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There's a lot that I like about Libertarians (one example is how they're against Federal Government control of everything) but oftentimes, they are a bit too close to Anarchy for me LoL.Quote:
Originally Posted by fred41
But if you're a Democrat or Republican, I'd say talk to a Libertarian so they can point out the bullshit within your own respective party.
I hear you, but I believe there are Libertarians on both right and left fields. Right now I’m an Independent voter out of honesty. I may have to say “Fuck that” though, because in order to vote locally, I need to be able to vote in the Democratic primaries. So I may have to switch to Democrat out of expediency.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFanti
Also from what I can tell, Julian Castro didn't poll too well in the Hispanic community either.Quote:
Originally Posted by fred41
Stavros: Regarding "the trained Marxist" thing:
http://nypost.com/2020/06/25/blm-co-...ained-marxist/
I'll just put this here...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFpaG_bvFZM
Facts!!!Quote:
Originally Posted by blackchubby38
Exactly why I ceased having fact based discussion with Stavros - he doesn't want to hear the truth.
He's loved in Texas....maybe not nationwide, but here in Texas both he and his brother are the "golden children"....Quote:
Originally Posted by blackchubby38
We don't have fact based discussions because your attachment to the truth is often elusive, and you don't think beyond the narrow perspective your libertarian ideas have boxed you into. For all your critiques of BLM, Obama, etc, you have offered not one policy alternative that I can think of, or any options to deal with the way in which the concept of race has saturated American life since Jamestown, to echo Hughes, that most perceptive of Americans.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFanti
Blackchubby38, thanks for the link, which gives me a better perspective but does not alter my view that BLM can organize around specific campaigns -statues and name-changing being two that are 'on trend'- but that as an organization it cannot make any major structural changes over the long term, and in any case, just as there are 16 BLM 'Chapters' in the US (there are at least four separate BLM groups in the UK) Marxists have a chronic tendency to fall out among themselves, so other than the demonstrations based around the topics mentioned above, they may be a nuisance to nocturnal diners in Texas and Americans going about their daily work -if they have any- I don't see BLM having the impact they think they will have.Quote:
Originally Posted by blackchubby38
One of the difficuties so-called 'Trained Marxists' of the kind that you find with Patrice Cullors have, is that their fixation with the 'superstructure' means they actually rarely offer a Marxian critique of contemporary capitalism with regard to the means of production and how it shapes the social relations of production -they are interested in the social bit, but have little regard for the economics, other than some platitudes about wages and profits.
It is also the case in the US that they have a problem which their European comrades do not. On the one hand, they must tactically endorse the Revolution of 1776 because it was a Revolution, and what's not to like about that? It is tactical, because it was not a Socialist Revolution, just as Marxists in Europe endorse the French Revolution for what it was, while using the way in which it developed to maintain their fidelity to Marx as the man who offered the justification for Revolution in the changed circumstances of the 19th century.
But even here they have a problem, because Marx endorsed with enthusiasm the formation of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) in 1878, thereby endorsing what became known as the 'Parliamentary Road to Socialism' -integrating Marxists into a Bourgeois system of government that they were supposed to overthrow by leading the Proletariat in the revolutionary transformation of Germany. Ironically or not, by 1914 the SPD had become so absorbed by Bourgeois politics it voted for the war credits that enabled the Empire to go to war with both France and Russia, sealing its fate, though this was not the intention of Ebert at the time. Not for the first or the last time, Marxists in 1914 were unable to disentangle their need to maintain their links with 'the people' with the State and Nationalism, two emerging sources of social power in the 19th century that Marx did not consider important in themselves, merely as tools of the 'ruling class'. Nationalism in particular has been the nemesis of Marxists and Communists since 1914, as the fate of both the USSR and China has shown.
And in America, some of the most bitter and resentful critics of Saul Alinsky were the Marxists who argued his successful campaigns had 'merely' integrated previously under-representated Black citizens of Chicago into the very City administration that 'oppressed' them -so what do they think they can achieve with BLM that is going to actually be revolutionary? Very little, I suspect, but that's the problem of Race, which runs through American like its blood.
Now consider another American dilemma- the tactical endorsement of the Revolution is made as part of an evolving economy which, passing through various stages, has used slavery and market capitalism to mainain its exploitation and oppression of Americans in an unjust system that cannot be reformed. But, because of the emphasis that people like Cullors put on culture, what now appears to be an opportunity to revisit American's Liberal Revolution, poses major problems for their attempt to recruit a new cohort of 'Comrades' into the longer term attempt to transform America.
