There’s no justice like angry mob justice

Posted on October 21, 2016 by hbreck

angry_mob_of_four

Some kids lose a game, and challenge their victorious opponents for a rematch. Some pout, take the ball, and go home. Some try to start a fight. And then there’s that big orange haired kid with the rich dad and the bad attitude. Near the end of a game of HORSE – down HORS to H – he declares that the girl who’s beating him is cheating, and that he’s gonna refuse to leave the court if she wins. He’ll sit on the ball under the basket and demand she admit defeat. And then all the other kids are wondering what to do if he does.

I have two quick points about Donald Trump suggesting he may not concede if he loses the election:

1. From a legal perspective, it doesn’t matter. Theoretically, he could tie things up in court with recounts for a while, but it would have to be on a state-by-state basis. And based on current projections (and where he stands in each state), there would have to be recounts in a lot of states to make any difference. This would require an extensive ground campaign apparatus (which he doesn’t have), and a lot of patience (which he doesn’t have). And of course, there is fairly recent legal precedent (albeit grossly flawed) for the Supreme Court to order a halt to recounts in much closer circumstances.

And if he doesn’t demand a recount, and just instead refuses to concede, then the process will proceed without him. The electors will meet, and cast their votes, and Hillary Clinton will be sworn in as the 45th president. All Trump would do in that circumstance is look like a jackass.

Except there’s a bit more to it. Which leads me to my second point.

2. His rhetoric isn’t legally dangerous as much as it is literally dangerous. Donald Trump has already incited violence among his supporters. He has made thinly veiled threats toward Hillary Clinton, suggesting both legal measures, as well as violent ones. Beyond the fact that all of his bombast is grossly disqualifying, it’s also theoretically hazardous to American lives.

Donald Trump has already planted that seed in the minds of many supporters. There have been more than one Trump voter who has stated in interviews that armed insurrection is not just possible, but just.

Trump constantly beats the drums of corruption, claiming over and over that the upcoming election will be “rigged.” This follows in the footsteps of his party, of which many have argued for years the largely debunked dangers of electoral fraud. And this not-so-subtle suggestion seems to have worked wonders. Millions of Americans are convinced the election is rigged in favor of Hillary Clinton. Never mind how unlikely and difficult that would be. Never mind the complete lack of historical precedent. Never mind the fact that recent polls show Trump trailing Clinton by a considerable margin.

If someone with some charisma repeats the same thing to a large enough crowd, eventually, some of them will believe it.

And many of them are already convinced that, any day now, Obama’s gonna take their guns.

Clock’s ticking on that one, fellas.

But the feelings are significant. And Trump stokes them well.

It has been argued that widespread violence isn’t likely to materialize. There are only so many people out there who are genuinely interested in bringing the Turner Diaries to life.

But it has happened. Remember Tim McVeigh?

It’s quite possible that Donald Trump has no interest in fomenting rebellion. A businessman with his hands in many industries doesn’t want the kind of instability caused by political violence. But as long as he keeps telling frightened, disillusioned, often-armed people that everything they believe in is threatened by a corrupt, criminally-inclined devil woman, the possibility exists of something stupid happening.

And if it does, at least part of the blame lies with the person riling up the masses.

Posted in Governance, immigration, Politics, Quick post, Rant | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Check your… societal dominance

Posted on October 18, 2016 by hbreck

From one straight white cis male to all the others… we need to have a little talk.

Here’s the thing. This country was literally built for you. For me. For us. The United States and its predecessor colonies existed for 400 plus years based entirely around our supremacy. Even when there were people like us who recognized this as a problem, it didn’t stop the way our society ran.

Now things are starting to change. Slowly, painfully, but they are definitely starting to change. We talk more about this than ever before. At this point, there’s still more talk than action, but at least we’re starting to comprehend the problem.

We need to acknowledge that from a societal standpoint, “straight white cis male” was considered the default position. That it was the textbook (literally) definition of “American.”

That was of course, what people do when they run everything. Everything defaults to them.

People are starting to realize this won’t work any longer.

Many straight white cis men understand that things need to change. Our culture, our social structure, our political structure, all need to represent… all of us. Not just the old default, but everyone. We’re all in this together. A realignment of our society is not an attack on straight white cis males. It doesn’t mean others are going to treat us the way we treated them, though one can understand the poetic irony in that occurring. It’s simply that we need to reset how we think. Guys, we aren’t the default any longer.

