The USA

Mr. Karate · 01-06-2020 3:56pm

threeball wrote: »

Ha, the police didn't even approach the gun toters. They had free reign to do as they please.

Because again they weren't doing anything wrong.

Yes there are factions using the current protests as cover to loot but the vast majority are protesting peacefully

The peaceful protesters are out in the day time. The rioters are out in the night. Surely, even with your limited intelligence can see a difference.

Flickerfusion · 01-06-2020 3:59pm

Having lived in the USA I think it’s extremely easy to gloss over the history. You’re looking at a community that was in many areas legally segregated, just like South Africa, until the civil rights act 1964 and that was met with very serious pushback and controversy.

It takes a long time to undo that and it’s even more difficult in a society with serious poverty traps, particularly around access education. Somehow, they seem to see school from kindergarten to 18 as a fundamental right but state funded third level is obviously communism!

There’s a huge, huge underlying race relations issue and it’s often shrouded in superficialities in the US. I find that with a lot of issues in the states. It’s a bit like their use of the term “bathroom” or “restroom” to describe a toilet, because they’re too polite to say the word. They also tend to deal only with the superficialities of racism. So you’ll get outrage over the use of words and so on, but it hasn’t dealt with the societal issue that goes much deeper and is also regional / cultural in some areas.

Just to give you an example, I shared a large apartment in triple decker (old 3 stack apartment) in Boston in 2005/6 with 2 guys (not Bostonians btw)

One Saturday, myself and my housemate from NY had the place to ourselves and we decided to have a very, very chilled out BBQ in the small back yard, which has a gril and as we were ground floor we had direct access ans there was a girl installed and we had used it plenty of times.

Idyllic afternoon, we had a total of 5 people outside having a lovely day - grilling burgers, chatting away, a couple of bottles of wine.

Next thing knock on door from a police officer about a report of a disturbance. We explained we were having a BBQ police officer was completely stumped as to why they were called.

She went upstairs to the neighbour and asked her to explain why she called 911.

“Officer, I saw two black males in the yard & I thought ... !!”

One of them worked for the State of Massachusetts and the other was a student at Harvard.

Try living in a world where old busybody racists decide you’re dangerously having lunch while being the wrong skin tone.

Now just to be fair; the cop was absolutely lovely and seemed baffled by the call and the neighbour was not from Boston and I don’t mean this as a slight on Boston, but it sums up the problem with a certain attitude.

You also constantly hear the stories of both subtle and overt racism in terms of access to employment and education.

There are genuinely huge issues and just because desegregation happened in the 1950s and 1960s doesn’t mean that the legacy it’s toxic societal impact and also the society that created it in the first place don’t still linger and in some areas (geographically and societally) far more than others.

On a parallel and connected issue the police brutality issue is also stemming from a culture of fear, guns and fear of guns and the response being robocop style policing. There’s an element of policing in the USA that would just be utterly unacceptable here and it has become paramilitary.

I think a bit like the reform of police forces, here - they’re going to have to do similar there eventually. You can’t have a situation where the police are basically operating by fear and terror at the end of a gun. That’s where they’ve gone.

It very much reminds me of the history of the RIC or the RUC, both of which ultimately had to be disbanded and recreated as something more community based and centric.

volchitsa · 01-06-2020 4:05pm

Overheal wrote: »

[laughs in Crimean]

Or in El Salvadorean Spanish. Or Chilean or Nicaraguan or..or..or.

coinop · 01-06-2020 4:19pm

Flickerfusion wrote: »

I shared a large apartment in triple decker (old 3 stack apartment) in Boston in 2005/6....

This explains a lot. Please understand you have a warped view of America. The vastness of the USA cannot be understated yet Irish people restrict themselves to the blue areas, seemingly afraid to leave the city limits for fear of not being able to get their beloved Starbucks milkshake. Tell me - is drinking your soy latte in Boston really that different to Dublin? These homogenized corporate chains are identical across the world.

Maybe it's the tall buildings the Irish yokels love. One of my favourite pastimes is to sit on Fifth Ave watching the spud faced boggers fresh off their Aer Lingus flight stop dead in the middle of the sidewalk and crane their necks upwards, mouths agape, in awe of the towering buildings above, oblivious to the crowds of frustrated pedestrians forced to walk around them.

Flickerfusion · 01-06-2020 4:23pm

Explains a lot in what way?

That I spent a period of time in Boston?