This is because -and this is just my take on it- Americans revere Washington, Jeffrson, Lincolm et al, for their justification of, and organized revolution against the Crown and British America and in Lincoln's case, against slavery. That the founders owned slaves was never part of the argument, it was a Liberal Revoution and one that privileged White Americans of European ancestry, true, but that also was not controversial until I think Charles Beard challenged the narratives of American history that had prevailed until his pioneering work in the early 20th century. In addition, surely Marxists must argue that Lincoln only liberated slaves so that they could be re-enslaved by capitalism -we are all, after all, wage-slaves under market condtions-and thus form a comradeship with the Libertarians who must also condemn Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln for betraying the Revolution by imposing on the American people a regime based on the wickedness of Taxation, and the Evil known as Government.
Thus, while I think many Americans are not afraid of reviewing their history and asking hard questions about the Statues and the Names of buldings, easly taken away and changed, I think it is a win-lose campaign for BLM rather than a win-win.
Yes, there is little to justify statues that revere the anti-American Confederates, there are strong arguments for re-naming buildings adornned with Woodrow Wilson; I am not so sure about Washington or Jefferson. Andrew Jackson and Martin van Buren were instrumental in the creaton of the Trail of Tears, but if genocidal violence is to be the measure of American men, then the entire history of the Continental Americas must not only be re-examined, it asks too much of the American people, because immigration and violence are two of the most fundamental forces that have shaped the country, but what a 'Marxist' narrative offers is a grim procession of failure to adhere to 21st century demands that offers nothing positive in its place, and robs that history of its context.
Critics will argue that Marxists in power have a bad habit of re-writing history, but right now, they are not the only ones at it, and while I am sure BLM will make a nuisance of themselves, and particulary those Black Americans who can say with honesty 'not in my name' (on which I agree with Mr Fanti), the real threat to the USA internally, as I have pointed out, does not come from a small groups of agitated BLM supporters, whatever their colour or credentials, but from the organized zealots of what is oddly known as Conservative America, institutionalized in the Federalist Society -an unelected body which has more real power than BLM- with its supporters in Congress and the White House, using the same radical campaign tactics of 'the left' to systematically unpick every advance made in the USA since 1965- except of course the Federalists/Conservatives are themselves re-interpreting history to correct its 'mistakes'...
But, in a polarized country like the USA, if you don't want BLM on this side, or the Federalist Society on the other, what does the Middle Way offer, given the extent to which Covid 19 has buggered your economy and exposed the rank incompetence of Mayors, Governors and indeed, the President--? It is always interesting, if for many peope tedious to constantly re-visit history, or read my posts, just as most Americans are worried about their jobs, housing, health care and education.
While getting into a lather over BLM, I think you are missing the bigger picture which to me is a blur, when for once, you might need a Blair?
More DANGEROUS than Law Enforcement - Black On Black crimes and homicide...(Yes this is a truth NOT reported by the mainstream Democratic dominated media)
And what some within the Black Community believe SHOULD BE INCLUDED within the "BLM" movement....(I.E, we have to clean the crap out of our own house first...)
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...NgX8yZw9B0x1QQ
So what do you propose should be done? And why do you present this as an either/or choice, as if nothing can or should be done about police violence until other issues affecting blacks are addressed? That sounds like the same basic logical error as your infamous alcohol vs gun deaths argument.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFanti
As Stavros noted, your posts always seem very short on solutions - and very long on diverting attention from issues you don't like because they are championed by "the left".
I was going to say "logically equivalent" but there is one difference. When people use "Black on Black" crime as a way to divert from other issues it's more than a diversion. They're often saying the Black community doesn't deserve protections from civil rights violations because there is some level of guilt borne by the community as a whole.Quote:
Originally Posted by filghy2
So the logic is often, "how can THEY complain about y when THEY are also doing x." But who is they? The logic breaks down as soon as you ask this question. Individuals who commit crimes aren't a justification for police brutality against individuals who haven't committed crimes....or even police brutality against those who've committed crimes. Police brutality is always wrong!
Note: I quit debating with filghy2 because that individual doesn't want to see the truth either, and instead resorts to "logical error".....
No need for me to waste my time anymore....
And for clarification in case filghy2 missed it, I am an American Black male...
Who are these "people" that you're referring to?Quote:
Originally Posted by broncofan
I've already shown that within my Black American community, we are divided on "BLM".....And we're no in unison as the mainstream Democratic media portrays us to be....
That being said, I believe I understand your response here...