That’s where you have the old guard. Guys like Donald Trump. People who see the world around them changing, but in scary ways. They see people pushing for greater equality, greater access, an even playing field. And they see it as an attack. Too many of us (straight white cis men) are fearful of losing that default setting. The head start we get by virtue of being born… us. And when people are accustomed to having that societal advantage, they see attempts to bring about equality as oppression.

Which leads to obnoxious men who act like they’re an aggrieved party. They act like the world is against them. That attitude, by the way, is how one inadvertently sets the world against oneself.

Guys, please listen. This is from someone who knows. From one straight white cis male to all the others… it’s no longer all about us. And that’s a good thing. Women make up 51% of this country. People of color make up about 37%. The percentage of LGBT people has been harder to accurately measure, but we can safely lowball the figure at 10%, with room to grow. And yet, our system still makes it harder for all of these people to contribute. Is it right that women only make up a quarter of government officeholders? And people of color make up just 10%? Is that representative of who we are now?

We’ve gotten too comfortable with seeing a movie with 20% women characters and maybe one token black guy and thinking that it accurately represents our world.

Privilege isn’t an absence of problems. Privilege doesn’t mean that everything is handed to you. It doesn’t mean that someone with less privilege can’t achieve greater things than someone with more. It simply means that people don’t start out on an even social playing field. A blogger whom I admire described being a straight white male as playing life on the lowest difficulty setting.

That’s just about right.

Even when we don’t have it easy, we still have the easiest start. And the idea is not to make it harder for us. The idea is for all groups to be able to start on the same setting. Nobody is saying the cops should now start harassing white guys, or women should catcall men. We’re saying that cops shouldn’t harass anyone and nobody should make unwanted sexual advances on anyone else. This isn’t an attack on one group. This is about getting the one group to quit fighting the advancement of everyone else.

So back to my fellow straight white cis males:

If you have a problem with everyone being able to start at the same point, be treated the same way, get the same chances – then you’re part of the problem.

Don’t deny your privilege. Don’t act like you don’t have an automatic leg up on the rest of the world. Acknowledging it isn’t self-hatred. It’s simply the first step. Be aware of how you interact with others. Think about how you see the world around you. And understand there are many other legitimate points of view out there, each deserving of the same respect. And with each person, their perspective is their own default. They shouldn’t expect to see yours as their own default perspective. Try to be aware of that.

Posted in Quick post, Social Justice | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Donald Trump Cannot Be President… and here’s why.

Posted on October 10, 2016 by hbreck

operation_upshot-knothole_-_badger_001Originally I intended to write a simple article, based on my “Elected Yet Unelectable” series, highlighting (in normal prose form) specific moments and events that prove that Donald J. Trump is completely unelectable and unsuitable for any public office. The problem is that I started the article back in August 2015, and he not only remained in the race, but he won the Republican nomination! And now he is competitive with Hillary Clinton (albeit still somewhat behind) for the general election. And he kept up his horrible proposals, childish behavior, and near-constant lies and slander. A simple article/opinion piece would be out-of-date in weeks. So instead, I waited, and compiled information. This is going to be mostly in list format. A couple other sites have done something similar, but I want to go ahead and jump on the pile, since Trump needs and deserves as many voices opposing him as possible. As of October 2016, here is a list of the worst lies, attacks, falsehoods, bad ideas, flip-flops, and outright bigotry spoken, acted upon, and proposed by the Republican nominee for President of the United States. It is not a complete list, although I provide links to several others. Today, on the eve of the 2nd debate between Trump and Hillary Clinton, with just under a month remaining in the election season, there undoubtedly will be more ways Trump disgraces himself and the nation.

But as his campaign starts to fall apart, I would like to reiterate that Donald Trump cannot and should not be elected President of the United States. This piece is not a specific endorsement of any one candidate, though I will mention I plan to vote for Hillary Clinton, and was a supporter of Martin O’Malley, then Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primaries.

I’ve divided this piece into sections for easier reading. You can click on the below links to skip to a section, or just scroll on down.

