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The USA

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Comments

  • #272
    Irish Praetorian
    Registered Users Posts: 1,745 ✭✭✭Irish Praetorian


    ShatterAlan wrote: »
    And yet you champion those who espouse such norms, all the while ignoring and abusing them, yet demanding others should adhere.

    Would you say that you, sir, are crashing into your contradictions? From afar, that's how it appears.

    Champion in what sense exactly? By opting for the lesser evil when faced with a choice between two? It is a fairly simple line and with very few contradictions to it; when the US does something bad I dislike and condemn it, but I don't feel the need to automatically oppose everything done by the US and I certainly don't feel the need to side with far worse regimes simply because they complain also. What were talking about is simply a good dose of nuance.


  • #273
    Harry Palmr
    Closed Accounts Posts: 40,061 ✭✭✭✭Harry Palmr


    On Friday night the president of the United States of America was in a bunker with a "mob" about quarter a mile away being corralled by the National Guard.

    That's what this America now is.

    [small hands]So sad[/small hands].


  • #274
    Irish Praetorian
    Registered Users Posts: 1,745 ✭✭✭Irish Praetorian


    Harry Palmr wrote: »
    On Friday night the president of the United States of America was in a bunker with a "mob" about quarter a mile away being corralled by the National Guard.

    That's what this America now is.

    [small hands]So sad[/small hands].

    Who knew when he said Make America Great Again he meant Greatly pissed off at him :D


  • #275
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭[Deleted User]


    Irish Praetorian wrote: »
    Who knew when he said Make America Great Again he meant Greatly pissed off at him :D

    TBF many of the problems with the US were there long before Trump became president, or his subsequent actions. Sure, he's contributed, but so too did all the administrations before him. They all passed the problems on to the next group voted in, refusing to deal with the real problems. It just blew up during Trumps term...


  • #276
    Mr. Karate
    Registered Users Posts: 1,373 ✭✭✭Mr. Karate


    Harry Palmr wrote: »
    On Friday night the president of the United States of America was in a bunker with a "mob" about quarter a mile away being corralled by the National Guard.

    That's what this America now is.

    [small hands]So sad[/small hands].

    And Obama would have been in the same position if rioters had tried to get to the White House while he was President.


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  • #277
    Harry Palmr
    Closed Accounts Posts: 40,061 ✭✭✭✭Harry Palmr


    Mr. Karate wrote: »
    And Obama would have been in the same position if rioters had tried to get to the White House while he was President.

    Which rioters though? Angry black people tired of being killed by white cops or MAGA brigades angry at not enough black people being killed by white cops!


  • #278
    Mr. Karate
    Registered Users Posts: 1,373 ✭✭✭Mr. Karate


    Harry Palmr wrote: »
    Which rioters though? Angry black people tired of being killed by white cops or MAGA brigades angry at not enough black people being killed by white cops!

    Does it matter? If you think Obama would have ran out and calmed the masse sthen you need to lay off the drugs.

    These riots have nothing to do with George Floyd. His killing was universally condemned. Then these idiots showed up to riot because they thought they had an opportunity and divided communities again.


  • #279
    threeball
    Registered Users Posts: 7,908 ✭✭✭threeball


    Mr. Karate wrote: »
    Does it matter? If you think Obama would have ran out and calmed the masse sthen you need to lay off the drugs.

    These riots have nothing to do with George Floyd. His killing was universally condemned. Then these idiots showed up to riot because they thought they had an opportunity and divided communities again.

    So the guys who showed up with guns outside the government buildings in numerous States were protestors because they weren't confronted by the police or army but the black people showing up to protest are rioters because they were confronted. Gotcha.


  • #280
    Sheep_shear
    Closed Accounts Posts: 138 ✭✭Sheep_shear


    USA's such a mad place. Last night started watching some of the violent videos (from both cops and protestors) and my heart sank. Then the playlist/rec turned into funny ones of the looting and I was openly laughing.

    FWIW I reckon this will actually help Trump. Police being attacked and dragged through the streets, businesses on fire, city centres gone mad and looking like a battlefield. I reckon your average family sitting at home think's it's all mad and wants some measure of normality to come back.

    I'm not saying it's right or wrong, just a guess.


  • #281
    Madeleine Birchfield
    Registered Users Posts: 271 ✭✭Madeleine Birchfield


    Sheep_shear wrote: »
    USA's such a mad place. Last night started watching some of the violent videos (from both cops and protestors) and my heart sank. Then the playlist/rec turned into funny ones of the looting and I was openly laughing.

    FWIW I reckon this will actually help Trump. Police being attacked and dragged through the streets, businesses on fire, city centres gone mad and looking like a battlefield. I reckon your average family sitting at home think's it's all mad and wants some measure of normality to come back.