I'm going to make the assumption that "filghy2" is not a Black American, otherwise he/she would have some clue about what I've been talking about within this thread....
Here's another interesting perspective from within my divided Black American community....
A group called 'Black Guns Matter' is teaching Black Americans how to use firearms
https://www.yahoo.com/news/group-cal...180300856.html
Additional Clarification:
One thing that Black America IS united on is that we are getting tired of White America (regardless of where they stand politically) thinking that they know what's best for us. Black America is finally beginning to think and do for ourselves instead of having White America doing this. And the Democrats are getting a rude awakening to this.... (see below).
BET founder Robert Johnson urges Black Lives Matter to form its own independent political party
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/23/robert-johnson-urges-black-lives-matter-to-form-a-political-party.html
Seriously dude, you don't have to keep reminding people that you're black.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFanti
Noted.Quote:
Originally Posted by blackchubby38
What are you you suggesting - that because you are an American black male nobody else is entitled to question anything you say on these subjects? I never claim to speak for anyone but myself, and I think that applies equally to you.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFanti
You can't quit debating people because you've never really tried it. The problem is not that you have a different opinion. The problem is that you belabour the same points ad nauseum (eg "mainstream Democrat media") and refuse to engage with other peoples' responses. That makes for very tedious discussion.
Incidentally, this thread is about the coming US elections so can we please get back to the topic? If you want to keep posting about BLM-related issues you should really start another thread.
According to exit polls, black votes in the 2016 election were 88% for Clinton, 8% for Trump and 4% for others.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_U...ntial_election
I think that tells you how representative Fanti and the fellow libertarians he cites are.
140 Seconds of facts NOT reported by the Mainstream Media...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjXAACwR8h8
So basically the same stuff you already said but some dude shouting it on a YouTube video.
Zing!Quote:
Originally Posted by broncofan
You missed the point!
In your own words tell us the point. It looks like you just posted a video of some random person saying a lot of the stuff you already said. Are the arguments more convincing because he made them? Are they more convincing because of the way he said them?Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFanti
Nobody is suppressing this viewpoint. It's just not all that compelling for reasons others have spelled out on the last couple of pages.
I wonder, with the President's poll ratings falling, is this Biden's election to lose? Through complacency rather than a gaffe, or even the choice of VP?
And, if the US does not get itself sorted by November, can the election take place? It seems incredible to me that an open-air convention in Florida in August can go ahead, but what are the practical implications if even by November so many people are still ill and confined to home? Are the majority of affected people in the South elderly white, dare one say, 'Republican' voters?
Then there are the polling machines that don't work, the legal challenge over the Poll Tax in Florida, etc et-
And what about the result in these conditions? I am probably thinking the worst, but there are reasoons for this....
Yes, back to the topic. It seems that there is a potential mechanism through which Trump could steal the election with a thin veneer of legality if Republican-controlled legislatures in some states refuse to certify the outcome. https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...crat-landslide
I wonder how likely this is, though I'm sure Trump would not baulk at it. If Republicans lose the battleground states then defying the will of the people does not sound like a way to win them back. One would hope that enough Republicans would realise that risking future disaster to allow an unpopular President to cling to office would not be a good move. Still, that sort of logic has not worked well over the past 4 years.
You Americans might need to resort to people power and take to the streets en masse to get rid of this guy.
I think you are pointing in the right direction, filghy2, with this irony: the extent to which this President already questions the ways in which Americans vote, even if designed to claim he is being cheated out of a win here and there, does actually beg the questions about the mechanisms by which Americans vote, indeed, who even is permitted to vote. Why does voting differ so much from one State to another? Why do some States allow people with convictions to vote, but not in others? Given that voting is a fundamental right, should it not be organized Federally by an Independent Federal Commission that designes, manages and reports the results of elections? It shoud undermine claims of voter fraud, even though this is rare in US elections.
And if as Freedland argues, Biden gets a landslide, will this not be so impossible as to be fake? This is a President who never loses, so how is he going to act this time if he does? Probably by crying foul. It still looks to me like the messiest election in the US in my lifetime.
Although I have no faith in the polls, it is exactly Biden's election to lose. Some of it could be to his own doing. I would say in this order:Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
1. His VP pick
2. Complacency
3. Over confidence
4. A gaffe
He can also lose the election if people don't like the direction the country is going in come November. In the wake of George Floyd's murder and the protests/riots, there has been a rise in violent crime and it seems that Democratic leaders don't want address the issue for fear of alienating their base. Or if they do address it, they come up with a bunch of other reasons for the spike.
