A Deeply Fractured US

[Czech_pivo]

One of the more intelligent posts I've seen in a long time on this subject.

The process should include the jailing and fining of individuals and companies that employ illegal immigrants.
Remove the employment opportunity and you remove 90%+ of the illegal immigrant issue. No work & no money means no illegal immigrants.

 

[Lumber]

Random thought. What are the implications in the midterms if suddenly a bunch of people who put a lot of weight into firearms rights begin to have a shifted perception of whether the Republicans can actually be relied upon there?



The fact that he was being facetious apparently went right over your head. Based on his history in this thread I’m quite confident that was his best sarcastic take on what a skilled licking of the boot would look like. And it was, admittedly, quite good. I wouldn’t be surprised to see those words parroted by those with a sudden “tread on me” fetish.

I originally had phrases like "Democrat controlled liberal media apparatus propaganda" strewn throughout but thought it was too on the nose.

 

[ModlrMike]

It's not the what, but the how. Masked armed men throwing people into vehicles and whisking them off to detention centres is never going to be the right way to do things. Neither party should be in support of this method, regardless of who the target is.

 

[Lumber]

I think everyone is aware of Lumber’s positions and could estimate a high probability of sarcasm in that post. Your problem is you think you’re smarter than everyone else in the room and likely believe you have special licence to insult people who disagree with your position.

To be fair to you and other, while I don't believe what I wrote in that post is the truth, I recognize that it COULD be the truth, or at least the truth could be in that direction. We're basically slaves to whatever each of our media sources are telling us, and the info sphere has gotten really good (bad) at spreading news/information that, despite being false work misleading, is consistent across many platforms.

 

[McG]

Random thought. What are the implications in the midterms if suddenly a bunch of people who put a lot of weight into firearms rights begin to have a shifted perception of whether the Republicans can actually be relied upon there?

It becomes a big win for the other side.
But part of the current US problem is the binary political system where extremism finds a home in big tents that are trying to attract 50% +1 of the population. Fiscal conservatives and single issue voters hold their noses and vote for fascism because that is their partisan identity and it must be better than the other side.

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

Stupid question here, probably coming from my ignorant Canadian perspective: Can you be said to be resisting arrest if the LEO hasn't said the magic words (You are under arrest) and given you a chance to simply surrender to him/her?

 

[Jarnhamar]

I wonder how many other police officers and members of the US military share the 'ICE Goon' mentality.

It's great to try and paint them as having separate sets of ethos but if you think about it, there's gonna be a lot of former police and former military members working for ICE. I believe Good's shooter was ex military Iraq vet.


Also, one of the many downsides of whats going on in Minnesota is the spotlight being taken away from the multi billion dollar fraud schemes that have been ongoing and ignored for years.
I wonder how many other police officers and members of the US military share the 'ICE Goon' mentality.

It's great to try and paint them as having separate sets of ethos but if you think about it, there's gonna be a lot of former police and former military members working for ICE. I believe Good's shooter was ex military Iraq vet.


Also, one of the many downsides of whats going on in Minnesota is the spotlight being taken away from the multi billion dollar fraud schemes that have been ongoing and ignored for years.

 

[Altair]

Or it’s possible that much of this collective outrage is being manufactured, driven less by facts on the ground and more by sustained media framing designed to provoke it. ICE officers, for the most part, are enforcing laws that already exist, addressing an immigration system that many would argue has deteriorated over the past two decades due to Democratic policy choices. ICE operates nationwide, and while individual incidents absolutely deserve scrutiny, taken as a whole there are not widespread patterns of abuse.

What is widespread is the amplification of every negative encounter, presented in a way that suggests systemic misconduct rather than isolated failures. The result is a public narrative that portrays ICE as routinely victimizing Americans, which in turn fuels harassment of agents regardless of whether they are acting improperly or simply carrying out lawful duties. Each confrontation then becomes fresh material to further inflame outrage.

This creates the impression that opposition to ICE is growing broadly and even bipartisan, but that perception is largely illusory. Many American conservatives see this as a deliberate effort to delegitimize the president, DHS, and ICE itself in order to obstruct immigration enforcement altogether. From a Canadian media environment that largely mirrors U.S. progressive framing, that dynamic may be difficult to recognize, but it doesn’t make it any less real.

***

(How'd I do?)

The Lumber told me to reject the evidence of my eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.

 

[Altair]

I wonder how many other police officers and members of the US military share the 'ICE Goon' mentality.

It's great to try and paint them as having separate sets of ethos but if you think about it, there's gonna be a lot of former police and former military members working for ICE. I believe Good's shooter was ex military Iraq vet.


Also, one of the many downsides of whats going on in Minnesota is the spotlight being taken away from the multi billion dollar fraud schemes that have been ongoing and ignored for years.
I wonder how many other police officers and members of the US military share the 'ICE Goon' mentality.

It's great to try and paint them as having separate sets of ethos but if you think about it, there's gonna be a lot of former police and former military members working for ICE. I believe Good's shooter was ex military Iraq vet.


Also, one of the many downsides of whats going on in Minnesota is the spotlight being taken away from the multi billion dollar fraud schemes that have been ongoing and ignored for years.

I find it interesting that the Reene Good shooter was ex military.

Because if a soldier disarmed a enemy combatant and then proceeded to shoot them in the back, I believe that would be a war crime.

 

[Remius]

I wonder how many other police officers and members of the US military share the 'ICE Goon' mentality.

It's great to try and paint them as having separate sets of ethos but if you think about it, there's gonna be a lot of former police and former military members working for ICE. I believe Good's shooter was ex military Iraq vet.


