Vaccines, Infrastructure, and Kids In Cages: US Politics April 2021

xp: Ideally that wariness can be converted very quickly with messaging on actual policy around defunding / reforming / whatever: ask people to consider whether they have ever personally had a satisfactory encounter with police, point out budget imbalances and what can be done with the money, pledge to prosecute murdercops and corrupt cops (mb let all weed criminals out of proz to make room?), etc. People are "wary" while what happens instead of cops having tanks and teargas is unknown: they ought to be more enthusiastic when offered a specific better alternative (or twenty better etc).

do tell

me: the main federal policies spreading covid and causing thousands of deaths are still going on. Trump also said and tweeted a lot of unhelpful bullshit.

Aimless: Ah! But what you haven't considered, is that Trump said and tweeted lots of unhelpful bullshit.

me: yeah, I said that. also here are some stats on the actual point.

Aimless: (strokes chin) Did you though

I like Biden as president because the fossil is Not Trump.

When Brett Favre stabbed the Packers in the back I remember a lot of fans saying something to the effect of "I can't be mad at him, he won a Super Bowl for us" and honestly that's how I feel about Biden. I've got the same issues with him that most of you do but at the end of the day, he's the guy that won, and I'm not entirely convinced that a more progressive candidate would have. in fact if you saw the election in Nate Silver terms: "just win Pennsylvania and you're set" - I think Biden was your best shot.

I don't want to be dramatic about this but I really did feel like the 2020 election was America's last chance...if Trump had won I think that would've been it for us. We'd be out of the WHO, out of the Paris Accord, and it's possible we'd never have another fair and free election again. Yes, vaccines would be distributed but 40 million of them would probably be expired after getting left on a tarmac in West Virginia while the Moderna one would suddenly get banned because the CEO retweeted a Washington Post article giving Trump 2 Pinocchios for claiming that masks give you brain damage and make you vote Democrat. Not to mention the shit that would do to our already deteriorating mental health. The past four years were a fucking nightmare, even worse than I thought they would've been, and when it became apparent that Biden had it in the bag I felt legitimately happy because finally a day came where my sense of impending doom wasn't rapidly intensifying. I was actually hopeful!! And I don't want to forget how I felt on that day. I don't want to like Joe Biden, there are dozens of reasons why I shouldn't, but Republicans have been electing such monstrous people that they're forcing me to!!

Those feelings are legit, frogbs

I just turned the teevee on to catch a clip of Biden offering boilerplate sentiments about the fallen dead; it was such a relief to be bored again!

(are there any US presidents who aren't war criminals? Jimmy Carter might get away clean, right? Ford's probably personally clean on Vietnam, despite whatever crimes Americans still committed before he got them out, but idk what he did as veep.)

frogs...yes.

Has there been a poll to see how many people are/were/have been all 'Biden is my guy, my #1 choice, we got the best man in the WH!'? Because I'm willing to bet that % is a one-digit number, maybe low two-digits at best. And Biden has a pretty big family, so you gotta figure they're making up a lot of that demographic.

Joe Bombin (milo z) at 2:54 14 Apr 21

But as ever, why would someone saying “all Presidents are war criminals” bother you if you... agree?


it's repetitive and annoying, doubly so because it's always posted as if it's a big truth bomb that has never been posted before

Ford's probably personally clean on Vietnam, despite whatever crimes Americans still committed before he got them out, but idk what he did as veep.)

East Timor.

it's repetitive and annoying, doubly so because it's always posted as if it's a big truth bomb that has never been posted before

it was specifically posted as "here's a thing that an extremely repetitive and annoying poster used to say all the time"

btw proz priz

ask people to consider whether they have ever personally had a satisfactory encounter with police

I would take this tactic off the table immediately. I've had more racially-fraught encounters with park rangers than I have with police officers; family members who have been directly hassled by the police for nothing, including pulled out of vehicles and handcuffed, then released without any charges because they hadn't done anything, have also had helpful, fruitful encounters with the police. Plus, "satisfactory" is a nebulous concept. If you are speeding, get pulled over, and get a ticket from a respectful and deferential police officer, is that a satisfactory encounter or is it unsatisfactory because you got a speeding ticket? If you survived the encounter, is that "satisfactory"? What is the baseline.