    I'm not saying it's right or wrong, just a guess.

    Right, this would help Trump. Just like the Syrian crackdown on the riots in 2011 helped Assad.


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  • #282
    Sheep_shear
    Closed Accounts Posts: 138 ✭✭Sheep_shear


    Madeleine Birchfield wrote: »
    Right, this would help Trump. Just like the Syrian crackdown on the riots in 2011 helped Assad.

    More like the anti-Vietnam protests helping Nixon.

    Where are you picking Syria from?


  • #283
    Ronaldinho
    Registered Users Posts: 829 ✭✭✭Ronaldinho


    Madeleine Birchfield wrote: »
    Trump has declared "ANTIFA" a terrorist organisation. ANTIFA isn't even an organisation, it is just short form for 'anti-fascist'. This means that anybody who has anti-fascist views in the United States could be arrested for terrorism.

    The US is a full blown authoritarian police state like the former Soviet Union or Communist China at this point.

    Another one of those posts that makes me wish Boards had a button to ignore all posts from trolls posters that have registered over the last month.


  • #284
    Madeleine Birchfield
    Registered Users Posts: 271 ✭✭Madeleine Birchfield


    Sheep_shear wrote: »
    More like the anti-Vietnam protests helping Nixon.

    Where are you picking Syria from?

    Nixon wasn't the incumbant American president under which the protests were happening; this allowed him to run on a law and order platform to stop the protests.

    Trump on the other hand is American president so he can't run against his own administration, and his actions have only fanned the flames and escalated the riots. Much more like Assad than Nixon.

    You also have rising food prices and skyrocketing unemployment, which Nixon did not have in 1968 or 1972 but Assad's Syria did in 2011.

    I could also point to the last days of the Soviet Union where it became clear to the Soviet public that the Soviet elites did not care about their citizens.


  • #285
    Mr. Karate
    Registered Users Posts: 1,373 ✭✭✭Mr. Karate


    threeball wrote: »
    So the guys who showed up with guns outside the government buildings in numerous States were protestors because they weren't confronted by the police or army but the black people showing up to protest are rioters because they were confronted. Gotcha.

    This might come as a shock to you but there were of Black people who were apart of that first group. They didn't have any altercations with Police. They didn't burn down buildings and they didn't loot.

    If you're intention is show up and cause destruction then you are a rioter. Skin color has nothing to do with it you worthless race baiter.


  • #286
    Covid19
    Registered Users Posts: 129 ✭✭Covid19


    Madeleine Birchfield wrote: »
    Right, this would help Trump. Just like the Syrian crackdown on the riots in 2011 helped Assad.


    And Asad is Stoll in power....


  • #287
    Madeleine Birchfield
    Registered Users Posts: 271 ✭✭Madeleine Birchfield


    Covid19 wrote: »
    And Asad is Stoll in power....

    After a coalition between Assad, the Kurds, the Turks, the US, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Israel defeated ISIS which came close to taking over Syria completely.


  • #288
    threeball
    Registered Users Posts: 7,908 ✭✭✭threeball


    Mr. Karate wrote: »
    This might come as a shock to you but there were of Black people who were apart of that first group. They didn't have any altercations with Police. They didn't burn down buildings and they didn't loot.

    If you're intention is show up and cause destruction then you are a rioter. Skin color has nothing to do with it you worthless race baiter.

    Ha, the police didn't even approach the gun toters. They had free reign to do as they please. Yes there are factions using the current protests as cover to loot but the vast majority are protesting peacefully yet the police classified them as an unlawful grouping. I'd expect nothing less than deflection from a MAGA head though. Morally bankrupt.


  • #289
    Flickerfusion
    Closed Accounts Posts: 242 ✭✭Flickerfusion


    The police over reaction to protestors was appalling stuff and the direct, physical police attacks on the press (right across the board from local outlets, national tv, online, photo journalists, foreign media etc) are really without precedent in any developed democracy and just should not be happening in the US.

    They’re already ranked a dismal 45th for press freedom, which had more to do with how the press is owned and the political atmosphere, but this really off the scale stuff.

    Some of the scenes last night were as bad or worse than what you might expect to see in an authoritarian state.

    There were lines crossed over the last few days that no democracy should cross. It’s not what the US claims to stand for and it is really indefensible.

    There’s no explaining this away. Reporters regularly operate in war zones without being shot at. They operate in all sorts of unstable and oppressive states, typically without being shot with rubber bullets and pepper sprayed live on air.

    A photo journalist even lost her eye!

    It’s disheartening to see the place sink this low.