Also, one of the many downsides of whats going on in Minnesota is the spotlight being taken away from the multi billion dollar fraud schemes that have been ongoing and ignored for years.
I wonder how many other police officers and members of the US military share the 'ICE Goon' mentality.

It's great to try and paint them as having separate sets of ethos but if you think about it, there's gonna be a lot of former police and former military members working for ICE. I believe Good's shooter was ex military Iraq vet.


Also, one of the many downsides of whats going on in Minnesota is the spotlight being taken away from the multi billion dollar fraud schemes that have been ongoing and ignored for years.

We’ve all seen guys leave the military that were goons and were either driven out or felt they didn’t fit and found somewhere else to go be a goon.

 

[JLB50]

America is cruising faster and faster towards remember the actual reason they have a second amendment. An unsurprising number of purported second amendment absolutists who would have taken to the streets armed if a fed under a Democrat administration killed a concealed carry U.S. citizen working as a VA nurse have done a rapid pivot to “tread on me harder, daddy”. Turns out a lot of the past quarter century’s paranoid talk about “the feds” is actually not at all contingent on the said feds’ behaviour, but rather who it’s carried out against.

There are a lot of armed liberals in America, and the discussion of arming themselves is becoming more frequent and open.

Dangerous times.

Yes, very dangerous times. If this article is correct it definitely looks as if Homeland Security is actively seeking to employ the super right-wing paramilitary groups as ICE men. Take a look at their advertising efforts in the enclosed article.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/ice-recruiting-9.7058294

 

[PPCLI Guy]

Or it’s possible that much of this collective outrage is being manufactured, driven less by facts on the ground and more by sustained media framing designed to provoke it. ICE officers, for the most part, are enforcing laws that already exist, addressing an immigration system that many would argue has deteriorated over the past two decades due to Democratic policy choices. ICE operates nationwide, and while individual incidents absolutely deserve scrutiny, taken as a whole there are not widespread patterns of abuse.

What is widespread is the amplification of every negative encounter, presented in a way that suggests systemic misconduct rather than isolated failures. The result is a public narrative that portrays ICE as routinely victimizing Americans, which in turn fuels harassment of agents regardless of whether they are acting improperly or simply carrying out lawful duties. Each confrontation then becomes fresh material to further inflame outrage.

This creates the impression that opposition to ICE is growing broadly and even bipartisan, but that perception is largely illusory. Many American conservatives see this as a deliberate effort to delegitimize the president, DHS, and ICE itself in order to obstruct immigration enforcement altogether. From a Canadian media environment that largely mirrors U.S. progressive framing, that dynamic may be difficult to recognize, but it doesn’t make it any less real.

***

(How'd I do?)

So, to deliberately simplify, the key to lessening egregious / criminal behaviour by law enforcement officers is to not report that behaviour?

IRRC correctly, Team Trump's approach to lowering the COVID infection rate was to stop testing for infection?. That was a policy, and it did not work.

 

[HavokFour]

I think this frame grab is developing into one of those “iconic photos of our times”.

View attachment 98060

By this point the officer holding the gun had watched his colleague remove the victim’s gun from his holster and move away with it. This photo was just as he was beginning to shoot.

With the slowed down versions the best count I’ve got is ten shots. Not sure how many officers fired. There’s a distinct possibility based on some analysis I’ve seen that the first shot was an ND of the victim’s own gun by the officer who had removed it from the holster and was walking away. Too bad the feds abandoned the perimeter and collapsed the crime scene before state investigators could thoroughly examine it.

Similar photos have caused great upheaval in the States in the past.

View attachment 98061

This is the comparison making the rounds all over.

 

[brihard]

This is the comparison making the rounds all over.

View attachment 98062

Oof.

 

[Brad Sallows]

I originally had phrases like "Democrat controlled liberal media apparatus propaganda" strewn throughout but thought it was too on the nose.

You were so close to being able to "steelman" in good faith positions with which you disagree.

Much of what you wrote is truly what some people believe. Some of it is incontrovertibly true (what the laws are, whether they've been faithfully executed, and what organized obstruction to government means), and the rest is the partisan shading. The latter shouldn't obscure the former.

 

[McG]

This is the comparison making the rounds all over.

View attachment 98062

The video compilation hits a little harder.

 

[RangerRay]

The video compilation hits a little harder.

 

[The Bread Guy]

... one of the many downsides of whats going on in Minnesota is the spotlight being taken away from the multi billion dollar fraud schemes that have been ongoing and ignored for years ...

Just because these forums focus pretty tightly on the LEO angle, and social media often focus on the sizzzle instead of the steak, I don't see any shortage of spotlight on fraud in Minnesota - VERY quick search of "fraud minnesota daycare" shows loads of material if people want to read it ....

• Google News
• Yahoo
• Bing.ca
• DuckDuckGo
• Swisscows

"Spotlight" can sometimes be in the eye of the beholder.

 

[Lumber]

You were so close to being able to "steelman" in good faith positions with which you disagree.

Much of what you wrote is truly what some people believe. Some of it is incontrovertibly true (what the laws are, whether they've been faithfully executed, and what organized obstruction to government means), and the rest is the partisan shading. The latter shouldn't obscure the former.

I thought removing those phrases made my Steelman attempt more honest. Pointing out that I thought of including them shouldnt detract from my post; actually believing what you wrote isn't a prerequisite of steelmanning.

 

[Brad Sallows]

I thought removing those phrases made my Steelman attempt more honest. Pointing out that I thought of including them shouldnt detract from my post; actually believing what you wrote isn't a prerequisite of steelmanning.

Then I think you win the substance points as well as style.