All of which is beside the point that leaving rights issues up to polling numbers is tyranny and we should be doing it because it's the right thing to do. I support changing the messaging to build more groundswell support for it but the primary motivator for reform is more likely to be constant, consistent images of police brutalizing and terrorizing people who haven't done anything, and even then we are in such a media glut that those images feel more like ghoulish entertainment at the expense of people like me than they do a catalyst for change (look, for example, at the past week while the Chauvin trial has been going on).

it's repetitive and annoying

doubly so because it's always posted as if it's a big truth bomb that has never been posted before

Who does this? Again, you went down this line because jaymc brought it up as something he disagrees with and table reiterated that he agrees with it. No one spiked a football in your face and said PRESIDENTS SHOULD ALL BE SENT TO THE GALLOWS.

There is a double standard that any number of generally soft and uncontroversial leftist opinions (like "all Presidents are war criminals") are either personal attacks on everyone else present or TRUTH BOMBS being flaunted directly your face. Somehow this is never pushed from the opposite direction toward any liberal positions - no one on the left takes offense at your vote for Biden or Obama or whatever.

literally everyone here thinks it's fine to say that and is just exhausted with your rhetorical approach to fucking everything

sorry should've saved that one for the second thoughts thread

East Timor.

Ta - obv I grew up in the 80s and 90s with Australian governments' ongoing complicity as a regular news issue, and the US having sold the invasion's weapons is more of a "as usual, the aggressive invasion was done with US military supplies" - it's just standard background for the Pentagon or State Department to be involved, and used to not be associated with the leader. I guess that covers Carter, too.

I find the anxiety/mental health framing (as in jaymc's "the alternative as never-ending anxiety") kind of odd - general hostility to Presidents and antipathy to the country in general releases you from some anxiety. The existence of Trump certainly seemed to hit harder for people who think Democratic Presidents are (capable of being) good people.

I'm anxious about economic survival, and about actual physical survival because of problems resulting from decades of limited access to healthcare, and about a senior parent on both counts, and about more vulnerable people than me being brutalized and murdered by the state and about climate change wreaking havoc on billions of people... Joe Biden and the Democrats don't assuage any of that anxiety.

The existence of Trump certainly seemed to hit harder for people who think Democratic Presidents are (capable of being) good people.

once again can't tell if you're having a conversation with the ppl on this board or if you are really fuckin projecting

i feel relief from the void of spewing hatred yeah. i don't think the democrats are good

well, most of them

it's kinda odd that ppl would feel some kind of mental relief from a piece of shit who literally said the worst possible thing every day from the loudest position in this country..... really odd......................

and i'm anxious about all the shit you are!!!! but you can take your projections elsewhere

call in to your favorite lefty podcast or whatever

once again can't tell if you're having a conversation with the ppl on this board or if you are really fuckin projecting

Well, I mean, I quoted jaymc there and responded to it, and various other posters have referred to anxiety that must be felt by always being mad about the US government.

it's kinda odd that ppl

I didn't say that at all? I'm responding to the presumption (stated multiple times in this thread) that hostile leftists must be constantly wracked with anxiety because of their beliefs, constantly outraged and mad at the world. I'm saying it doesn't work like that - that when your default political position is that 'American politicians are all guilty until proved otherwise' there's less anxiety.

re more cop $$$ — to be clear I’m not talking about “defunding”, which is obv v controversial. I should have been more clear in my post.

I simply have a hard time believing that a majority of people who voted for Biden — white or not — think cops need more $$$. I may be totally off base here. I don’t have poll data; just the ‘intuition’ that anyone trying to backslap cops is definitely not voting Democratic Party in the post-Trump era.

.... this is extremely fuckin tedious xp

afaict the goalposts have been moved all the way up the hill and i'm out

or i misunderstood milo's point bc it's like nested within overlapping conversations. jaymc seems fine with us thinking that all politicians are murders or whatever

Has there been a poll to see how many people are/were/have been all 'Biden is my guy, my #1 choice, we got the best man in the WH!'? Because I'm willing to bet that % is a one-digit number, maybe low two-digits at best. And Biden has a pretty big family, so you gotta figure they're making up a lot of that demographic.

there's a guy down the street who has the Trump flag where he's photoshopped onto Rambo's body. if someone did that with Biden I'd think they were either an incredible troll or an insane person. even more insane than the guy with the Trump flag.

Has there been a poll to see how many people are/were/have been all 'Biden is my guy, my #1 choice, we got the best man in the WH!'?

Thousands of older Black voters in the South want a word.

