What an amazingly inaccurate statement.

Contextually, during Trump, I ended up with less money in my pocket. If you're going to be absolutist, you're completely wrong. The question you now have to ask is ... just how wrong are you?

Out of context, there are so many ways Captain Orange made us worse. What you're saying with this one statement is so worshipping that you really need therapy, unless you're a white nationalist bigot woman hating insolent xenophobe, which he pushed into the mainstream and made the US a laughing stock in the world.

Note I'm not saying you are, truly, but captain orange is a really really bad person and should not ever be the national leader of anything - except a poster child of how not to behave and model your children from. The only reason he survives at all is R solidarity and horse-blinder politics.

No, he lucked out, but Trump’s foreign policy was worse. He just capitulated to international thugs, cozied up to them except Iran. That’s why Ukraine was already occupied and Crimea recognized. It’s why N Korea advanced their capabilities so much. It’s why the Taliban gained so much power in 2020. He actually claimed China used biological warfare against us (utter bullshit, but his position), but made no moves against them in retaliation. No wars happen if you don’t oppose our enemies.

Biden isn’t my god, he’s far from perfect, he’s just an improvement. Being instrumental in opposing Assad gassing his own people is a bad thing? I was disappointed we didn’t depose him quickly with international support.

The Ukrainian parliament threw Yanukovych out in Feb 2014 on the grounds that he "has restrained himself from performing his constitutional duties" and effectively resigned. He had surprised everyone by abandoning an agreement made with Europe to be part of a free trade union, shocking the country, and instead intended to strengthen ties with Russia, and had been murdering protesters in the streets when he fled the country.

The people of Ukraine and Russia will suffer. Germany too. Probably all NATO nations….and all countries dependent on Russian aid.

My idea would have been to threaten Putin months ago that if one MORE Russian soldier or piece of military equipment crosses the border into Ukraine, we will fast track Ukraine into the UN immediately, permanently recognizing their actual borders, if he doesn’t send more military, we can negotiate peacefully with UN status on hold…and get solidarity with our allies on the plan. Maybe simplistic, but it’s what he fears, use it.

@newtboy,

I agree with more of what you say than you make out. You need to appreciate how different Canada is from the US, particularly in power balance within government and corresponding police action and media coverage.

Long delays in stopping illegal blockade and protest activity is the norm.
-Fairy Creek blockades persisted almost 12 months before police took action
-Blockade of Coastal Link pipepline went on for months before police intervened to allow work to continue.
-Mohawk solidarity blockade of railways in Ontario persisted multiple weeks

The difference to the protests today, the Liberal government was tripping over themselves to reach out to those protest groups, while immediately spitting in the faces of this one.

I've always been of the opinion illegally blocking a roadway, border or business should lead to arrests within the time it takes to notify and send police.

The problem here from a Canadian eye, is that the only time current government is interested in bringing a hammer down is based not upon the actions of protestors, but instead based upon their professed cause.

I refuse to accept tying the right to protest to what cause is being rallied to.

Those are decent points, but have absolutely zero to do with the mass abandoning of their positions. It was 100% due to one of their own being charged after beating nonviolent protesters. They originally admitted exactly that, and now that they aren't being supported in their walkout, they are coming up with excuses that didn't matter to them the day before the officer was charged.

I think they should have to pay for the training and equipment they now refuse to use.

What are you talking about? You think budget cuts caused time off to be cancelled?! It costs double to not rotate in other officers, because you pay those on duty overtime, it doesn't make it cheaper. Budget cuts were not the issue when these cops were doing crowd control, only now that they're suddenly called to account for their own actions. No time off temporarily, because of extreme circumstances, was not an issue until one of their own was charged. It's certainly not abnormal, and absolutely not because of budget cuts, it costs more.

