America

[Mikey Brown]

What an incredible week or two for the gun nuts. Daunte Wright’s death seems like old news at this point.

Stumbled on this, which I realise is a good few years out of date now. But an interesting glimpse in to the mindset of the David Grossman / IDF training techniques these guys use.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/reason.com ... ues/%3Famp

“one officer explaining that he enlarged photos of his own kids to use as targets so that he would not be caught off guard with such a drastically new experience while on duty“

[morepork]

Against this background of endless social inequality and unacceptable use of force by the authorities against people of colour, the Q-Barbies in government have drafted a policy platform for a new caucus founded on "Anglo Saxon political traditions". I shit you not. That is their big fancy word for "white". This is on the back of consistent social media trolling labeling protesters responding to the latest incident in a catalogue of excessive police force as Marxists, and terrorists.

I don't think the Q Brigade knows what Anglo-Saxon or Marxist means...

Sure does bring in a lot of small donations that would otherwise be spent on meth or off label opioids though!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... glo-saxon/

[Mikey Brown]

No more school shootings I don't think but can't keep track. There does seem to be an incident where a student shot at police (???) and then was killed in return. Not sure what you call that exactly.

More details now coming out about this one too, initial reports sounded very strange and now seems like the cop who got shot was either shot by his colleague or himself.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/14/us/k ... mpson.html

The last bit of this article is particularly grim-

"At the time of Monday’s shooting, Austin-East High School was still reeling from the fatal shootings of four students since January, The Knoxville News-Sentinel reported.

In late January, a 15-year-old student died after another teenager accidentally shot him in a car, the newspaper reported, citing information from the police. A 17-year-old was arrested and charged with criminally negligent homicide in that shooting, the paper reported.

On Feb. 12, a 16-year-old student was shot and killed as he was driving home from school, the paper reported. Two boys, 14 and 16, were arrested and charged in connection with his death, The News-Sentinel said.

Four days later, on Feb. 16, a 15-year-old freshman was found shot outside her home and was later pronounced dead at a hospital, The News-Sentinel reported.

And on March 10, another 15-year-old student died at a hospital one day after he was found with a gunshot wound in south Knoxville."

Really hard to picture a way back against the current gun culture in the US. Is there anyone with the means or the bollocks to really do anything about it?

[morepork]

In a country where gun rights take precedence over access to health care? Over worker advocacy? Yeah...

The second amendment is the laziest way of appearing to "fight" for your constituents and you can make a comfortable career based around that alone (ask Taylor-Greene and Boebert). The only way forward is to take the money out of the picture, which means getting money out of politics. A huge ask, but the only way forward.

[Mikey Brown]

Yeah. Not really on the cards is it. Biden of all people would be a surprising one to try and take that on.

The slow realisation in the UK this last week that 'lobbying' might just be a code word for 'bribery' has been sort of entertaining, but the US system seems to be fundamentally built on open corruption.

[morepork]

Why do you think Elizabeth Warren gets shut out of the picture so often?

[Digby]

Because she performs badly on a nationwide basis

[morepork]

Chauvin guilty on all counts. Jury unanimous. Please, please let this an agent for change

[Digby]

If the USA was on the verge of trying to be normal it'd be possible to know if this ad was an intentional farce

[morepork]

I share your cynicism, but now is not the moment for Big Dan.

[Digby]

There remains a reality to dealing with concerns about access to guns and reimagining the police, the courts, the prisons

[morepork]

There remains a reality to dealing with concerns about access to guns and reimagining the police, the courts, the prisons

With today’s events being an important stepping stone . Big Dan is a sideshow in an increasingly redundant circus.

[Digby]

Trump lost by less than 50k votes. I have a certain lack of faith

[morepork]

Trump lost by less than 50k votes. I have a certain lack of faith

There are communities here that would take issue with your lack of faith.

Trump lost the popular vote by just over 7 million incidentally. I take your point, but take issue with you lying down like an All Black team in a World Cup semifinal.

Be best baby.

