies international treaties and laws and simply sends in a drone and missiles that fucker down.

mission accomplished.

but lets ask another question.
when do you stop being an american citizen?
at what point do you lose all rights as a citizen?
do we use cell phone coverage as a metric?
the obedience of the country in question?

i am just being a smart ass right now,because the point is moot.
the president can deem me an "enemy combatant" and if he so chose,send a drone to target my house,and he would have the legal protection to have done so.

and considering just how critical i am,and have been,of bush,obama and both the republican and democrats.

it would not be a hard job for the US state department and department of justice to make a case that i was a hardline radical dissident,who was inciting violence and stirring up hatred in people towards the US government,and even though i have never engaged in terrorism,nor engaged in violence against the state.

all they would need to do is link me with ONE person who did happen to perpetrate violence and slap the blame on me.

i wonder if that would be the point where you might..maybe..begin to question the validity of stripping an american citizen of their rights,and outright have them executed.

because that is what is on the line right now.
and i am sorry but "he spoke nasty things about us,and some of those terrorists listened to him,and he praised violence against us".

the argument might as well be:enoch hurt our feelings.

tell ya what.
let's use the same metric that you are using:
that awlaki incited violence and there were deaths directly due to his words.

in 2008 jim david akinsson walked into a unitarian church in tennesee and shot and killed two people,and wounded seven others.

akinsson was ex military and had a rabid hatred of liberals,democrats and homosexuals.

he also happened to own every book by sean hannity,and was an avid watcher of FOX news.akinsson claimed that hannity and his show had convinced him that thsoe dirty liberals were ruining his country,and he targeted the unitarian church because it "was against god".

now,is hannity guilty of incitement?
should he be held accountable for those shot dead?
by YOUR logic,yes..yes he should.

now what if hannity had taken off to find refuge in yemen?
do we send a drone?

because,again using YOUR logic,yes..yes we do.

i am trying my best to get you to reconsider your position,because..in my opinion...on an elementary moral scale..to strip someone of their rights due to words,praise and/or support..and then to have them executed without due process,or have at least the ability to defend themselves.

is wrong.

i realize i am simply making the same argument,but using different examples.which is why i asked,sincerely,if you were a neo-conservative.

because they believe strongly that the power and authority of the american empire is absolute.they are of the mind that "might makes right",and that they have a legal,and moral,obligation to expand americas interest,be it financial or industrial,and to use the worlds largest military in order to achieve those goals.they also are of the belief that the best defense is the best offense,and to protect the empire by any means necessary.(usually military).

which is pretty reflective of our conversations,and indicative of where our disagreements lie.

i dunno,but i suspect that i have not,nor will i,change your position on this matter.

but i tried dude...i really did try.