No prosecutions is the norm, if I recall, over 98% of charges levied at protesters have been dismissed nation wide, mostly because police had no evidence to back the charges they brought. You might note, as described in the article, "Mr. Schmidt immediately announced that he would focus on prosecuting cases of violence or vandalism; protesters who simply resisted arrest or refused to disperse after a police order would not necessarily be charged." They are taking a stand against anarchic violent protesters, but not the peaceful protesters with a legitimate gripe about violent, racist, deadly police acting as an anarchist gang that believes rules only apply to you, not them.

There are few prosecutions in large part because police declare riots when all participants are peaceful and not causing damage, and police are almost always the one's giving the orders to remove the people they declared "rioters", and in most cases they have zero evidence to back up their declarations, and are as violent as possible, beating peaceful videographers and reporters who were trapped and could not disperse, then charging them with refusal to disperse and resisting arrest, even violence against police for attacking police batons with their faces.
(Edit: remember the freeway shutdown when they marched on the freeway, and police blocked them from exiting or continuing while a second group of police came from behind, forcing them into a small fenced in area with no exit, then charged them all with refusal to disperse and the few that tried to disperse were charged with attacking police officers who blocked every escape route, violently attacking anyone trying to leave...all on live tv?)
Many peaceful protests became riots only after police moved in to violently disperse protests, fully 1/2 were riots because counter protesters and bad right wing actors like proud and boogaloo boys were planting bombs, shooting crowds, starting fires, driving through crowds, and murdering police in an effort to paint protesters as violent anarchists. That is verified fact directly from the DOJ investigation.

It's not a Portland only thing, police abandoning their communities because, as they indicated to the DA, "“It was like, ‘There’s our team and there’s their team, and you are on their team and you’re not on our team. And we’ve never had a D.A. not be on our team before,’” Police assume they are on a team against citizens, and won't do their jobs if, by doing them wrong with bias and malice, they might be prosecuted. They are used to immunity, and don't know how to do their jobs without it because they are abusers of power.

One day after charges were levied they quit in solidarity with the criminal abusive cop, and came up with fake excuses later.

You seem to have missed "the Justice Department said that the city’s Police Bureau was violating its own use-of-force policies during crowd-control operations, and that supervisors were not properly investigating complaints." part.

I looked up some stats just to see.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1123070/police-shootings-rate-ethnicity-us/

30 per million blacks fatally shot by police.
12 per million whites fatally shot by police.

So cops are roughly twice as likely to kill a black person, per racial group.

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045219gg

US being 76% white and 13% black, that works out to an aggregate ratio of roughly 9 whites killed per 4 blacks, per capita. In the end the death toll is high all around, white people aren't getting away scott free.

We should also consider poverty. Poverty and crime tend to track one another. It's safe to assume that areas with more crime will be more likely to experience police encounters, and hence more police shootings on average.

https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/poverty-rate-by-raceethnicity/?currentTimeframe=0&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%
22%7D

White poverty rate (9%) is roughly half of black poverty (22%), which implies that crime is also half as frequent among whites, which is roughly similar to the per capita difference in police shooting rate.

30/12 is 2.5
22/9 is 2.44
2.5 > 2.44, so it implies bias against blacks, but not as big as I expected.

As far as total people killed, cops kill plenty people of all races. The numbers don't look as lopsided as I expected, which surprises me.

I appreciate the solidarity among black people. They at least try to hold authorities to account.

White people couldn't care less when cops kill whites. They just shrug it off as 'well the guy must have done something to piss off the cop, so it was probably their own fault anyways'. You can sit on liveleak watching cops kill white people all day, but other white people never get worked up about it. It's a shame they don't have the same sense of unity as black people do.

I wish the protests were about police abuse in general. Or even goverment abuse. There are so many issues that need fixing (e.g. civil forfeiture, repeatedly trying people for the same event by tweaking charges until a conviction sticks, government budget being infinitely larger than a defendant's budget, government freezing a defendant's funds so they can't afford lawyers, etc).

-scheherazade

The black fist has a historical significance I'm not sure a white fist conveys, but I do see the likelihood any attempted solidarity would be overshadowed by people's outrage at perceived racial appropriation.

