|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Oct 3, 2017 11:00:06 GMT -5
How does that response not translate to "Why bother?" Did we close the bases? No. Turns out that these bases all happen to be in somebodies' Congressional District. Other Presidential Commissions, however, have had greater impact. Some more than others. The point is that they study problems. They make recommendations. They add to the public discourse, whether implemented or not. All of this pretty much falls in the Moot Point Department, as the NRA will continue to make sure that we do not invest in solutions. That is not making the NRA the boogey man, that's just proper respect for how effective they are at making sure we don't ever address guns in a logical way.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Oct 3, 2017 9:32:01 GMT -5
I think the smartest thing the resident of the oval nursery could do at this point is appoint a nonpartisan commission of experts from areas like law enforcement, health care ( including psychology), the firearm industry, etc., analyze the available data as well as possible and come to some consensus as to recommendations for changes in legislation and act on those recommendations. Could take a year or more and maybe nothing would change but it seems logical to attempt. That's how we got congress to close all those useless military bases we don't need anymore but that are still in existence. It worked there so what could go wrong? How does that response not translate to "Why bother?"
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Oct 3, 2017 8:50:08 GMT -5
What exactly possesses anyone to believe that more of the same stuff that didn't work will suddenly cause it to work? 1. The ability to ridicule instead of debate people they disagree with. 2. The ability to set up the NRA as a boogey man instead of debating the issue with people they disagree with. I believe that the NRA is at the heart of the problem. I detailed a few reasons why. But when I post that I am making them a boogey man? Bottom line: spend decades making sure that there are no effective national gun laws. Use rampant gun violence to rationalize that weak laws don't work. This is honest debate?
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Oct 3, 2017 8:47:23 GMT -5
Anti-do anything about it posts, summarized:
1) Why bother?
2) Nothing will work.
3) America is a pitiful, helpless giant.
Sigh.
We decided after Newtown that dead children were not enough reason to address this problem.
Why would I expect a few more dozen dead to make a difference?
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Oct 3, 2017 8:42:48 GMT -5
Problem #1: The public is already armed. And yet there seems to be a demand for more guns.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Oct 2, 2017 20:04:05 GMT -5
There are common sense measures we could take Which ones? Massachusetts has the most restrictive gun laws in the country. In the past 20 years their rate of gun fatalities has gone down by 60%. Why is this? And what would happen if we had more 50 state laws in place of these one-state laws? Might be good questions for the CDC to study. After all, they spend about 5 billion a year studying cancer- and, $00.00 studying the causes of gun violence. I won't insult anyone's intelligence by pretending we don't all know what lobbying group has bought off enough members of Congress to make sure that this remains the case. My first common sense measure would be that everybody- especially liberals, like myself- quit asking "Well, wuddyagonnado?" This is the response that the NRA has paid very good money for. Apparently this guy turned a semi-automatic into an automatic by purchasing an adapter on the internet? WTF? Let's start there. Will we catch every bad actor? No. Will we stop a few? I suspect we will. And I think we should spend a little money to research and see if I might be right. The First Amendment has limits. The 4th has limits (wiretaps without warrants). The Fifth? How about drug-testing without cause? The Second has better lobbyists, I guess, but fuck 'em. They are, in no small part, how we ended up with all those dead bodies in Vegas. We put a man on the moon, but we can't have less gun violence than Australia? Or, I guess, you can just roll over. Or pretend that if everybody has enough guns and ammo everything will be cool. (Even without federally funded research that particular myth has been pretty well debunked. But I digress.) Your solution, Millring? More of the same?
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Oct 2, 2017 13:24:14 GMT -5
"No Way to Prevent This," says the Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens." -The Onion Unlike, say, France. No comparison. Since 1970, a bit more than 400 people have been killed by terrorists in France. We beat that in one night. There are common sense measures we could take that might, at least, reduce this kind of thing. As a nation , however, we have chosen helplessness and the idea that this will keep happening.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Oct 2, 2017 12:01:32 GMT -5
"No Way to Prevent This," says the Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens."
-The Onion
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 30, 2017 16:56:53 GMT -5
Tax reform is hard.
There's a reason it has not been done since 1986.
Trump ain't Reagan, and Ryan ain't Tip.
The initial reviews of the first draft are that the people in Trump's income range make-out like bandits. Families making from 50k up to 200k take a hit? Something like that.
Can't see it happening.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 30, 2017 9:13:43 GMT -5
The kid is right. The Supreme Court ruled in about 1947 that the state can't compel you to say the pledge or honor the flag in any way. Violation of the First Amendment right to free speech as well as freedom of religion. That was true even back when I was in school. But you are required to sit quietly. The problem is the kid has no idea what it means. Has no idea what it means? The 10 year old kid has that common with the President.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 29, 2017 13:04:32 GMT -5
Ever hear of a Pittsburgh Left?
(From Wiki): The Pittsburgh Left is a colloquial term for the driving practice of the first left-turning vehicle taking precedence over vehicles going straight through an intersection, associated with the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area.
I call it the Asshole Left, and it is not something you only see in Pittsburgh.
If you are a good driver, you can see these jerks from a mile away. It's probably saved you from a few fender-benders or worse.