I am wracked with anxiety and constantly outraged and mad at the world though xps

Adding one more person or party to the list for the gallows adds no extra weight, though.

Who does this? Again, you went down this line because jaymc brought it up as something he disagrees with and table reiterated that he agrees with it. No one spiked a football in your face and said PRESIDENTS SHOULD ALL BE SENT TO THE GALLOWS.

I know it's beside the point, but...it's less that I *disagree* with it than that I don't find the rhetoric useful. Do nearly all presidents contribute to the suffering of others through their policies? Yes, but I object to framing this as a personal quality of amoral malevolence (which is what "war criminal" implies) rather than an inevitable consequence of the structures of state power that have been in place for decades.

Thousands of older Black voters in the South want a word.

I know there was an article on this, was it because they legitimately thought he was the best man for the job or because they thought he was the candidate most likely to get white people's votes?

The line between those two explanations is thin in politics.

Yes, but I object to framing this as a personal quality of amoral malevolence (which is what "war criminal" implies) rather than an inevitable consequence of the structures of state power that have been in place for decades.

whynotboth.gif?

You have to be willing to blow up the Doctors Without Borders hospital or aid and abet ethnic cleansing to want the job in the first place - and each of those Presidents you want to see in their best light has done their utmost to uphold and expand the structures of state power. It's an ouroboros of human misery.

. I'm saying it doesn't work like that - that when your default political position is that 'American politicians are all guilty until proved otherwise' there's less anxiety.

I'll have to take your word for it. I guess I'm not ready to accept the premise, which seems depressing and dispiriting.

Rather ouroboros than theiroboros

re more cop $$$ — to be clear I’m not talking about “defunding”, which is obv v controversial. I should have been more clear in my post.

I simply have a hard time believing that a majority of people who voted for Biden — white or not — think cops need more $$$. I may be totally off base here. I don’t have poll data; just the ‘intuition’ that anyone trying to backslap cops is definitely not voting Democratic Party in the post-Trump era.

I'm not sure about more recent data but this is from August 2020:

https://news.gallup.com/poll/316571/black-americans-police-retain-local-presence.aspx

This is also from August 2020:

https://news.gallup.com/poll/317114/black-white-adults-confidence-diverges-police.aspx

That being said, I think increasing spending on the police in 2021 is fucking stupid. I am not convinced it's unpopular.

Obama and Carter probably didn’t enter office looking forward to presiding over the deaths of innocent people but it wasn’t a dealbreaker and they didn’t exactly take steps to stop their successors to preside over the deaths of innocent people.

All of which is beside the point that leaving rights issues up to polling numbers is tyranny and we should be doing it because it's the right thing to do.

Yes.

I would take this tactic off the table immediately.

Yes, perhaps I should have said how many, or what proportion of satisfactory encounters - or asking how many positive encounters? Either way it's a personal messaging / campaigning tactic, not a policy-marketing one.

(I do consider getting pulled over and ticketed for having expired registration to be a satisfactory encounter, and giving an officer directions to be neutral. But reporting a theft, or reporting an assault, or protesting a named officer's inconsistent application of restraint, or being lightly swatted by a harassing neighbour (who eventually broke through his own floor and smashed the ceiling onto a housemate's bed, after the police refused to respond to any of our own reports about him), or engaging in discussion about policy with officers on the barricades at the protests last year, or being repeatedly tear-gassed and pepper-gassed, or getting bottlenecked with 700 ppl at the train station bcz the cops are running sniffer dogs at the top of the stairs, or working in an office with ex-cops and having to engage in polite discussion about how all juries should be abolished and how great it is just to work for fun because of your $100k pension at age 50, have all been unsatisfactory ime.)

((I had to cross the road twice on one block yesterday to pass the huge concrete barriers topped with cyclone fences that they still have on the road around the cop shop, nine months after "retaking" the street from taco stands, mutual aid lawayers, free food tables and dancers. Didn't encounter any actual officers, but it's still an unsatisfactory way to get to a door on the same block.))

i agree with milo and often find interesting information in what he posts but it's pretty clear to me that he's always in fight mode and it gets fuckin old, not least because doing that is like a complete refusal to actually like or engage in positive terms with anyone here and quelle surprise, people don't like that - unless you've got some deep seated anger / hardman issues.

also, the biggest empire on earth isn't going to reform itself and its violence by any significant amount, which would lead to it no longer being an empire. so shocking it needs to be posted 5,000,000 times i guess.