    Repeated phrases like “The Land of the Free” and references to constitutional rights when they’re trampled upon are meaningless words when things like this are allowed to happen. It’s just hollow hypocrisy.

    You can also be damn sure this will set the tone for authoritarian states elsewhere now too and you’ll have a spate of attacks on press and clampdowns on reporting as that thin layer of protection reporters have was just washed away in a country that is supposed to stand for so much more than this.


  • #290
    utyh2ikcq9z76b
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,213 ✭✭✭utyh2ikcq9z76b


    Flickerfusion wrote: »
    The police over reaction to protestors was appalling stuff and the direct, physical police attacks on the press (right across the board from local outlets, national tv, online, photo journalists, foreign media etc) are really without precedent in any developed democracy and just should not be happening in the US.

    They’re already ranked a dismal 45th for press freedom, which had more to do with how the press is owned and the political atmosphere, but this really off the scale stuff.

    Some of the scenes last night were as bad or worse than what you might expect to see in an authoritarian state.

    There were lines crossed over the last few days that no democracy should cross. It’s not what the US claims to stand for and it is really indefensible.

    There’s no explaining this away. Reporters regularly operate in war zones without being shot at. They operate in all sorts of unstable and oppressive states, typically without being shot with rubber bullets and pepper sprayed live on air.

    A photo journalist even lost her eye!

    It’s disheartening to see the place sink this low.

    Repeated phrases like “The Land of the Free” and références to constitutional rights when they’re trampled upon are meaningless words when things like this are allowed to happen. It’s just hollow hypocrisy.

    It has been and can get worse
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings


  • #291
    Carfacemandog
    Registered Users Posts: 2,042 ✭✭✭Carfacemandog


    Covid19 wrote: »
    And Asad is Stoll in power....

    Syria is in such a better condition now, and has been for the last decade, than it was 10 years ago don't you agree?


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  • #292
    Overheal
    Registered Users Posts: 81,547 ✭✭✭✭Overheal


    ShatterAlan wrote: »
    The Americans have ALWAYS been the aggressor, not the Russians.
    Maybe if you stopped listening to US propaganda and stepped back and examined the whole global situation for yourself from a neutral standpoint you might actually see that.

    [laughs in Crimean]


  • #293
    joe40
    Registered Users Posts: 3,811 ✭✭✭joe40


    Considering the amount of guns in circulation, this unrest could get a lot worse.
    The disparity is stark, heavily armed lockdown protestors get support from Trump.
    The violence and looting by some of the protestors is awful, but I have yet to see evidence of armed protestors. It's not like the guns aren't available.
    The police really need to get the situation settled, but they'll not achieve that if the treat civil unrest like a war situation. They're not the same.
    Hard-line tactics are guaranteed to make it worse.


  • #294
    Flickerfusion
    Closed Accounts Posts: 242 ✭✭Flickerfusion


    Zaniyah Refined Fumble wrote: »
    It has been and can get worse
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings

    This is what I sometimes don’t get in Ireland. If an incident like that happened here, and it did in Derry and basically sparked the Troubles, we would be all outraged, but plenty are willing to suck up the “everything is fine! Nothing to see here! Move along! Stop asking awkward questions! Land of the Free dontyaknow! Look: a Liberty Bell!” line from the US establishment & right.


  • #295
    Madeleine Birchfield
    Registered Users Posts: 271 ✭✭Madeleine Birchfield


    Flickerfusion wrote: »
    This is what I sometimes don’t get in Ireland. If an incident like that happened here, and it did in Derry and basically sparked the Troubles, we would be all outraged, but plenty are willing to suck up the “everything is fine! Nothing to see here! Move along! Stop asking awkward questions! Land of the Free dontyaknow! Look: a Liberty Bell!” line from the US establishment & right.

    It did happen here; it was called the UK dragging its feet on Irish Home Rule before WW1 and the Easter Rising in 2016 and the British treatment of the nationalists after Easter Rising all of which caused the people to turn towards Sinn Fein and the IRA.


  • #296
    Flickerfusion
    Closed Accounts Posts: 242 ✭✭Flickerfusion


    That’s my point though (and a I referenced it above). We seem to have an element of commentary emerging that’s very at odds with our own history. It’s easy to forget that this place was founded on a struggle against systemic oppression of an ethnic minority, often also in the context of what was at the time a very sanctimonious, flag waving establishment in a very wealthy country, that managed to fail a large chunk of its population.

    Some of us seem to have forgotten the parallels in our own history and have swallowed a lot of political marketing. Where most of us are sitting now and having our passports issued from was very much driven by people who weren’t and aren’t unlike those protesters.