You know nothing about me, my family, my travel history or anything else and I am very familiar with a lot of other parts of the USA, yet you seem to feel that because I spent any time in an east coast city I have some warped view.

That to me sums up modern American politics - an imagined culture war between red and blue. Find the cracks and exploit them.

The main thing is just overlook all the problems and take no action to resolve any of them.

Everything’s fine! Nothing to see here. Just the acrid smell of democracy wafting in the breeze and the sound of rubber freedom bullets ricocheting off press camera lenses?

Yurt2 · 01-06-2020 4:30pm

volchitsa wrote: »

Or in El Salvadorean Spanish. Or Chilean or Nicaraguan or..or..or.

We know America's history, along with some good deeds it has done for humanity, there has been some abject failures and often wars unleashed on malicious grounds.

But the guy was trying to sell us on Russia NEVER being aggressors. That's silly. And You don't need to have a first in Russian history from Oxford to know how silly it is.

Fr Tod Umptious · 01-06-2020 4:34pm

coinop wrote: »

This explains a lot. Please understand you have a warped view of America. The vastness of the USA cannot be understated yet Irish people restrict themselves to the blue areas, seemingly afraid to leave the city limits for fear of not being able to get their beloved Starbucks milkshake. Tell me - is drinking your soy latte in Boston really that different to Dublin? These homogenized corporate chains are identical across the world.

Maybe it's the tall buildings the Irish yokels love. One of my favourite pastimes is to sit on Fifth Ave watching the spud faced boggers fresh off their Aer Lingus flight stop dead in the middle of the sidewalk and crane their necks upwards, mouths agape, in awe of the towering buildings above, oblivious to the crowds of frustrated pedestrians forced to walk around them.

What you do not realise is that even though the state of Massachusetts is blue on the political map, and Boston is blue on the political map it's about the most racist city in America.

Black people don't live or in or visit white areas, and white people don't live in or visit black areas.

Same is true for Hispanics.

The Irish have a lot to do with it, the Irish Americans and the people from Ireland living there.
Few that I meet had much interest in racial diversity and to be honest I did not care one iota myself that I did not know any black, Hispanic or Asian people while I lived to there for a number of years.

Flickerfusion · 01-06-2020 5:04pm

Boston has a fairly dubious racial history and also a history of stratification with class system and who arrived first issues. I’ve had everything from snooty comments about how “my ancestors arrived on the mayflower” which I responded to with : oh! So they were English puritans and pilgrim refugees fleeing the turmoil around the time of Cromwell then?

It didn’t go down well!

MadYaker · 01-06-2020 5:10pm

I’ve only been interested in current affairs and politics in the US for 15 years or so but these are the most serious riots I can remember. What will happen in another few months when another similar video emerges? The police in America kill hundreds of people every year, some of them are bound to be unarmed and black so I think they are doomed to repeat this. Where does change start? At the top or the bottom? Trump is incapable of uniting the country as we can see from recent tweets, he has no interest in solving this issue and only wants to use for political purposes which will only make the problem worse. But I don’t know if there’s much a president can do anyway. 2 terms for Obama didn’t help this issue at all. Can anyone see a solution?

DeanAustin · 01-06-2020 5:17pm

ShatterAlan wrote: »

They do historical memorials better than anyone else on the planet? Really? What like having kids come up to some wall with names on it in Washington and say "all these people died so you would be "free" ". Crap like that. Nice revisionist history there. Do they mention that Vietnam never lifted a finger to hurt an American but had their country incinerated and 2 million of their people murdered. Same goes for Laos and Cambodia.

They have these feel good monuments relating to Valley Forge and Little Big Horn and all completely whitewashed to blot out the real truth and horrors and crimes that went with those campaigns.

And Vegas is the "best place on earth"? Are you serious?

You'd hold that cesspit of tackiness over Vienna or Budapest or Isfahan or Damascus (before it was trashed by American paid scumbags)?

A mecca for sex workers, gluttons, alcoholics and gambling addicts is your idea of the "best place on Earth"?

Whoa!

I think you may have misunderstood me. I said for what it is, Vegas is the best place on earth (i.e. the best place of its type). It’s tacky as f**k but it’s very impressive and no one is going there for culture. Personally, there are lots of places I prefer to Vegas but Vegas is great if you’re in to that stuff.

