Thought for the Day

[broncofan]

Here’s my thought for the day. we now have a saner President...but he lies almost as much as Trump did.

I haven't closely followed what Biden has said and I don't doubt he occasionally lies but it's hard for me to believe anyone in public life could come close.

Promising a vaccine in three months, saying the virus will disappear (over and over again), saying ballots were destroyed, saying they were shipped in. It got to the point where it wasn't even spin, it was an alternate universe. Typically when politicians lie it's to make their policies seem more effective and it's subtler.

I've followed Gaetz for a while and he's a complete doofus. I remember when he started sharing the pictures of Nestor. I don't think the tweets hurt him but I can't believe he thought tweeting about his situation would help.

[Jericho]

Yeah Jericho...the law had to catch up to what everyone was already doing. My neighborhood already has a constant skunky smell from it.lol. ........Oh , and I think Gaetz is definitely guilty. He was always a weird wolf. Remember when he said he had a young Hispanic son...that he’s not related to? I saw that interview with Tucker Tuesday...it was odd, to say the least.

Wait, whut?
But not related...Someone started early on his 3oz!

The weed situation over here's a joke, I don't think it'll ever be legal, or at least not until they figure out a way of taxing the are out of it!

[Stavros]

Two takeaways from the trial of Derek Chauvin -

1) how common are fake banknotes in the US, has anyone ever handled one?

2) I would argue that if a suspect has been taking drugs, by prescrption or from another source, the suspect is more vulnerable to a potentially morbid incident if handled in the manner in which Chauvin is alleged to have done, so I don't think the defence can claim 'it was the fentanyl that killed him' or whatever drug/drugs they cite. In fact they should have led Floyd go and told him to appear at the station the next day or they would come get him -I mean, all that aggro for a $20 bill?

[fred41]

Once I suspect he’s a possible EDP and/or on drugs (especially with the Fentanyl problem in the States)..I would’ve called for an EMT bus. George Floyd was clearly a big strong guy, but the hardest part is usually getting the handcuffs on...but they had already accomplished that. They could’ve rolled him on his side..with handcuffs on and both legs on the ground, he would’ve been easy enough to control, because he wouldn’t have any leverage. If I was already familiar with him, then I would’ve changed tactics slightly according to what I would then already know about him, but if you let him drive off, as a possible EDP or on drugs or both..then it would be irresponsible to just let him drive off (a caller had described him as “awfully drunk and not in control of himself).

[fred41]

I haven’t watched the trial, just the reports and the footage.

[Stavros]

Once I suspect he’s a possible EDP and/or on drugs (especially with the Fentanyl problem in the States)..I would’ve called for an EMT bus. George Floyd was clearly a big strong guy, but the hardest part is usually getting the handcuffs on...but they had already accomplished that. They could’ve rolled him on his side..with handcuffs on and both legs on the ground, he would’ve been easy enough to control, because he wouldn’t have any leverage. If I was already familiar with him, then I would’ve changed tactics slightly according to what I would then already know about him, but if you let him drive off, as a possible EDP or on drugs or both..then it would be irresponsible to just let him drive off (a caller had described him as “awfully drunk and not in control of himself).

Good points Fred, especially on the car which I had not thought of. It seems to be that training is a major issue in this and other cases, not just the placing of a knee on the neck, but more broadly. I came across some footage of a five-year old being handcuffed and then taken back into the school he had walked out of owing to some incident with a computer, but the officer sceaming at the boy is clearly in need of anger management training or something to overhaul her attitude to children and 'suspects'. I mean, a five year old!
https://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news...d-109200965560

I would like to say our policemen are wonderful, but they ain't. There was the gruesome case of two officers who took selfies next to the dead bodies of two women murdered in a London park, and there have been no successful prosecutions of police officers following a death in custody since 1971. There is one case outstanding (the death of Dalian Atikinson) that has not been tried owing to the delays caused by Covid. So bad policing is not unique to the US.

Wembly Park murders-
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-53198702

Overview of police prosecutions in the UK-
https://fullfact.org/crime/prosecuti...olice-custody/

[Stavros]

"This morning, Buckingham Palace confirmed the news Prince Philip had died at the age of 99.
Broadcasters have halted their scheduled programming in order to air tributes, including a statement from the Prime Minister Boris Johnson."