If enough of the independents and/moderates get fed up, they maybe willing to accept 4 more years of Trump because of the law and order issue.
If there are people that would vote for someone who has committed at least a half dozen impeachable acts, has engaged in financial corruption, and commuted the sentence of a felon who lied to protect him it is not because they're concerned about law and order. It's because they only want some people to be able to break the law. All sorts of crazy things can happen but this will be a tough election to argue both sides are equally bad given that only one side has decided to do away with our constitutional form of government.Quote:
Originally Posted by blackchubby38
Black Americans are finally showing the Democrats that Democrats can no longer use, abuse, and take advantage of the Black vote!!
Black Americans Have a Message for Democrats: Not Being Trump Is Not Enough
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/31/u...ats-trump.html
Exactly!Quote:
Originally Posted by blackchubby38
Hillary was favored in every single poll......
Correct again!Quote:
Originally Posted by blackchubby38
"Broncofan",
Your bias never ceases to amaze me!
You give me a "thumbs down" for quoting something from someone else but do not give the ORIGINAL POSTER a "thumbs down"
LMAO!!!!!
I amaze myself sometimes. The original post was fine. I don't agree with every point, but at least it was a view. You posted three times without saying anything.Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFanti
First, the same argument about how not every Black person likes the Democratic party. Fine, but your political views are still not that well represented within the Black community. Posting a two month old article doesn't change that. And btw, everyone agrees that you're entitled to your views....that doesn't mean those views are all that common.
Then two more posts just to say you agree with someone. Since when does a post need your pronouncement that it's correct? Like the post and write something of your own for the love of all things holy. Not a big deal but the cheerleading is annoying. Should I just quote you from now on and say "incorrect!" every time I disagree. I figured it was just easier to dislike your post. Have a good evening!
No dispute from me, given I live in a normal country that has such a system. It's beyond belief to me that a democracy would have a system where the parties competing in the election run the voting process - as well as relying on the losing party being willing to certify that it lost. That looks like a powder keg just waiting to explode and the November election could be the spark that does it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stavros
This recent article suggests that overall violent crime is actually down on last year, though murders are up. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/06/u...ronavirus.htmlQuote:
Originally Posted by blackchubby38
If there has been an increase, why do you attribute it to the protests rather than the economic downturn and lockdowns caused by the coronavirus?
The US is about the most heavily-policed developed country in the world, yet it also has the highest rates of violent crime. Doesn't that suggest that more law and order can't be a sufficient solution - that there also has to be a focus on the underlying economic and social factors?
The only outlandish and dangerous idea I've heard from some Democrats is the suggestion that police be de-funded. It doesn't have mainstream support and is not anything close to part of Joe Biden's platform. Most policing is done locally as police forces are enforcing state law.
When I hear a crazy idea from the left I generally assume it will not be represented in a Biden administration. When I hear a crazy comment from someone on the right, I not only think Trump will have surrogates who agree with it, but he will never clearly denounce the bad idea if it comes from someone who flatters him.
If someone wants to vote for Trump over Biden I assume they were looking for an excuse to all along. Biden could not more clearly represent a return to normalcy; respect for rule of law, respect for experts, and respect for constitutional norms. No more threatening retribution on people doing their jobs, no more threatening political opponents with prosecution, no more intervening on behalf of friends, no more financial self-dealing, no more threatening war on twitter, and no more threatening war crimes like he did with Iran.
I honestly think Biden should be the ideal candidate for moderates and independents given the fact that he's been around forever and is pragmatic. You can always cherrypick something scary about something in certain parts of the left but you're talking about total entrenchment of that extremism on the right...
I didn't mean to make it sound like the protests were the cause of the spike in violent crime. Just saying what's been happening since then. Here in NYC there has been a rise in shootings and murder when you compare that stats to last year.Quote:
Originally Posted by filghy2
Through July 12, the city has recorded 634 shootings compared to 394 for the same period last year, a 60% increase. There have been 203 murders so far in 2020, a 23% jump compared to same time period in 2019, when the city recorded 165 killings.
I don't think the economic downturn isn't the only reason why that has happened.
The state recently passed a bail reform law and even before the pandemic there was evidence that it wasn't working. There are people who are out on the streets that just shouldn't be. You combine that with an economic downturn, a pandemic and shitty leadership on the local level, then the people who these reforms are supposed to help are usually the ones who wind up getting hurt in the end.