On the memorials, go to the Kennedy museum in Dallas, Alcatraz, Pearl Harbour or Ground Zero and they are all very impressively run operations and very respectful of their subject matter. The US do that sort of thing better than anyone else in my opinion.

Flickerfusion · 01-06-2020 5:26pm

I remember a statistic being used for illustration - one year by March there had been more police shootings in the USA in than in the U.K., since the benign of the 20th century and that included the Irish war of independence era and the troubles.

Gun violence be it from criminal or police activity is just off the scale compared to Europe. It’s not really comparable at all on that topic.

The one thing I would say though is the USA can be many things at the same time.

I mean take something like gay rights. It’s been simultaneously at the forefront of introducing rights like same sex marriage, while also having some of the most backwards politics about exactly the same topic.

You just can’t describe it in one neat summary anymore than you could say the EU contains the Netherlands with its very liberal attitudes and Hungary at the other end of the spectrum.

It’s a country or states that are almost countries in their own rights.

I think with issues like the COVID-19 response, Trump has managed to weaken the bonds though.

Irish Praetorian · 01-06-2020 5:29pm

Zebra3 wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RM0uvgHKZe8

Imagine defending these scumbags.

How fortunate that there is no need to - the figures quoted were the product of several poorly conducted studies, which recent scholarship have since rebuked. My understanding is that the present scholarly consensus is that there was no significant rise in child mortality in the period of sanctions on Iraq.

Flickerfusion · 01-06-2020 6:02pm

You do get the strong sense that the US has a school of thought on international relations that goes back to the end of World War II and the Kissinger style of interventionist politics that tends to be on both sides of the house. It’s perhaps dying down a bit now, as that era is really “boomer” aged.

However, you see a sort of crude and often quite aloof approach to dealing with international affairs. It’s like someone sitting in a classroom somewhere in some Ivy League college or in an office in some think tank in Washington comes up with some grand plan, much like the way the British or French empires used to behave, and then implements it without anymore than a passing regard for what the reality of the situation is.

Time and time again you see these interventions sold as well meaning and bought into by politicians who seem to, often genuinely, believe they’re helping . You get a big campaign of reductionism and next thing you’ve goodie vs baddie and it’s all like a superhero comic. A few months later you’ve some, probably obnoxious, but stable régime deposed, usually at alarmingly and unacceptably high human cost. Then chaos left in its wake and bunch of over excited companies run in chasing down energy resources or rebuilding contracts.

It reminds me of the old empires with a touch of the Wild West and frontier mentality.

It definitely isn’t an empire in the classical sense, but it’s certainly a sphere of influence type operation that sells itself palatable lies about what it’s doing, just like every empire has done in the past. They all went off “civilising” people who never asked to be.

If the Trump era does anything positive at all it might have been to focus the US on domestic issues. That’s it he doesn’t do something crazy like cause a war with China.

Madeleine Birchfield · 01-06-2020 6:05pm

Flickerfusion wrote: »

You do get the strong sense that the US has a school of thought on international relations that goes back to the end of World War II and the Kissinger style of interventionist politics that tends to be on both sides of the house. It’s perhaps dying down a bit now, as that era is really “boomer” aged.

However, you see a sort of crude and often quite aloof approach to dealing with international affairs. It’s like someone sitting in a classroom somewhere in some Ivy League college or in an office in some think tank in Washington comes up with some grand plan, much like the way the British or French empires used to behave, and then implements it without anymore than a passing regard for what the reality of the situation is.

Time and time again you see these interventions sold as well meaning and bought into by politicians who seem to, often genuinely, believe they’re helping and the next thing you know you’ve an régime deposed at unacceptably high human cost, chaos left in its wake and bunch of over excited companies chasing down resources or rebuilding contracts.

It reminds me of the old empires with a touch of the Wild West and frontier mentality.

If the Trump era does anything positive at all it might have been to focus the US on domestic issues. That’s it he doesn’t do something crazy like cause a war with China.

Or Iran like he almost did in January.

Flickerfusion · 01-06-2020 6:06pm

Madeleine Birchfield wrote: »

Or Iran like he almost did in January.

That’s what’s worrying me. He may decide he needs a war to deflect from coronaviruses and human rights marches and he strikes me as every bit as dangerous as to do just that.

All that will concern him is tv ratings and opinion polling.

01-06-2020 6:11pm

Flickerfusion wrote: »

You do get the strong sense that the US has a school of thought on international relations that goes back to the end of World War II and the Kissinger style of interventionist politics that tends to be on both sides of the house. It’s perhaps dying down a bit now, as that era is really “boomer” aged.

