American Politics / Current Events Thread

[RegularGuyGamer | 2,013]

57 minutes ago, MrWunderful said:

Have you ever been to Baltimore? Its a rough place, especially the inner city. Bet it sucks just like any other inner city school attended by primarily minority students.

East Coast got the fuckin slums man no joke. I was at a school on Philly where in January of 2017 there was over 100 violent crimes within a 1/2 mile radius of the high school including 5 homicides and 3 rapes. 

One of the teachers got car jacked in the parking lot that year by one of her students. 

When there were fire drills, kids would smoke blunts while they waited to go back in, or just leave. I had a kid tell me that when she turned 18 she wanted to get a shotgun and walk down to center city killing white ppl. Kids had tattoos from their fingers to their eye brows who weren't even 18 yet. 

W.e people think happens in the hood needs to be multipled by 1000. I wouldn't have believed it unless I lived it and I'm not from a nice area. I have stories for days and I only taught there for 3 months. 

 

[JamesRobot | 5,800]

2 minutes ago, RegularGuyGamer said:

When there were fire drills, kids would smoke blunts while they waited to go back in, or just leave.

All else aside, this one happens in the burbs too.

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

3 minutes ago, JamesRobot said:

All else aside, this one happens in the burbs  everywhere too.

FTFY

 

Maybe its because Im from SF bay area, but weed has never been an issue around here. 
 

when I was a shit head kid, me and my buddies got caught with pot by the cops a few times and never got jammed up, even at school. 

[RegularGuyGamer | 2,013]

1 minute ago, JamesRobot said:

All else aside, this one happens in the burbs too.

I never seen it at the school I'm at and we have a lot of drug activity now. Literally lighting marijuana 20 feet from teachers and walking away from school w.o returning is something I've never see since. That was the only place I've seen that type of outward disregard to norms.

The school I'm at now kids will smoke in the bathroom or locker room. The difference between the suburban kids or even those who are in urban area but not the from the straight hood was that down there, there was nothing to hide for them. Like who they were and what their young lives were about was written all over them and when confronted they owned it. 

[Californication | 1,477]

3 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

Correct. My Father worked for a local high school district for 35 years, You end up voting on “Bond measures” that will raise your property tax in order to fund it. I think you can vote on it to raise other types of taxes too. 
 

Last year we paid 10k in property tax . But my old high school got 35$ million in early 2000s (after I graduated, or course) and it made the school significantly better so I am ok with it. 

So ya, I think you can only partially blame red states for education outcomes. The federal government doesn't support each state school system enough making it necessary for states to raise things like property taxes for schools. I am assuming there are some red states were politicians gyp the students. But even if we leave that out since red states generally have smaller populations and fewer economic centers they are going to have lower priced homes as a whole which would decrease potential taxes to fund schools. 

I guess what I am trying to say is that the weakness of public education is the fault of dems and republicans - as well as assholes like bill gates who helped create the charter school industry. And c$!#s like betsy duvos who wanted to siphon of money from public schools into charter schools.

 

[Link | 2,710]

On 3/23/2021 at 7:27 PM, ThePhleo said:

My ideal system:

1. You must pass an anonymous psychological evaluation test. (To prevent racial bias)
2. You must pass a basic shooters marksmanship course with at least (X) amount of hours. (Only thing more dangerous than a gun is one with a poor shot behind it)
3. You must pass a safety course.
4. You must be sponsored by at least two or more current gun owners who are willing to risk their license for you. They cannot be family or household members.
5. You must provide your immediate neighbors documentation that there is a firearm in your home, but no need to know the quantity or type.
6. You must inform your local police office about any and all firearms in your home.
7. Guns must be locked away and unloaded at all times in your home, business, or during transport.
8. 30 day minimum wait for first time gun buyers after initial purchase.
9. Additional 30 days for ammunition brought outside the shooting range for first time buyers.
10. Proof of an approved safe or storage purchase must be supplied to the seller before release to the owner for first time buyers.
11. Guns cannot be sold, traded, or Inherited without documentation provided to the new owners local police department, save for a few exceptions for vintage collector firearms or the next rule.
12. Anyone 18 or older can purchase a gun at any time with or without a license but it must be stored at a shooting range, or local police department in a locker rented by you until fully cleared and documented....this satisfies 2A IMO
13. All firearm owners must carry liability insurance attached to their guns for the event that they are used maliciously. Each firearm requires its own policy.

