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Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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Coming up with the perfect title Sometimes when doing a blog post, the hardest bit is coming up with the most appropriate title. This one had me LOL’ing 😀
I Felt A Great Disturbance In The Narrative
Note, this is about the art of blogging rather than some civil disturbance in the USA, about which I really have no opinion beyond saying I am against US-style paramilitary policing. But I also think burning down local businesses because you are pissed off with the state indicates an advanced state of communal derangement. But have I have seen no reliable information that moves me to stick my oar in the water at any length about this particular bit of local nastiness.
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“But I also think burning down local businesses because you are pissed off with the state indicates an advanced state of communal derangement.”
– – –
When the various pissed-off peoples of our country burn things down, we send them money.
Knowing this, it would be deranged for them to NOT periodically burn things down.
(Of course, the sending of the money is itself deranged.)
As with so many other situations involving racial flammability, just about everything initially reported regarding this incident was either wrong or grossly incomplete.
Just for a start, the supposedly mild-mannered youth who ended up shot for absolutely no reason was apparently involved in a convenience store robbery a few minutes before in which he subjected an elderly store clerk to some pretty rough handling.
Was the officer justified? Very sketchy information, but enough rumor and claims of police murder to enrage the minority community, and result in some serious disorder.
The handling of the disturbances is already the subject of further complaints and charges, with plenty of video and outside commentary to further aggravate an already volatile situation.
Isn’t it handy how some random incident somewhere in the country can always be found to distract the media and populace from all that boring stuff happening here and there in the world, with some group killing a bunch from some other group and blah, blah, blah.
So much more interesting to find a cop who did, or didn’t, so something wrong, with lots of yummy video of stuff burning and people looting and confrontations and stuff.
Another generations long democratic-ruled city with simmering social tensions and possible police misbehavior.
Gee, where have we seen that before?
bobby b and veryretired have it correct.
Since the reaction to the Watts Riots in 1965 (the great wall of lies about this event, in the history texts and so on, is extreme – in reality Police Chief Parker was not corrupt [he fought against corruption] and was the man who introduced black officers into the LAPD, although his decision to reduce foot patrols and go over to cars was a classic post WWII blunder – it meant that officers got cut off from the streets) led by the L.A. Times newspaper and the education system that produces the “mainstream media” (and much else).
The reaction was ever more government spending – with the various government programs being in the hands of the very Cloward and Piven style Marxists who were PUSHING the burn-baby-burn message on the streets (the Community Organisers).
President Johnson himself was a corrupt social democrat (like Governor Brown in California) others were high minded new “liberals” (like the Mayor of Detroit – the “model city” of the left, till it exploded in 1967).
But the people on the ground (the Community Organisers and so on) were Marxists.
What has now changed is that these people have worked their way up (over generations) in the system.
As Saul Alinsky was fond of pointing out – real Revolutionaries do not take up radical poses, real Revolutionaries “cut their hair, put on a suit, and infiltrate the system”.
Although some Comrades in Chicago still question the sincerity of Comrade Michelle and Comrade Barack (even though Comrade Barack was actually born into the movement – a “Red Diaper Baby”) – claiming that Comrade Michelle and Comrade Barack have sticky fingers (are a little too concerned for their personal, corrupt, profit and comfort – rather than selflessly working for “the cause” every minute of the day).
What can be done with a population which holds people like Barack Obama, J. Jackson and Al Sharpton to be hero figures?
A population that has been taught for (many decades) to look to the government for all their material needs – whilst (at the same time) taught to hate the police (and so on).
Nothing can be done.
Nothing at all.
Take the town of Ferguson.
It is now 85% black. Not 1940s blacks or 1950s blacks – but modern ones. It is not a matter of genetics – it is matter of culture (education system and media produced “culture” the culture of government dependency).
These people have a right (under any normal idea of democracy) to run the town as they see fit. The white Mayor is a hangover from the old “demographics” of Ferguson – and he (like the State Governor) is a Democrat, who has not got a clue about reducing welfare dependency and so on (in fact he most likely thinks it is good thing – hoping the dependents vote for him).
That (just telling people to pack up and leave the town to the activists) may offend libertarian rights theory – but it is the practical truth. No reform of Ferguson is going to happen – just more welfare and so on.
So people who do not like the way the “black community” (or rather the activists – any community is led by a small minority of leaders) want to run Ferguson should LEAVE.
Let the “community” control the town as they see fit – but do NOT subsidise them (no “food stamps” or anything like that).
Over time (I believe) that most black people would see that the rule of the activists had failed (the starvation might be a good clue) and would turn on them (and get more sensible leadership).
After all there is no “racial” reason why blacks should be socialist – most American blacks were conservative as recently as the 1950s.
Brainwashing can be countered by bitter experience.
So no more “police brutality” – indeed no more white police (or store keepers – or any colour) at all.
Just leave “the community” to sort themselves out – with no subsidies of any kind.
Eventually (I believe) they would sort themselves out.
And even if they do not – it is nothing that outsiders are going to fix.