-As a result, the final of Masterchef will not be shown in BBC1 tonight. This change to the scheduling is outrageous, because Prince Phillip was not an important person. I would understand it if the Queen, as Head of State, were the one who died and they had saturation coverage of the event, but to deprive me of one of the few TV programmes I watch is disgraceful and undemocratic and proves the lies you read in the Telegraph that the BBC is a 'woke' radical left organization.

It is also a good year with three very good cooks in the frame. I am rooting for Alexina Anatole who has made some delicious looking plates of food, which is of greater importance to me than a 99-year old who bedded a Princess who became Queen producing four children, two of whom are either bonkers or crooked, a third so irrelevant most people in the country cannot remember his name or list a single thing he has done. The daugher likes horses and supports Scotland when it plays Rugby Union. I prefer perectly made croissants, lobster mousse, and someone who knows how to cook a rack of lamb so it can actually be eaten and washed down with a robust Burgundy. Let's get some priorities in order here!

[Stavros]

Hmm Tucker Carlson -I don't know a lot about him but read these stories, which presumably conform to the Murdoch view that rude, insulting, racist language and reporting is better at making the news, rather than reporting what is actually happening Anyway, this latest rant begs the question -rather than claim that he is being 'replaced' by "more obedient voters from the Third World", maybe he can explain why, if it is true, new immigrants to the USA don't vote Republican? And, more to the point, maybe he should ask if the problem is w ith a Democratic Party with magic powers of coercion, or the party he supports that is viewed by new immigrants as irrelevant to their needs and interests?

Thus-
"“Everyone wants to make a racial issue out of it,” he said. “No, no, no. This is a voting rights question. I have less political power because they’re importing a brand new electorate. Why should I sit back and take that?”"
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/antisemiti...214904963.html


-No, spud, spend your time persuading them to change their vote to match yours. Or does that take too much effort?

[filghy2]

"“Everyone wants to make a racial issue out of it,” he said. “No, no, no. This is a voting rights question. I have less political power because they’re importing a brand new electorate. Why should I sit back and take that?”"

If it's not about the skin colour of immigrants then why is he objecting to something that's been happening since 1783? Is he unaware that the USA was built on immigration? Does he think the population should have been held constant to avoid diluting the political power of existing voters?

[Stavros]

I think the US is heading for a crisis in regard to the changes to voting that may become law in many states, with the Supreme Court asked to make a judgment -but will it do so or refer these matters back to the State, or support the changes? It is when Carlson talks about 'obedient voters' that one wonders what his intentions are.

Most immigrants tend to be conservative, they want to make their own way in the US -or the UK or Australia- and don't want state handouts or look for a life on welfare. It has long been one of the standard allegations made by people like Farage that asylum seekers arrive and get put up in nice hotels, or are given apartments and benefits, which is rubbish, or that migrant workers from the EU were living on benefits when most were not.

It suits the narrative that 'our country is being taken away from us' and that it is 'the left' and 'the Liberals' who are responsible, when the fact in the US is that the Republican Party has made itself hostile to what ought to be one of its most loyal constituencies, as Florida and its Cuban-American voters suggest, though there is a historical twist to that. In the UK and parts of Europe, the left in the form of Socialist and Social Democrtic parties has been losing votes, in spite of the 'austere' policies that have created the feeling the working class and even the middle cass have been 'left behind', as they were also implemented in the US, so the comparison reveals the stark differences among Conservatives.

But as I have suggested before, I am not sure that the current 'leadership' in the GOP whether that is Trump or the various Governors and Congressional reps are in fact Conservatives. Much as in the UK the language and policies of the neo-Nazi National Front were considered unacceptable in the 1970s, they are now common currency in the Government of Boris Johnson as they were in Farage's UKIP. And 'race' plays a more significant role in shaping US politics than in the UK, not that we are immune to its evils. And to think I thought a decade or so ago that we had moved on from the brainless nationalism that agitated the 'right', only to see it's vengeance in action today.