HORRIBLE POLICY PROPOSALS

LIES

LIES ABOUT HIMSELF

LIES ABOUT POLICY

LIES ABOUT EVENTS

LIES ABOUT OTHERS

HORRIBLE STATEMENTS, IGNORANCE, ATTACKS, and SLANDER

RACISM AND BIGOTRY

TRUMP’S FAILURES

MISCELLANEOUS HISTORY

CRIME AND ACCUSATIONS OF CRIME

And here we go…

 

HORRIBLE POLICY PROPOSALS

* Trump promised to deport American citizens if their parents entered the country illegally. This is blatantly unconstitutional.

* Donald Trump has suggested he would use nuclear weapons in combating ISIS. It’s disturbing to see someone so enthusiastic about nuclear weapons when it’s been made abundantly clear he doesn’t remotely understand nuclear policy or even basic history surrounding nuclear weapons. He had no clue what Hugh Hewitt was referring to when he asked Trump about “the nuclear triad.”

* He also described his strategy toward them as “I would bomb the shit out of them. I would just bomb those suckers. And that’s right: I’d blow up the pipes, I’d blow up the refineries. I would blow up every single inch. There would be nothing left.” In the same rant, he claimed to “know more about ISIS than the generals do.”

* He has stated he endorses not just waterboarding but “stronger” torture methods. He claims that torture works, even though all evidence points to the contrary.

* He has stated he would order the military to carry out acts of torture, and claimed they wouldn’t refuse him.

* Along the war crimes theme, Trump advocated assassinating the families of terror suspects.

* Donald Trump has proposed to build a wall on the border of the United States and Mexico, lied about the cost, and claimed that he would somehow force Mexico to pay for it.

* He proposed creating a database to track Muslims in America.

* In a move that blatantly taunts Godwin’s Law, Trump has also suggested requiring a special ID for Muslims.

* Trump has called for a complete ban on Muslims entering the United States. This would end up requiring the registry mentioned above, in order to work. This would likely be ruled unconstitutional, which makes it all the more disturbing, even beyond the obvious bigotry. Speaking of which, this also would qualify under the “Racism and Bigotry” category.

* Trump even advocated “shutting down mosques.” A clear violation of the First Amendment.

*He has suggested drastically cutting the FDA, or “food police,” as he calls it. Not surprising that he hasn’t read Upton Sinclair.

* His first tax plan, back in September 2015, would have added 12 trillion dollars to the national debt over the next 10 years, based on massive cuts to the taxes of the wealthy.

His more recent revisions to that plan would be less costly, but would still result in nearly 6 trillion dollars of lost revenue from the current tax-and-spending rates. In addition, it would certainly add to issues of inequality that have been largely ignored by Republicans.

* Donald Trump has endorsed implementing a nationwide stop-and-frisk policy for police as a way to deal with crime in black neighborhoods. A heavy-handed policy that was in part responsible for the tensions between police and communities of color around the country. Also, it has been ruled unconstitutional.

* Donald Trump is on the anti-vaxxer bandwagon, claiming that “spacing” doses too closely will cause autism. This is untrue.

* Trump proposed changing libel laws to make it easier to sue media organizations.

In a a rather frightening example of his embrace of blatant authoritarianism, Trump has also implied punishing media outlets and individuals for criticizing him.

* Trump has refused to step away from any of his business ventures if he is elected President, despite the myriad conflicts of interest and ethical issues involved.

* Trump suggested women who have abortions should be punished, though he did eventually backtrack on that claim.

* Trump suggested defaulting on debts to avoid paying them.

 

LIES

Lies are rarely just lies. Lies can be (and often are) truly dangerous.

Here’s a good list to start things off, but let’s delve a little deeper into Trump’s issues with reality.

 

LIES ABOUT HIMSELF

* Trump has claimed that he wasn’t sure if guns were allowed at his hotels and golf courses, but that they should be. Then his organization claimed they were. Turns out, they aren’t.

* Trump claimed in October 2015 that his campaign was entirely self-funded. In actuality, it was less than half self-funded.

* Trump took credit for the Ford Motor Company moving a factory from Mexico to Ohio. Thing is, they planned the move in 2011, four years before Trump’s claim.

* In 1998, Donald Trump held a meeting with an official in Florida to try to ease restrictions on opening a casino there. Jeb Bush mentioned this in a GOP primary debate, and Trump flatly denied it. Documents prove otherwise.

* He lied repeatedly about his business ventures (primarily golf courses) in Scotland.

