Trump is Using Us

[ArtD]

Part political, part theological.

https://youtu.be/V9X-u3YM2qw

[bdsimon]

All political. But also on point in many areas.

[bskeptic]

The "very fine people" thing is a media hoax.

Is Trump willing to use religion when he isn't sincere? Quite possibly.

But hey, at least the guy is standing up to the madness of the BLM group, which it should be clear to everyone now are far left lunatics.

Yeah, let's defund the police; that isn't going to make minorities (and everyone else) suffer at all. Some Democrats even willing to go along with the "defund the police" idea... Trump not perfect but more sane than the Democrats these days.

[kurros]

The "very fine people" thing is a media hoax.

Is Trump willing to use religion when he isn't sincere? Quite possibly.

But hey, at least the guy is standing up to the madness of the BLM group, which it should be clear to everyone now are far left lunatics.

Yeah, let's defund the police; that isn't going to make minorities (and everyone else) suffer at all. Some Democrats even willing to go along with the "defund the police" idea... Trump not perfect but more sane than the Democrats these days.

I think you don't understand the "defund the police" concept correctly.

[OrthodoxJew]

The only people who view trump as a person/individual/politician are cosmopolitan media types who can't see past their own nose.

Trump did not rise in a vaacume. He is a cultural phenomenon. A reactionary response to a madness.

The people who put him in office (myself) are very plain oridanry people. Torch carrying white nationalists are not a real entity in my mind. Just a figment of the imagination.

[lapwing]

Trump being elected by "reasonable" people (how is this reasonableness measured?) doesn't guarantee that Trump is himself reasonable or acts reasonably..
Applies to anyone democratically elected.

"far left lunatics" I spy cognitive bias.. Are the far right necessarily "lunatics"? How is "far left" or "far right" defined objectively?

[bskeptic]

The "very fine people" thing is a media hoax.

Is Trump willing to use religion when he isn't sincere? Quite possibly.

But hey, at least the guy is standing up to the madness of the BLM group, which it should be clear to everyone now are far left lunatics.

Yeah, let's defund the police; that isn't going to make minorities (and everyone else) suffer at all. Some Democrats even willing to go along with the "defund the police" idea... Trump not perfect but more sane than the Democrats these days.

I think you don't understand the "defund the police" concept correctly.

Well...

https://blacklivesmatter.com/what-defunding-the-police-really-means/


The idea that you can defund the police, and invest in other services, and people will be safer, is really very questionable. 
I guess technically it's an empirical question as to how well it would work, but I'm going to say it's dangerous far left crazy talk.

And let's get it right: the threat to black people normally, is not that innocent black people will be murdered by the police. That's relatively rare. Of course any unjust killing by police is a serious matter, and it sometimes does happen. But that doesn't mean that the police don't make communities safer! That doesn't mean it's a good idea to defund the police! Many police shootings of white and black people etc will be justified as defence.

Even with the disproportionate number of black people killed by police, there isn't an easy, clear answer, that this is certainly because of racial bias, rather than other factors.

[noncontingent]

Leftists have daddy issues. That's why they focus on the police.

[ArtD]

OrthodoxJew: The people who put him in office (myself) are very plain ordinary people.

You’re being too modest; I’d hardly call "ordinary" an orthodox Jew who votes for a candidate who supports neo-Nazis.

[kurros]

The "very fine people" thing is a media hoax.

Is Trump willing to use religion when he isn't sincere? Quite possibly.

But hey, at least the guy is standing up to the madness of the BLM group, which it should be clear to everyone now are far left lunatics.

Yeah, let's defund the police; that isn't going to make minorities (and everyone else) suffer at all. Some Democrats even willing to go along with the "defund the police" idea... Trump not perfect but more sane than the Democrats these days.

I think you don't understand the "defund the police" concept correctly.

Well...

https://blacklivesmatter.com/what-defunding-the-police-really-means/


The idea that you can defund the police, and invest in other services, and people will be safer, is really very questionable. 
I guess technically it's an empirical question as to how well it would work, but I'm going to say it's dangerous far left crazy talk.

It is an empirical question that has long been answered. The United States has a bizarrely militarised police force compared to the rest of the civilised world. Almost every other Western nation is doing a better job on this question, even if they still have things to work on.

And let's get it right: the threat to black people normally, is not that innocent black people will be murdered by the police. That's relatively rare. Of course any unjust killing by police is a serious matter, and it sometimes does happen. But that doesn't mean that the police don't make communities safer! That doesn't mean it's a good idea to defund the police! Many police shootings of white and black people etc will be justified as defence.

The point is not to replace police entirely, it is to send people other than police to deal with many of the situations where sending in armed agents of the government just risks escalation and violence.

Even with the disproportionate number of black people killed by police, there isn't an easy, clear answer, that this is certainly because of racial bias, rather than other factors.

While it is hard for me as a white male who doesn't even live in the U.S.A. to judge, I would agree that it is unlikely that police are all that often directly racist. The issue instead is probably systemic racism and disadvantage of black communities, stemming from all sorts of historical issues, which leads to those communities more often having the police called on them. And the mere presence of armed individuals increases the probability that someone will get shot, even before you add in other issues like how police are trained to deal with situations. So if you really want to make these communities safer then police are not always the best option. Harshly enforcing the law doesn't necessarily prevent crimes. Dealing with the origins of poverty and disadvantage does. Very few people engage in dangerous criminal behaviour just out of innate malice or social deviancy; for most there are a host of background circumstances that drove them to that behaviour. And police are not equipped to deal with these roots of the problem. Thus "defund the police".

That said, you read a lot of stories about even well-off black people in the U.S.A. being terrified to walk around by themselves for fear that some nervous white person will call the police on them for their mere presence, and that police are so aggressive in their response to calls that they feel there is a significant risk of being killed or at least badly handly by them no matter the reason for the encounter (at least in some places). So as an external observer I cannot easily discount these stories and say that clear and direct racism isn't also a problem here.

[bskeptic]

OrthodoxJew: The people who put him in office (myself) are very plain ordinary people.

You’re being too modest; I’d hardly call "ordinary" an orthodox Jew who votes for a candidate who supports neo-Nazis.

Trump explicitly condemned white supremacist groups etc.

[bskeptic]

It is an empirical question that has long been answered. The United States has a bizarrely militarised police force compared to the rest of the civilised world. Almost every other Western nation is doing a better job on this question, even if they still have things to work on.

Yeah, that's not an empirical answer here. The real test is to try it in the US in the specific situation.

Hey, I could point to the fact that it's often Democrat run cities that have a surge in crime right now. So proof that left-wing policy doesn't work?

Well if left-wing policy doesn't work, oh of course, the answer has to be even more radical left-wing policy. Then everything will be brilliant...

[TheCross]

OrthodoxJew: The people who put him in office (myself) are very plain ordinary people.

You’re being too modest; I’d hardly call "ordinary" an orthodox Jew who votes for a candidate who supports neo-Nazis.

His daughters husband is a jew?!!???!!!??!???!??!??!??!?!!??!!!!??!?!!??!???!??!!!?!??!??!?!?!??!?

[Saibomb]

OrthodoxJew: The people who put him in office (myself) are very plain ordinary people.

You’re being too modest; I’d hardly call "ordinary" an orthodox Jew who votes for a candidate who supports neo-Nazis.

Trump explicitly condemned white supremacist groups etc.

He also more recently tweeted a video of a guy shouting "white power"...