[Puja]

Chauvin guilty on all counts. Jury unanimous. Please, please let this an agent for change

I was not expecting that result at all, despite his obvious guilt. I was sure that the, "Yes, he continued kneeling on the guy's neck and refusing medical treatment for 3 minutes after he was noted to having stopped breathing and having no pulse, but maybe it was carbon monoxide, you can't know for sure," defence was going to see him get a maximum of manslaughter. Good sign for the USA and hopefully this is the precedent that means more juries will find guilty cops guilty.

I do worry that Trumpmerica will see it as a fix and a travesty and head even further to the nutjob side though.

Puja

[Which Tyler]

That feeling of relief as the George Floyd murder trial verdict comes in.

American cops kill another black kid: http://www.thedailybeast.com/columbus-p ... comes-down

[Digby]

Trump lost by less than 50k votes. I have a certain lack of faith

There are communities here that would take issue with your lack of faith.

Trump lost the popular vote by just over 7 million incidentally. I take your point, but take issue with you lying down like an All Black team in a World Cup semifinal.

Be best baby.

It's not about lying down, it's just it's going to be hard to make progress. It's going to take patience, and that's something in precious short supply.

[Digby]

American cops kill another black kid: http://www.thedailybeast.com/columbus-p ... comes-down

This one isn't remotely in the same league, this one looks to be nailed on justified tbh given the risk she was presenting to others. Maybe something else could have been done earlier, and I also have no idea just wtf was happening here even before the police got involved, but this looks much more like saving someone in discharging a firearm then simply electing to harm someone

[Mikey Brown]

Lol. 'Nailed on justified' & 'I don't have a clue wtf was going on here'. Perfect.

It's clearly not the same scenario as Chauvin/Floyd, but I think the instinct to simply execute people in these situations is a large part of what people have an issue with. Maybe this 15 year old girl required several gunshots to prevent her from being a threat, but I'm not sure how you've concluded that without seeing the incident. Or is there a video?

[Digby]

There is video

[Mikey Brown]

I meant one that you'd seen and concluded she needed to be shot several times. I genuinely don't know, I haven't seen it.

[Digby]

At the point she's shot she's about to knife/stab someone else. So in the instant of the shooting I have little sympathy. I have however no idea what led to a situation wherein she felt the need to be attacking someone else, nor do I know if the police could have done anything earlier. But in the actual moment of the shooting it does seem reasonable to shoot first to protect others and then ask questions

[morepork]

Shoot first. Ask later. Brilliant. Why is it always the gun that is the response of choice in the first instance?


Social meja is alight with white culture war warriors claiming the justice system has bowed to a terrorist group, which they claim BLM is. When they say 'Muricans don't do irony, some of them do it less than others. Fuck me its pathetic how far the culture warriors will go out of their way to erect a flashing neon "I'm a racist bell end terrified of diversity and am struggling not to show it" sign on their front lawn.

[Digby]

I'm happy to agree in many instances, such as the recent confusion between a taser and gun, highlight police can be far too quick for search for a violent solution. This latest shooting where someone was about to be assaulted is just a bad example of that, in this instance the officer can choose to protect the person attempting the stabbing or the person about to be the victim of the stabbing, both once such point of escalation has been reached isn't an option. And in that instance I think protecting the person about to become a victim is a reasonable call

[Puja]

I'm happy to agree in many instances, such as the recent confusion between a taser and gun, highlight police can be far too quick for search for a violent solution. This latest shooting where someone was about to be assaulted is just a bad example of that, in this instance the officer can choose to protect the person attempting the stabbing or the person about to be the victim of the stabbing, both once such point of escalation has been reached isn't an option. And in that instance I think protecting the person about to become a victim is a reasonable call

Frankly, I'm not sure I trust any initial information put out by the police after a shooting. The "young adult who had a gun in his hand" just recently who turned out to be an unarmed 13 year old boy who was running away springs to mind. Plus someone just shared this - the original police version of events in George Floyd's death:

Capture.jpg

Puja