Don't see the point. If i want to "stand in solidarity with black America" i'm sure my (Caucasian) power fist will do just fine, if a power fist, is the way one must go. Don't see much upside with black hands or arm but lots of potential downside. Maybe ask a few black people first before doing something that may be potentially problematic, regardless of your intentions. I assume there are many other ways to stand in solidarity if one truly cares. One thing we all know is that black face is an issue, so why even fuck with it? Imo seems so naive. In the end i would say it's hurting, because i feel it would potentially cause a distraction from the real issues you are trying to be in solidarity with.

I wondered the other day....what's the ruling on black arms/hands?
If a white guy paints his forearm black to stand in solidarity with black Americans by raising a "black power fist", is he helping or hurting?

In open warfare of govt vs people, drones don't matter, just like jets don't matter. I already covered this above.



Nowhere is an oppressive dictatorship - until it is.
[redacted]
I feel like people are too distracted with instagram and other B.S. to bother learning about how the world works.
History is long. The current peace is an anomaly. When things go bad, there is little warning. If you're lucky, a year or so of build up. If you're not lucky, weeks or days. Shit likes to spiral.
In bad times, you have only what you have on hand.


Most western countries with [regardless of gun ownership] don't have a population that's F'd in the head.
Nothing stops a German gun owner from taking his AR15 and shooting up a concert.
Storing his guns in a safe that he can open doesn't mean anything.
Paying for a new license card for every few guns doesn't alter the guns.

Gun laws, as proposed, are fluff. Nothing that makes people safer, nothing that prevents ownership, but plenty to crap on collectors.
* 10 round limit = 2 second pause to reload
* Gun show loophole is a misnomer.
* (re. above) Only private sales (gun show or not) don't require checks - but you still end up in court if the buyer does something bad.
* Assault weapons ban only bans pistol grips and threaded barrels. Cosmetics. Just google "California compliant AR15" (they already have a de-facto AWB).
* There's already laws against straw purchase.
* There's already laws against crazy people buying (already part of the background check)
* Registration is pointless as gun control. Doesn't alter the guns or who has them (background check already tells gov who, when, and where bought a gun).

(I'd sooner vote for mandatory roll cage and 6 point harness in every car. Could eliminate 90+% of car fatalities in one rule - if people cared enough.)


By the way, gun owners hate people like the Vegas shooter even more than anti-gunners hate people like him.
Precisely because assholes like that shooter make anti-gunners turn on their frustration on innocent gun owners.

The call to "do something" is the phrase that perfectly describes the sentiments that led to actions, that in turn became described by either "famous last words" or "the road to hell is paved with good intentions".





We had shit health insurance before Obama. We had shit insurance during Obama (only you're required by law to buy it, even if it's not a good value), we continue to have shit health insurance during Trump, and no matter what trump does, it will still be shit.
Problem is that the insurance company lobbyists draft the language of the law (no matter the party in charge), and it's not for our benefit.





Re. Minorities, most are living normal lives. The white eutopia that the few vocal people complain about, doesn't exist. At least I have yet to see it. Don't let a few thousand people in a nation of millions guide your thoughts about overall social norms.

I'm happy to see them protest. Frankly, I wish white people had the same solidarity that black people have. When a black gets shot by a cop, they come together. When a white is shot by a cop, other whites say "he probably deserved it". I wish the black community good luck and success.





Yes, I wish we weren't jailing more people than anywhere else on the planet, over things that harm nobody.
I wish we had the drug laws of Portugal (decriminalization)
I wish we had the legal system of Sweden (no jail before conviction).

Know how I said that most countries don't have as many people that are F'd in the head? Same applies for people in government.
None of this shit will get fixes.
Republicans are bible thumping retards that funnel money to defense contractors and campaign donors.
Democrats are buck-passing censors that funnel money to insurance companies and campaign donors.
And people just pick a team and bark at the other team, while each gets fleeced by their very own side.