Yes, perhaps I should have said how many, or what proportion of satisfactory encounters - or asking how many positive encounters? Either way it's a personal messaging / campaigning tactic, not a policy-marketing one.

I think it's a perilous road to go down in a society that, by majority across demographics, wants to trust cops more than distrust them. If you give people the opportunity to personalize their interaction with police, people who have had bad experiences will have had REALLY BAD experiences but A) I don't think data supports that being the experience of the majority of the country, which would cause the messaging to backfire, and B) I would be surprised if American psychology didn't warp inconveniences or bad situations that should be blamed on police not handling things correctly onto a nebulous, diffuse array of Other (read: ANTIFA these days, but also GANGS and STRANGERS and basically whatever the adult version of the scary thing that was hiding in your closet when you were a kid is) because people want to believe that mental image of a competent organization that will help them if they find themselves victimized by a criminal situation.

This is part of why I think positive messaging would work better as a personal campaigning tactic; talk about funding and empowering social workers trained in de-escalation and crisis management, talk about funding medical professionals who can render aid to people causing a disturbance, talk about funding risk analysts who can interpret a situation and line up the correct resources to deal with it in the correct priority order, etc etc etc. You can even pitch it as streamlining the responsibilities of the police so they can focus their training on fewer things and be more effective and less dangerous when they do need to be involved.

(Whether that last bit is actually true or not kind of doesn't matter as long as you can convince people that keeping armed police off the streets in interminable, unending training sessions will make everyone safer)

here are the 4 police encounters I can recall:

1) when I was 13, I got arrested for shoplifting, had both of my parents come into school so they could watch footage of me NOT ACTUALLY STEALING ANYTHING, then was told they had footage of me shoplifting the next day even though I wasn't at the store. I was given a $350 fine but was told if I didn't push back I'd be eligible for a "second chance" program. I had to actually go into this convenience store (which "banned" me for a year) and apologize to the owner, not even knowing what the hell it was they thought I stole (on second thought, I absolutely should have fought this, but I was 13 and scared). It was humiliating and I kept having to hear my parents say how disappointed they were. I really wish I had pushed back but I was 13 and $350 seemed like SO MUCH MONEY.

2) pulled over for expired plates. the cop made me walk home in the cold and told me he'd be waiting around the block for me. prick.

3) a buddy had a brick thrown through his car window, so he called the cops, not knowing what to do. they didn't do anything nor did they really try but they did breathalyze him and gave him a ticket for blowing a 0.02, literally a month away from his 21st birthday

4) got a speeding ticket on the highway. this cop was actually pretty nice. what can I say, I was speeding.

here's what's infuriating about it - some of the people I know who are the staunchest Blue Lives Matter and It Wouldn't Have Happened If They'd Just Complied idiots are the same people who tense up the hardest every time they see a cop car behind them. I had a Crown Vic for a while and these are the exact people who called me an asshole for driving it (tbf, they kind of had a point). Seems to me that it's got nothing to do with "supporting the law".

xp 2 Dan

Good post.

(And part of the idea is that you follow up the initial question by focusing on what these people have had go well with cops, what hasn't (eg did they get your stolen shit back?), and how reallocating resources can emphasize the things that go well, above the tanks and violence.)

Oh yeah, being breathalysed is a positive encounter. It's a public good, and the cops are usually polite.

i’m probably pretty unusual on this board for having had lengthy interactions with a number of police detectives about a pretty serious crime. i was very impressed by them. they didn’t believe my story at first, and eventually they did. i don’t doubt that my skin color and social background helped in that regard. but once they believed me they were... how do i say this? straight fire. detailed, patient, persistent, dependable. just a world away from the lunkheads on the beat. there’s got to be a way to nurture this specialist investigation strand of policing while basically getting rid of the lunkhead aspect? surely?

I feel like even cops would welcome being relieved of a lot of those functions of their job that they aren't really prepared for

but then I don't know really know the mentality of who becomes a cop now, violence seems to be the point so I don't know how to reform

yeah.

Oh yeah, being breathalysed is a positive encounter. It's a public good, and the cops are usually polite.

well, not in the situation I mentioned. someone damaged his car, he called the cops because he couldn't afford to fix it, and instead of helping him they gave him a $200 citation because he drank a Bud Lite a month early. the cops were polite, sure, but what's the public good?