 

I see little difference when it comes to open or conceal carry though.

Also, many firearms can be modded without something as simple as a rubber band to become semi automatic...so I don’t think there should be “levels” of a firearm license.

Rule 4 can be an entire industry as well. I’d imagine that a business interested in selling you a gun would also want to make sure you’re capable of carrying one. They should be willing to risk their license to sell you one.

Lastly, there are probably a ton of cases where exceptions should be made but I can’t think of them all in one sitting (or possibly ever really since I’m not a lawyer)

Like it or not, weapons are a RIGHT granted to American citizens. They’re so important to our culture that they’re the second rule written in our constitution, RIGHT AFTER the right to say whatever the heck you want...but our forefathers had the amazing foresight to say W E L L. R E G U L A T E D.

I don’t see anything wrong with this. Sounds great. 

[MrWunderful | 2,927]

40 minutes ago, Californication said:

So ya, I think you can only partially blame red states for education outcomes. The federal government doesn't support each state school system enough making it necessary for states to raise things like property taxes for schools. I am assuming there are some red states were politicians gyp the students. But even if we leave that out since red states generally have smaller populations and fewer economic centers they are going to have lower priced homes as a whole which would decrease potential taxes to fund schools. 

I guess what I am trying to say is that the weakness of public education is the fault of dems and republicans - as well as assholes like bill gates who helped create the charter school industry. And c$!#s like betsy duvos who wanted to siphon of money from public schools into charter schools.

 

Im not placing the blame for shitty schools 100% on red states. Like I said there are shitty schools everywhere. If the feds spent  10%  of the defense budget or 10% more taxes a year on people making 1 mil+ a year on schools, our society would be much better off. 
 

But low tax, low regulation, and anti-union thinking coupled with rich republicans only caring about more and more tax cuts has a lot to do with it. 
 

I would wager that most of the states with the highest rating for education have strong teachers unions and are blue states, and the lowest are red states with right to work laws and weak unions. 

 

Agree on charter schools being bad. More of a fan of 100% private, or 100% public. 

[avatar! | 1,811]

5 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

I would wager that most of the states with the highest rating for education have strong teachers unions and are blue states, and the lowest are red states with right to work laws and weak unions.

Seems quite true. Here is one ranking

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/education

They rank both public higher education as well as K-12. 8 out of the top 10 are blue states. MA (a state I know incredibly well) is ranked #2. It's higher education is phenomenal, BUT only when considering private universities. Public higher ed is ranked #25 in MA. K-12 is quite phenomenal in much of MA. They of course pay teachers quite well, but living anywhere near Boston is expensive and challenging. Also, if you don't like long miserable winters, Boston ain't for you.

[Californication | 1,477]

I'm reading more of these articles about the Atlanta shooter. I am not understanding why he is being called a sex addict except as self identification and because the police there are idiots. 

[arch_8ngel | 1,597]

52 minutes ago, Californication said:

I'm reading more of these articles about the Atlanta shooter. I am not understanding why he is being called a sex addict except as self identification and because the police there are idiots. 

Supposedly he was in rehab for it at a clinic well known for treating sex addiction as their primary focus.

[Californication | 1,477]

2 hours ago, arch_8ngel said:

Supposedly he was in rehab for it at a clinic well known for treating sex addiction as their primary focus.