You should take a look at Kissinger's documentary on US foreign policy and his own contributions. It's an eye opener to realise just how much he was ignored by those with the power to make decisions. A different time. In any case, Kissinger was easily one of the more intelligent men to work there, and he was followed by people less capable of engaging in his style of diplomacy.

His books are excellent reads, especially "Diplomacy".

I'd say that the US approach to foreign policy isn't based on Kissinger, but continues what they've been doing since WW2, with elements of their policies from before even that.

If the Trump era does anything positive at all it might have been to focus the US on domestic issues. That’s it he doesn’t do something crazy like cause a war with China.

I'd say that people give too much credit to Trump for what's happening. Since Bush Jnr, it seems to me that all US Presidents were having their strings jangled by someone else or another group. If war with China happens, it'll likely be due to the weapons industry, rather than Trump himself...The days of strong leaders has ended for the US..

01-06-2020 6:15pm

Flickerfusion wrote: »

That’s what’s worrying me. He may decide he needs a war to deflect from coronaviruses and human rights marches and he strikes me as every bit as dangerous as to do just that.

All that will concern him is tv ratings and opinion polling.

Unlikely. Considering what Covid did to an Aircraft carrier, the US ability to force project is very limited.. imagine what covid would do to their sub fleet which would be necessary for any offensive against China. There's simply too much going on at home anyway... Without covid, sure, a war might be on the books, but not the way things are.

Flickerfusion · 01-06-2020 6:23pm

I’m not so sure about that with regard to Trump.

There’s a huge corporatist element in American politics for many years, but in this case I think whatever is influencing Trump it that isn’t the major factor.

The same is visible in the U.K., as the tories have completely ignored big British business interests and Trump has ridden roughshod over a lot of powerful US businesses. He’s caused a lot of businesses big a lot of headaches with fickle and irrational approaches to trade and even personal vendettas played out against companies and CEOs he doesn’t like. Amazon being a prime example.

I think we’re very much left an era of big business corporatism and entered one of raw online populism and a lot of that is also driven by funding streams and who can campaigns more effectively.

Trump is very much a populist, a creature of shock jock radio, reality tv and layer of social media and both gained and maintains power by continuing to be a showman and tapping into a the hope and fear buttons while playing to any conspiracy theory that’s going.

He’s not a GOP Republican anymore than he’s a Democrat. He’s in this for him. The GOP basically raised a cuckoo and gave him their party infrastructure.

The tail is still wagging the dog, it’s just not the same tail. It’s more about reshaping society than just about money.

To me the Trump administration looks far more like what you see in more typically unstable executive full presidential republics in Latin America and parts of Africa. You’ve a big showman style president making all sorts of unpredictable moves and nobody seems to be able to reign him in.

The history in the US was always that you assumed a president was somehow “presidential”. This presidency has really changed that and without reform of the system it’s inevitable this won’t be the last president of this type. The line has been crossed and the model has been proven to work for the candidate.

Lesnar Defender · 01-06-2020 6:25pm

Indestructable wrote: »

What a KIP of a country it is. That's all.

If the US is such a kip, why are there millions of people around the world desperate to live there?

kowloon · 01-06-2020 6:26pm

coinop wrote: »

Maybe it's the tall buildings the Irish yokels love. One of my favourite pastimes is to sit on Fifth Ave watching the spud faced boggers fresh off their Aer Lingus flight stop dead in the middle of the sidewalk and crane their necks upwards, mouths agape, in awe of the towering buildings above, oblivious to the crowds of frustrated pedestrians forced to walk around them.

Typically, how much time in your week do you spend on Fifth Ave looking out for 'Spud Faced Boggers' blocking pedestrians? How many would you count in an hour?

Madeleine Birchfield · 01-06-2020 6:28pm

Lesnar Defender wrote: »

If the US is such a kip, why are there millions of people around the world desperate to live there?

Because the United States hasn't destroyed itself yet like it destroyed other countries i.e. Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen.

Flickerfusion · 01-06-2020 6:33pm

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Unlikely. Considering what Covid did to an Aircraft carrier, the US ability to force project is very limited.. imagine what covid would do to their sub fleet which would be necessary for any offensive against China. There's simply too much going on at home anyway... Without covid, sure, a war might be on the books, but not the way things are.