I want to know how self-driving cars will see that sort of maneuver before I sign on.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 28, 2017 16:49:03 GMT -5
Why, yes! I can hear Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh going on and on in their praise. Trump, no doubt, would Tweet his support. Maybe even drop the birther lie in response. Yes. They would. And you wouldn't care and neither would most of America. Most of America would listen to NBC, CBS, ABC, PBS, and read Washington Post and NYTimes articles praising the president. And the majority of Americans would think themselves as totally neutral and a-political as those sources. Hannity and Limbaugh aren't the news. The actual, honest-to-god news casters of America would have praised the president. We don't have to guess. They praised him for everything from the beer summit to Ferguson. The right owns what was until recently the dominant cable opinion channel, FOX. They also dominate talk radio. They are probably the single "news" and information source for about 35% of the population. The idea that the journalists at the NY Times or NBC (as opposed to the opinion pages of NY Times or MSNBC) have a left wing bias does not square with observable reality. If anything, a generation of right wing media working the refs, screaming "liberal bias" have led to them bending over backwards towards a "both sides" false equivalence all too often. Yesterday, for instance, most news headlines referred to the new GOP nominee for Senate in Alabama as a "firebrand." What a nice was to say "twice-removed-from-his-job-for-failing-to-follow-the-law lunatic." But, balance, so, OK, firebrand it is. By the way, here is the real time NY Times news article for the beer summit, including references to Obama adding fuel to the fire and berating reporters. It was news. Not sure how else it was supposed to be covered: www.nytimes.com/2009/07/31/us/politics/31obama.html?mcubz=1
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 28, 2017 14:39:27 GMT -5
Here's one I read: What do you suppose the reaction would have been had a player taken a knee in protest of legalized abortion, and Obama had called him a son of a bitch and stated that he ought to be fired? Easy. Wide spread adulation for such a brave and outspoken president. What else could it be? Why, yes! I can hear Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh going on and on in their praise. Trump, no doubt, would Tweet his support. Maybe even drop the birther lie in response.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 28, 2017 13:47:50 GMT -5
Just read a provocative thought experiment on all this: What if an NFL player decided to hold up a Confederate flag during the anthem? Here's one I read: What do you suppose the reaction would have been had a player taken a knee in protest of legalized abortion, and Obama had called him a son of a bitch and stated that he ought to be fired?
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 28, 2017 8:54:07 GMT -5
One moment that stood out in the past couple of nights: a Gallup Poll taken shortly after the shootings at Kent State revealed that 58% of the respondents believed the responsibility for the deaths lay with the demonstrators.
Nixon planted and nurtured the 'hippies versus the squares' issue that continues to divide Americans to this day.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 26, 2017 9:57:33 GMT -5
Definitely the Extemp. 50 cent cover at the door. That sweet little room provided my first exposure to Lonnie, Sean, Robin and Linda Williams, Greg Brown... so many great musicians.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 26, 2017 9:41:24 GMT -5
This showed up in my facebook feed this morning. Posted by the guy who managed the Extemp in the early 70's, Steve Dobbleman. Sean Blackburn and Lonnie Knight, circa 70/71.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 25, 2017 14:58:10 GMT -5
Fine and dandy. But what does disrespecting the anthem/flag accomplish other than a bit of self-righteous pleasure? Nothing changes until hearts change. I'd argue that this and meaningless protests like it do nothing but harden people in their positions. Maybe that's the goal. Hadn't thought of that... Three points: 1) The flag is a symbol. A symbol of a country whose highest ideals are expressed in the Constitution. Systematically, callously violating the Constitution disrespects that flag more than anything Kaepernick or any NFL player ever does. The cops in Baltimore who chased down Freddie Gray with no cause, beat him severely, then locked him in a van and purposely drove it so he would get hurt trampled the Constitution and pissed on that flag. The cop who shot Philando Castile who had done NOTHING wrong trampled that Constitution and pissed on that flag. The cops in Ferguson, as well as their courts and city leadership, trampled that Constitution and pissed on that flag. When people get as upset about that as they get about whether Colin Kaepernick's ass is on a bench or standing up, then pretty soon there won't be any reason to protest. 2) Nothing is going to change in people's hearts until the issue is brought to their attention. 3) There is so much crap on FB right now about this that is obviously produced simply to provoke RW people's outrage that I can't help but think if this is still the Russians using FB to sow division and distrust among Americans. We now know that the Russians did exactly that in 2016, using anti-Muslim memes to stir up Islamophobia, even to the point of actually organizing an anti-Islam rallies in America THAT PEOPLE ATTENDED. If Trump wants to be patriotic in a way that goes beyond mere symbolism and sloganeering he could commission a Presidential Commission into Russia's hacking of the 2016 election, and demand that reforms be instituted ASAP, ideally before the 2018 elections.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 25, 2017 13:21:51 GMT -5
But this wasn't us, the populace, getting distracted. This was our president senselessly pouring gasoline on some dying embers. The rabble rouser is in the White House, the Distracted in Chief. But, you are right, he should be ignored. This is Trump at his best. And I mean that 100% literally. I suppose it's impossible to ever expect the media to ignore the President. And it's obvious that Trump knows that. Any issue can be examined at multiple levels of abstraction. Some might look at these protests as the final, fatal over-reach of the Postmodernist movement, signifying it's inevitable death. Some might look at this an exercise in free expression. Some might look at this as the unwelcome injection of politics into a non-political context. Some might look at this and see a President acting "un-Presidential". But what Trump understands is that there are millions of people who look at this and see nothing more complex than a bunch of rich guys disrespecting "muh flag and muh country". Forget subtlety, nuance, analysis, philosophy, abstraction. Forget all of that. Trump operates from his id, and knows how to punch people right in the id. And it works. A little id - the most disorganized and primitive part of human personality structure- goes a long way. It's great at dividing. Trump is all id. Governing and leading require skills he will never have. So, we can expect four years of galvanizing his base and hope the world does not require anything more complicated from the USA.
|
|
|
Post by casualplayerpaul on Sept 25, 2017 10:41:49 GMT -5
Wasn't this last year's news? I had not heard anything about it this season until Trump had his latest tantrum.
|
|