Idk. Imo at 21 someone has to do some really messed up stuff/compulsive stuff to be a sex addict. Like there was a guy in the news this week that met an underage girl online and he went over to her house for a week and slept under her bed and at least statutorily raped her and potentially against her will. That sounds like some one needed a psychologist to talk with about sex addiction.

They make it sound in the papers like this dude felt uncomfortable because he wanted to have sex and his church and family told him that is wrong. All of it is second hand so I have no idea what is true. I'd have to know more about the clinic. They have pray the gay away clinics in the south and psychologists/clinics in general are incentivized to treat people. 

All that being said I'm still 100 percent sure that the fact that this guy killed mostly asians was not a coincidence. There was some racial motive to him targeting asians.

[arch_8ngel | 1,597]

13 minutes ago, Californication said:

All that being said I'm still 100 percent sure that the fact that this guy killed mostly asians was not a coincidence. There was some racial motive to him targeting asians.

I think the "some racial motive" is at most racism by association with the types of sex workers he intended to target.

The more I read about the story, the easier it is to accept that the guy's primary motive was an intent to violence against sex workers, and that he was just a fucking weirdo.

[Silent Hill | 276]

17 hours ago, Californication said:

Omg that is worse than I remember. 

Same, it's one of the toughest things I've tried to read. It's difficult to even see where someone would "read between the lines" and start bathing in Clorox. lol

[Silent Hill | 276]

17 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

And the right wing missinformation isnt aimed  at school age children, that just gets filtered down from the parents. But I dont think many black/latino/minority families watch fox news so if its an “inner city” kid, they probably arent exposed to it anyways

You've hit a very important piece in this puzzle which are the parents. A school like the one described in Baltimore may very well have enough "resources" compared to other schools that have a much better student success, but the parents aren't doing those kids any favors. Listening to his Mom speak on the issue was alarming to me. No accountability to be had. Pepper in school choice within these areas with strong parenting and I'd bet you'd see the trajectory change. 

Edited March 25, 2021 by Silent Hill

[Californication | 1,477]

18 hours ago, arch_8ngel said:

I think the "some racial motive" is at most racism by association with the types of sex workers he intended to target.

The more I read about the story, the easier it is to accept that the guy's primary motive was an intent to violence against sex workers, and that he was just a fucking weirdo.

I think that's a cop-out. At the end of the day none of us know what his motivations were. 

There are so many other known potential effects from the belief systems this guy fell under, saying it was "sex addicition," just seems lazy.

This guy was raised christian and it seemed important in his life. Christianity teaches celibacy and celibacy is the opposite of one of our strongest base needs. 

Christianity pushes patriarchy, the original sin of women, and the subservience/inferiority of women to men.

We know that the white christian south vote heavily conservative. Whether or not this kid was conservative he would have heard conservative thought in passing. 

Conservatives push anti-minority rhetoric which is causing an increase in violence around the country. 

Conservative politicians have been using women as their primary target for attacks for decades because they know that their population responds to it.

So this 21 year old "sex addict" felt at odds with himself because his family/church told him he should be abstinate. His church was then in the process of ex-communicating him. Now if church is a big part of your family/social life and that is being taken away from you that would be upsetting.

And who does he murder mostly asian women. He could have killed strippers or prostitutes which could be white or minorities and there are plenty of strip clubs in Atlanta to pick from. 

So I don't know what went through his head, but the probablity of negative effects of his belief structures is too high to say oh, he was addicted to sex and just happen to shoot a bunch of asian women. 

Also fyi, he was at an evangelical sex treatment center. 

 

[OptOut | 8,884]

1 hour ago, Californication said:

I think that's a cop-out. At the end of the day none of us know what his motivations were. 

****PROCEEDS TO SCREED ENDLESSLY ABOUT HIS MOTIVATIONS****

 

[arch_8ngel | 1,597]

2 hours ago, Californication said:

I think that's a cop-out. At the end of the day none of us know what his motivations were. 

There are so many other known potential effects from the belief systems this guy fell under, saying it was "sex addicition," just seems lazy.