-scheherazade

You did good on that joke and on its explanation. I got it just fine without the commentary though.

I left your whole commentary here, because I make it a practice to delete all comments from my wall. Your essay needs to be saved for posterity.

So here is a quirk of Videosift.

If you are ignoring someone, and they make a comment on one of your videos, you will never get another email saying that comments have been made.

I had no idea of the implosion on that comment stream. Dear god in heaven.

What is really sad is I only wanted a temp ban. I honestly didn't know of @gorillaman's propensities. I am all for second, third and fourth chances -- even though some people have left the Sift in the past because the worst abusers were allowed back. I understood their pain, but I'm still all for more chances. If you love something enough, maybe you will change your behavior. I certainly don't change immediately. I will accord others the opportunity to learn over time.

So no edit help, huh? I think I'll use this:

As "Homeland Security" says, if you see something, SAY something. (Because here is the truth: As Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel wrote, "Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.")

Much cleaner. Don't need the snark bit. Quote marks. Gotta love 'em. (Quote marks, not parentheses, to denote snark. I'm getting old.)

I didn't address your tendency to tread lightly with me in my first response. I figured it was made up of three things:

1. My early days on the Sift, I had really thin skin. I was easily hurt and upset. One of the biggest gifts to me in my life was learning on the Sift to be clearer and stronger in my communications. And to walk away from the abusers. And to use the ignore button. I figured that my early reactions were in your brain pan still.

2. That tone of voice thing. It is real. What is a simple, clear declarative sentence in my head can be read as a whine-fest by others.

3. I think it is great that you write carefully when you write to me. Keep it up! It's called caring about the person you are talking to. I have zero problem with that. In fact, I see it as a Great Good. (Because if you aren't, and I lay my own internal tone of voice onto your words in a way that doesn't match the words in your head, you will be hearing from me. And I am just as verbose as you, my friend! A punishment worse than death!)

And yes. We are people who hang in there. It is a blessing and a curse.
Well, only a curse to those who roll their eyes and snort "good grief, just shut up!" I'm cool with it.

Thanks for hanging in with me. And I am truly sorry about gorillaman. He did it to himself, though. He did have other choices.

In solidarity, I say to you -- Fuck Homeland Security and ginned up xenophobia and racism.

(A poet? Do you write epic odes? Surely not haikus!)

Sounds like an exercising in rearranging the furniture on the Titanic to me.

In a world where discrimination and separatism is qualitatively and quantitatively on the rise, people in charge must be ecstatic that they can appease people without having to do anything meaningful that might piss off the extremists on the right, or "shareholders". And people are so used to being told that change is only possible through incremental adjustments that they'll eat it up like candy and think this is progress.

"People people people, if you're going to call someone a filthy tranny and throw fast food at xem on public transport, at least use the proper pronoun when you verbally abuse xem."

When there's a hole in the boat and you're taking on water, the least of your concerns should be about what language you use to describe the in-rushing water or shape of the hole, nor arguing over the colour of the material you use to repair it.

I'm sure some people will see this as a victory. Until next time they apply for a job and not get hired due to transphobia. And the manager of the company, with a gleam in their eye, begins the rejection letter with 'Dear bun/bunself', then sniggers to themselves and says "fucking trannies."

What I'm trying to say was summed nicely in a tweet i saw the other day:
ALTRIGHT/NEO NAZI: your all going to the gas chambers!!!
NEOLIBERAL: you're*

If this is the extent of what activism is able to achieve, i should say that the establishment/elite have won by pacifying and declawing the protesters. It's no longer about breaking the shackles of oppression. We can't go around breaking shackles everywhere - think of the effect on the economy? And what about people getting hit by shrapnel? No, instead the LGBTQ community will be given multi coloured chains, the black community will be given slightly longer chains, and we'll pad the shackles with silk so that everyone is much more comfortable. Don't complain about the concept of being chained, instead complain that your chain is not as nice as the next guy's chain.