    The situations aren’t identical and we don’t have the experience of African Americans and slavery but we should be well able to appreciate where they’re coming from.

    Formerly oppressed peoples should never punch down or become jaded about these issues. There are common threads in all of those struggles.

    What’s shocks me more is an element of both this weird xenophobic little cabal of domestic “Irish Nationalists” who seem to have absorbed some kind of heady mix of American and British nativism or something and also elements of Irish American society using our identity, symbols, flags and even language to rather disgracefully link it to some kind of supremacy thing that was the very stuff that oppressed us for centuries.

    Clearly all too easy for some to forget their roots and adopt someone else’s toxic ones instead.

    The again, I suppose if you go back to the old days there were plenty waving their little “Jackeens” and praising the old imperial forces putting down those annoying protesters, even though it was busily using brutal paramilitary police against their own community.

    Just seems we’ve a lot who’ve metaphorically “taken the soup” or in this case a Stars and Stripes double-vanilla-marshmallow-mocha frappe with an extra side of freedom donuts.


  • #297
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭[Deleted User]


    Flickerfusion wrote: »
    That’s my point though (and a I referenced it above). We seem to have an element of commentary emerging that’s very at odds with our own history. It’s easy to forget that this place was founded on a struggle against systemic oppression of an ethnic minority, often also in the context of what was at the time a sanctimonious establishment.

    Nope. I don't buy it. Parallels between Ireland and the US count for nothing. Different times, and a far different access to rights.

    The US has been limping along with regards to Black people and other minorities since the 70s . They made tremendous strides during the 60s/70s, but then let it all slide. That's as much the fault of the Black community as it is the White community.

    I really don't get this willingness to give the Black community a complete pass in how their communities have developed. Sure, some of the blame rests on the White community (inequalities) and the various governments, but there are heaps of very stable & successful Black communities scattered across America where they're fully employed and their children gain access to quality education. Low crime, and less social instability.

    There are too many people here and elsewhere on the internet seeking to promote one side over another. And that's why nothing good will come out of this. Few people involved are willing to take responsibility for their own behavior, and the development of their racial culture... instead, it's everyone else's fault. As long as that continues, nothing will change, except for more violence, and a greater establishment of bitterness.

    Probably the only parallel is with the Republicans you often see on boards.. who thankfully, do not represent the majority of Irish people.
    Some of us seem to have forgotten the parallels in our own history and have swallowed a lot of political marketing.

    Forgotten? Nope. Unwilling to accept the political marketing? Yup.


  • #298
    ChikiChiki
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,950 ✭✭✭ChikiChiki


    joe40 wrote: »
    Considering the amount of guns in circulation, this unrest could get a lot worse.
    The disparity is stark, heavily armed lockdown protestors get support from Trump.
    The violence and looting by some of the protestors is awful, but I have yet to see evidence of armed protestors. It's not like the guns aren't available.
    The police really need to get the situation settled, but they'll not achieve that if the treat civil unrest like a war situation. They're not the same.
    Hard-line tactics are guaranteed to make it worse.

    All this in the midst of a pandemic. I cannot see them getting control of things at this point. Unemployment and social discourse will continue to prevail.

    They certainly won't be able to lockdown effectively again in some states as may be required in 5/6 weeks.

    What an absolute mess of a situation.


  • #299
    Zebra3
    Registered Users Posts: 13,846 ✭✭✭✭Zebra3


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


    Imagine defending these scumbags.


  • #300
    Das Reich
    Registered Users Posts: 736 ✭✭✭Das Reich


    Quantum Erasure wrote: »
    Wouldn't like to be a black man over there

    Wouldn't like to be a black man in Mali or some place like that. In USA at least you would have loads of fat white women to ride.


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  • #301
    volchitsa
    Registered Users Posts: 6,953 ✭✭✭volchitsa


    Andrewf20 wrote: »
    It depends where you are. It has great scenery, people are friendly, roads and infrastructure are great. Politics, the medical side of things (cost) and college fees are not so great. Fairly crap work life balance for alot of professionals too and social support is lousy.

    Great scenery, yes, friendly people, definitely, good roads and infrastructure? Get outta that! Awful roads and worse infrastructure in lots of places I've been to, including major cities like Chicago - electric wiring on streets that looks like it's about to fall on passers by, and this was in the city centre and good neighbourhoods nearby.

    I guess compared to Ireland it holds up, just about, but it's not very fair to compare what is supposedly the richest country in the world. Compared to France or Germany where I spend a lot of time, to me American cities are crumbling at the seams. The one good thing Trump promised was to invest in the infrastructure, but of course that was the first promise that was dropped after he took power.


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