 

 

I'm not saying I believe the "sex addiction" label, taken completely at face value -- but I am willing to accept that the guy had serious mental health issues with a fixation on sex and sex workers that manifested in violence.

Violence against sex workers by repressed weirdos has a pretty long history, to where it is a very plausible explanation for primary motivations in this case.

 

And yes, I think the specific treatment center he went to is probably a genuine part of the problem that led his attack.

But all of that points back to the weirdo killing sex workers, rather than the overt racist killing Asians, as an argument for motivations/root-causes.

 

It seems strange to me that you think explicit bias and intent to violence against sex workers is a "lazy explanation" versus a claim of racism against Asians.

It certainly strikes me as a more thoughtful and nuanced understanding of the situation than just looking at the race of the victims alone.

 

I'm not arguing that "casual racism" wasn't at play in the assumption that all of the women in the massage parlors were sex workers. 

But having actually lived in Atlanta, I can very confidently tell you if the guy's motivation was purely a racist intent to kill Asians, he would have been in a different part of the city and he could have EASILY scored a death toll 10x higher with no additional effort.

[Tulpa | 3,494]

So apparently that ship stuck in the Suez Canal is tied to Hillary Clinton, according to QAnon.

 

[avatar! | 1,811]

Not to be outdone, Florida decided to have it's own "Suez Canal Moment"

A boat trailer collided with a guardrail on Interstate 10, causing a boat to break loose from its trailer and flip several times, according to a Florida Highway Patrol report.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/26/us/florida-boat-stuck.html

[Tulpa | 3,494]

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/03/donald-trump-mar-a-lago-wedding-speech

 

Edited March 30, 2021 by Tulpa

[avatar! | 1,811]

On 3/29/2021 at 10:53 PM, Tulpa said:

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/03/donald-trump-mar-a-lago-wedding-speech

 

 

[Tulpa | 3,494]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/how-trump-steered-supporters-into-unwitting-donations/ar-BB1fgYen?li=BBnb7Kz

Stacy Blatt was in hospice care last September listening to Rush Limbaugh’s dire warnings about how badly Donald J. Trump’s campaign needed money when he went online and chipped in everything he could: $500.

It was a big sum for a 63-year-old battling cancer and living in Kansas City on less than $1,000 per month. But that single contribution — federal records show it was his first ever — quickly multiplied. Another $500 was withdrawn the next day, then $500 the next week and every week through mid-October, without his knowledge — until Mr. Blatt’s bank account had been depleted and frozen. When his utility and rent payments bounced, he called his brother, Russell, for help.

What the Blatts soon discovered was $3,000 in withdrawals by the Trump campaign in less than 30 days. They called their bank and said they thought they were victims of fraud.

“It felt,” Russell said, “like it was a scam.”

But what the Blatts believed was duplicity was actually an intentional scheme to boost revenues by the Trump campaign and the for-profit company that processed its online donations, WinRed. Facing a cash crunch and getting badly outspent by the Democrats, the campaign had begun last September to set up recurring donations by default for online donors, for every week until the election.

Edited April 3, 2021 by Tulpa

[avatar! | 1,811]

I'm going to guess that Kristi Noem also thinks video games and D&D are evil and corrupting... too bad, I think she could make a decent rogue

Also, is she really this daft or is she secretly working with Lil Nas X to sell his shoes, since she sure is promoting them well!

[Kguillemette | 1,544]

I hope lil nas X don't gets the bricks sued off him. I heard Nike don't too kindly to using the swoosh without their permission, and apparently that happened here.

 

[Tulpa | 3,494]

Looks like the identity of the main guy behind Q is now known.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/v7m58a/q-accidentally-outed-himself-but-qanon-followers-dont-care?fbclid=IwAR1ozEO-8nxZgKBrpdpRxEtpP26NKmk5-Zw5tBU0I3bV0Oaf3cPS0kJOxCo