Who says he’ll have thought it though or been remotely logical about it? All it would take is for him to order some attack on a Chinese facility somewhere, China would likely respond and then he could assume he would be able to attack them.

That, or he picks some low risk target that isn’t capable of retaliating. The Middle East tends to be a favourite.

I just hope there’s a large check and balance in his ability to command the military and particularly to use any kind of nuclear or major weapons.

threeball · 01-06-2020 6:54pm

Mr. Karate wrote: »

Because again they weren't doing anything wrong.

The peaceful protesters are out in the day time. The rioters are out in the night. Surely, even with your limited intelligence can see a difference.

Aw poor petal, can't handle being shown up for what you are so start lashing out, two posts in a row. Go back to rimming Trump

completedit · 01-06-2020 7:27pm

All empires collapse. The American hegemony is over. Time for a new power.

kowloon · 01-06-2020 8:44pm

completedit wrote: »

All empires collapse. The American hegemony is over. Time for a new power.

If America falls apart we're in for a rough ride too. It's not something I'd look forward to.

da_miser · 01-06-2020 8:54pm

Dems are jumping to defend Antifa now that Trump is declaring them a terrorist origination, the stupidity of TDS has them in a death grip.
https://twitter.com/IamNomad/status/1267144654677565440
Cheering on Antifa until it effects them
As you can see the riots are in Dem controlled Cities, Trump will just leave it to the Dems to control their Cities, they will let them burn, the rest of the country that is not run by Dems will defiantly be voting Trump come November and these riots will bring a lot of blue Dem controlled cities over to Trumps side, going to interesting to see how the Dems try and dig themselves out of this mess of their own making.
https://imgur.com/a/WhWnMUP
I was convinced Trump would win in November , im now convinced he will also win the popular vote as well, i will have a double on that, nice little earner once the bookies reopen.

paddythere · 01-06-2020 9:13pm

da_miser wrote: »

Dems are jumping to defend Antifa now that Trump is declaring them a terrorist origination, the stupidity of TDS has them in a death grip.
https://twitter.com/IamNomad/status/1267144654677565440
Cheering on Antifa until it effects them
As you can see the riots are in Dem controlled Cities, Trump will just leave it to the Dems to control their Cities, they will let them burn, the rest of the country that is not run by Dems will defiantly be voting Trump come November and these riots will bring a lot of blue Dem controlled cities over to Trumps side, going to interesting to see how the Dems try and dig themselves out of this mess of their own making.
https://imgur.com/a/WhWnMUP
I was convinced Trump would win in November , im now convinced he will also win the popular vote as well, i will have a double on that, nice little earner once the bookies reopen.

Even there actually is an election this year then Trump will 100% have it rigged beforehand. That's why I am betting the house on him too.

01-06-2020 9:14pm

Flickerfusion wrote: »

Who says he’ll have thought it though or been remotely logical about it? All it would take is for him to order some attack on a Chinese facility somewhere, China would likely respond and then he could assume he would be able to attack them.

That, or he picks some low risk target that isn’t capable of retaliating. The Middle East tends to be a favourite.

I just hope there’s a large check and balance in his ability to command the military and particularly to use any kind of nuclear or major weapons.

Trump isn't an absolute ruler. Congress still needs to approve any such venture. There's your check and balance.

The M.East is possible, but would need preparation, which would lead to intervention by congress. Still, I doubt the US is really capable of it, considering the unrest caused by covid.

Madeleine Birchfield · 01-06-2020 9:25pm

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Trump isn't an absolute ruler. Congress still needs to approve any such venture. There's your check and balance.

The M.East is possible, but would need preparation, which would lead to intervention by congress. Still, I doubt the US is really capable of it, considering the unrest caused by covid.

The US has been bombing Yemen since 2015 with no congressional approval. And judging by recent events the US is more likely to go to war with itself.

01-06-2020 9:31pm

Madeleine Birchfield wrote: »

The US has been bombing Yemen since 2015 with no congressional approval. And judging by recent events the US is more likely to go to war with itself.

A war was mentioned. Not a bombing campaign. Which means a much more public war movement, since it was suggested as a distraction. Nobody in the US cares about their participation in Yemen.

And no.. I think you're being very premature imagining a civil war of any kind. An insurrection shut down in record time, possibly... but there isn't enough support with the kind of financial/logistical backing needed to provide a genuine threat.

The USA

Comments