It's as though the great struggle of protest and civil disobedience has been taken over by the liberal intelligentsia, and the worst kind of discrimination faced by a 20 year old middle-class university student with rainbow coloured dreadlocks and a nose piercing is the letter they receive about their student loan that begins "dear sir/madam". So they go out and march about it and think they've made progress when they get their own pronoun. In their life, in their experiences, they are treated equally in other respects, so they think they ARE fighting inequality.

But for the working class male or female transsexual who gets filthy looks and a seat isolated by themselves on public transport, to travel to their entry level job where they've been skipped over for promotion for not looking the part, or getting the right level of respect from the trans-phobic staff, getting snide whispered comments from customers about the size of their hands, getting abuse yelled at them as they travel to have a night out at the ONLY trans-friendly bar within a 20 mile radius....... I get the feeling that receiving a letter with the correct pronoun isn't exactly going to change their fucking lives.

To remove a weed, you go for the roots. Some wanker calling you him/her when you prefer bun/bunself is not the root of this problem. The problem is that they are trans-phobic, not the language - which is just the tool they use to discriminate against you. To change the language and think that you've won is a bit like redefining room temperature and claiming you've warmed everybody by a few degrees.

If you march for equal rights, fair pay, fair treatment then people are going to see that and join your protest because they also want those things. Those things will solve the problems faced by the trans community, feminists, masculinists, minorities alike! And through common goals and by supporting each other en masse for simple, unified goals like EQUALITY, progress will be made, change will happen. It is a concept called solidarity and seems to be going out of fashion, but our grandparents knew.

The objective for the establishment is to drive a wedge between groups of people so that their demands are more manageable, and they can be turned on each other. Feminists, masculinists, LGBT, everyone... can't you see how better off you'd be marching together for common values that lie at the core of what every human wants?

Wall of text, sorry... and I know it looks like i'm being insensitive. So congratulations, genuinely, for getting someone to use your preferred pronoun if that makes you feel better. But whilst people have been fighting tooth and nail to get their own pronoun (in civilised settings only), we've suffered huge leaps backwards in freedom and tolerance behind their backs whilst they were bent over intently concentrating on the finer detail of what their ideal equality looks like.

@bobknight33

i wasn't making a claim that using labor and solidarity rhetoric has helped black or working poor communities.i was simply saying that was the tactic the democrats used to garner and solidify votes.

see:FDR

the current state of republican/democrat power structure is almost purely a machine to retain political power.it may go one way one election cycle and another the next,but BOTH parties attempt to crush any dissenting voice from the current narrative of power,and neither really offer any substantive change.

go ahead and ask your friends who gary johnson and jill stein are,chances are they never even heard of them.

because americans taken as a whole,are pretty fucking stupid.

I know this video probably makes you feel good..

But as a "brown" person.. please.. deeply consider the points Chaos has made here..

Anything else is insincere and disingenuous "solidarity" with the sentiment of this video, truly.

anywho, happy sifting

I dunno about his comments on Trump making "sexist remarks" about Hillary.

Trump says that the only thing she has going for her (why she gets votes) is being a woman. Is that sexist? Yeah, probably. He says that her approval ratings are low, even among women. Is that hypocritical, considering his own numbers with women? Sure.

But is either of those statements actually *wrong*? I think that is much less clear cut.

McCain chose Palin as his running mate in 2008 for precisely one reason: she was a woman, and he and the GOP at large were terrified that Hillary (who seemed unstoppable at the time) would get the Democratic nod and then women would vote for her en masse due to some sort of "vagina solidarity" effect. In other words, the only thing Palin had going for her was being a woman. Is it sexist to say that? Maybe, but it doesn't make it any less true.

Hillary is admittedly a vastly more legitimate candidate than Palin was, but I think there is a certain degree of truth to the suggestion that being female is a pretty significant part of why she's getting the push from Democrat elites. And it is just as insulting for the Democratic elites to think that Hillary can benefit from "vagina solidarity" as it was for the GOP to think that about Palin.