While you can focus on underlying economic and social factors, you still need smart and effective policing to combat crime.
http:////www.cnn.com/2020/07/18/us/n...ers/index.html
A good point, but not relevant to this thread is the reserve power of the Governor-General, partly due to the recent release of Sir John Kerr's justification for sacking Gough Whitlam (an act that trashed the Labour Party yet led to the reforms that enabled Bob Hawke to take command by the end of the decade)- I wonder, is it because the Queen remains Head of State in Australia that the Governor-General retains 'reserve powers', and, if Austalia were to become a Republic, would a President have the same powers?Quote:
Originally Posted by filghy2
And the polls were right! She won nearly 3 million more votes than her rival for the White House. Clinton lost the Electoral College, with the smallest of margins in what, four States?Quote:
Originally Posted by MrFanti
Look, Mr Fanti, nobody here disagrees with you, that there is a diversity of politics among Black Americans, and I think most of us can agree that for years the Democrats have taken 'the Black Vote' for granted.
But so too has the Republican Party, or are you telling me that the strenuous efforts made to remove Black people from the electoral register in Republican run States, to impose financial conditions on registering to vote for ex-convicts, to closing polling stations on election day in primarily Black areas, is 'simple racism', ie- because the people are Black? Or is it because the Republicans also assume all Black people in, say, the Carolinas vote Democrat?
I would prefer, too, a more important analysis of the structural issues involved here- how, over the 100 years after 'Juneteenth', there was a significant geographical shift among Black Americans, from rural areas to urban areas, and how this was motivated by the availability of jobs -partcularly in Los Angeles, which, as Mike Davis argued in City of Quartz (1990) was originally estabished as a community of White Christians fleeing the North-West to get away from the Blacks and the Jews, with the added intention to shut them out of their Shangri-La, at which they failed (having dismissed the film industry as a waste of time and money, they left it to the Jews they despised on the basis they would fail -ha-ha on that one!).
Is it the case that the importance of Black Americans as industrial workers (auto in Michigan, aerospace in California) condemned them to become the 'urban poor' when automation and re-structuring between 1960-2000 shredded the jobs they once had? They became ripe for the welfare system that Murray and others has argued has undermined 'the Black family', (important to create a 'unique' problem) to which one adds the desperate effect narcotics has had on Black Urban America, with the additional availabiity of guns -though one notes, pace Chicago, that the phenomenal rate of drug-related crime and murder in Washington DC in the 1980s and 1990s has since declined , and why is that?
There is a fascinating profile in today's paper of that exquisite actor, Alfre Woodard, due to the release of the film Clemency. In it, she not only points out her great-grandfather was born into slavery, that-
"...he showed up in records as ‘property’ when he was eight years old” – but that after emancipation he went on to be a landowner with his own acres. “There was a period of reconstruction right after the proclamation. These people had only the rags on their backs, but they got out there and did it for themselves,” Woodard says. “That story rarely gets told, but what a great lesson it would make. We had more black representation in the legislature in that period, before lynching and the Jim Crow laws, than we had up until about a decade ago.” (my underlinings)
https://www.theguardian.com/film/202...-film-clemency
The key point is that Black people not only had the ability, then as now, to make something of their lives without welfare or affirmative action, but that many of the wider advances, in voting rights and crucially, access to senior offices in the US Government -were then taken away from Black people, not because they were not good at being Postmaster General or civil servants, but because they were Black. Yet for some, this reinforced their need for self-reliance, so that, as Woodard says of the Tulsa community in which she was raised-
"Ironically, partly because of segregation the community she grew up in was incredibly vibrant, she says. “Everyone lived together – doctors, lawyers, ballerinas, pole dancers. You could go to the well-off white part of town, but not to the white working-class areas. The butting of heads was between well-off black people and working-class whites. Classism was as important as racism in some ways.”
Here is the point: what does a man or woman do if they are not Doctors, Lawyers or Ballerinas? What if their standard of education is lower, less well-funded than their parents? Clearly some continue to do well, but we always come back to this unknown factor in Libertarian arguments, that if you take away welfare, former dependents will get jobs, that markets and individuals provide- what happens to the losers? Those who fail? Some fail through personal inadequacy, that is true of all segments of society, but suppose failure is the consequence of poverty at every level, in terms of income, and mentality? And, have Black Americans, rural or urban been most disadvantaged, and since when?
These issues -poverty, urban violence + drugs + gangs cannot be dismissed as something to do with 'race' -surely it is embedded in the complications of the way the USA experiences capitalism, the distribution of work, as well as the distrbution of income? After all, the majority of White Americans are not Doctors, Lawyers or Ballerinas too.