Go in there with tanks and what-not – what are you going to do?
Nothing really – hang about (in the tanks) till you get bored, then leave (and things go back to economic decline and the rise of dependency).
“Paul this sounds like your non interventionist view of Iraq under Saddam”.
It is.
I accept that Saddam was a total swine (and an enemy) – but I tend to think he was a fairly typical Iraqi, so getting rid of him was not going to improve matters.
Ditto with American places such as Ferguson.
They will even sort themselves out – or they will not.
They can not really be helped from outside.
None of the new info alters the fact of cop thuggery in the US.
Thus:https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ziK1Z1Kpec8
The video verbally complains about police violence against blacks– but
to my eyes there seem to be just as many white people (if not more)
getting the shit kicked out of them by costumed thugs.
Obama often seems to feel the need to stick his oar in over “black issues”, and it is usually far from helpful. I guess he feels the need to play to his base.
Anyone that would assume that a kid shot by police is innocent simply because he is black is just as much of a racist as a person who would assume he is guilty because he is black. As more facts become available it is looking increasingly like this kid was both a thug and a criminal. That still doesn’t mean his shooting was justified, but it nudges the balance of probabilities that way.
Some would say it was because he was “unarmed”, but that doesn’t mean deadly force was unjustified. Trayvon was “armed with the sidewalk”, and the court ultimately found against him in a deadly force hearing. It also doesn’t explain why there is only one “community” involved in the protests and riots.
As far as I can tell (and I’m choosing my words carefully here) many black Americans (Obama included) appear to be honest-to-goodness racists. It is an overused word, but here it is accurate. They have a problem with black men being shot/arrested/searched/fired by white people in exactly the same way that Jim Crow rednecks had a problem with white people being attacked/accused by/talked to/replaced in favour of black people – in both cases conclusions are jumped to before the merits of the individual case becomes apparent.
I’ve never known a Kurd who thinks we were better off under Saddam than we are now. What does a “fairly typical Iraqi” look like?
For sure, but damn that was a great article title 😛
I am not an uncritical admirer of Mark Steyn these days but the article of his that I link to is dynamite. Much recommended.
Azadi Barzani, Paul can well speak for himself, but from where I sit, a ‘typical Iraqi’ is not a Kurd.
Here’s a piece from a criminal defence lawyer that speaks to attempts to shape the metacontext around such incidents.
other rob, I followed that link. The writer holds that at this point the tables have turned and the kid, formerly portrayed as the victim, is now being painted as an obvious perp who (more-or-less) deserved what he got. But I will say that it doesn’t strike me as being anywhere near as overheated, at least, as defenses of Trayvon Martin. Very interesting, thank you.
However. The guy thinks that his “fealty” is not to “the people,” and that it’s his job to “pander to racism and stupidity” if that’s what it takes to get the defendant off. I felt the necessity of Educating him. (Fools walk in …! 🙁 )
What it boils down to is that the D. lawyer is first and foremost an officer of the court and his “fealty” really is supposed to be to the truth (or as close to it as mere mortals can come) and to the impartial application of the law, so as to protect his client and, therefore, “the people” as well from the defendant’s unjust conviction.
For “the people” are not well served when the innocent are convicted.
His job isn’t to “tell the better story” nor yet to “get his client off.” It’s to see that untruthful statements are neither made nor insinuated by either side — with himself acting as watchdog against prosecutorial misrepresentations — and that laws are applied impartially, granting his client every means of honest pleading of innocence. “Telling the better story” ought to mean at most presenting a rational theory of events in which his client is not culpable.
It will be interesting to see if the comment passes moderation.
Paul,
“…claiming that Comrade Michelle and Comrade Barack have sticky fingers (are a little too concerned for their personal, corrupt, profit and comfort – rather than selflessly working for “the cause” every minute of the day).”
You don’t say! Apparently even some of the Comrades aren’t entirely witless!
I done tol’ ya and tol’ ya. Wants to be a cross between Robert Mugabe and Bruce Springsteen. AND, suffering from a permanent, irreparable Identity Crisis.
Clintons just as sticky-fingered and possibly more corrupt, in terms of personal worldly gain, but out of sheer worldly self-interest would in desperation probably put U.S. ahead of Marxism and even their own Acquisitive Instinct. Still think Bill knows which side has the butter. Has the instincts (and experience) of a successful con-man. Whereas the Sith seems more like a wind-up toy.
JMO, of course.
Paul, by any chance does that about Watts come from Cashill’s Hoodwinked? I don’t recall ever reading an analysis like that one, not even at the time. Don’t remember it from J. Goldberg’s book either. Nor from D. Horowitz.
All,
There is a very lengthy discussion of the perceived militarization of the cops going on at Eric Raymond’s site.
They are as of right now up to 227 comments. Y’all won’t even have to leave the house for entertainment this week.
http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=6160
And I will just note that Samizdatista William O. B’livion weighs in rather cogently in the discussion pursuant to Mr. Raymond’s posting. Repeat:
http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=6160