* Trump has claimed to have given “102 million dollars” to charity. Nobody has been able to locate an amount even close to that.

* Trump lied about donating a million dollars to veterans groups, and only ponied up the cash when shamed into doing so.

* Trump took credit for changes in NATO’s policies on combating terrorism. He had nothing to do with it.

* Herr Trump said that his financial disclosures make up for his lack of tax return disclosure, and that he has given a more extensive financial review than any other candidate. This is false.

* Trump claimed that Vladimir Putin called him “brilliant,” and a “genius.” Not quite.

* Trump claimed he never planned to “profile Muslims.” Links to his many statements otherwise can be found in this piece.

LIES ABOUT POLICY

* Donald Trump claimed that the Iran nuclear deal forces the US to defend Iran against Israel. This is false.

* Related to his horrible tax proposals (mentioned above), The Donald claimed that his first tax plan was “revenue neutral.” Not even close.

* Trump claimed the “real unemployment rate is 21 percent.” Then he claimed 42%. He was loosely (very loosely) referring to the U6 unemployment rate, which takes into account underemployed people and people who have dropped out of the workforce. At the time, that rate was around 10%. Trump was counting retirees, the disabled, and full-time students in his “calculation,” which is a deceptive and incorrect way of counting the labor participation rate.

* In November 2015, Trump claimed that the Obama Administration was planning to send 250,000 refugees to red states. The red state claim was incorrect, and the actual number President Obama said he would accept was 10,000. The administration did state that official refugee goal was 185,000, but only the 10k number was Syrian.

* One of his favorite claims is that global warming is a hoax concocted by China. Actually, not only is this a lie, it’s also dangerous. Any presidential candidate should be unelectable automatically if they are a climate change denier. This is a serious threat to humanity and simply cannot be ignored.

More on Trump denying basic climate science, and more explanation of how and why he is so terribly wrong here.

He has also argued that the drought in California isn’t real.

* Trump (and several other Republicans during the primary process) claimed that terror suspects were already prohibited from buying guns. In most cases, they were not.

* In October 2015 (and a few times later), Trump claimed that the United States has “the highest tax rate in the world.” This isn’t even close to true.

* Trump greatly exaggerated the youth unemployment rate.

* Trump claimed that the United States is the only country in the world without the concept of birthright citizenship, and Mexico in particular doesn’t have that. In truth, 30 countries around the world have birthright citizenship, including Canada, and yes, Mexico.

* Trump blamed the lack of housecalls made by doctors on Obamacare. Even thought housecalls pretty much disappeared 50 years ago, and the ACA has actually been responsible for a small uptick in the practice.

* Trump lied repeatedly when discussing the Iranian nuclear deal back in March 2016. In fact, the claims he made are claims he has continued to repeat, including in the first debate with Hillary Clinton. He stated that when the terms of the deal expires, that “Iran will have an industrial-size military nuclear capability ready to go, and with zero provision for delay no matter how bad Iran’s behavior is.” This is totally false. He also claimed to have “studied the Iranian nuclear deal more than anyone else.”

* Trump falsely claimed that the 2016 federal budget includes provisons to fund illegal immigrants entering the country through Phoenix – a city that is many miles from the Mexican border.

* Trump incorrectly claimed that the Affordable Care Act has caused an increase in part-time jobs.

* Trump claims that illegal immigration costs the US taxpayer 113 billion dollars per year. Because these workers are undocumented, it’s difficult to accurately ascertain the net cost or benefit, but there have been studies that have shown an actual net economic benefit, and virtually no legitimate studies have come anywhere close to the cost that Trump cited.

In addition, he blatantly lied when he stated that Hillary Clinton’s immigration proposals would “create totally open borders.”

* Trump has falsely claimed that President Obama’s energy policies have caused the loss of 50,000 jobs in the coal industry in Michigan alone. Considering that the total number of coal jobs in Michigan has fluctuated between 5000 and 7000 over the last decade, this claim is impossible. As Trump often does, he grabs a number from a different discussion, and shoehorns it into a policy claim. In this instance, the 50,000 figure comes from a discussion of “potential” jobs losses in the future on a nationwide basis. That figure also ignores the fact that a significant percentage of lost coal jobs would be replaced by natural gas production.

* Trump stated that, “Our veterans, in many cases, are being treated worse than illegal immigrants, people that come into our country illegally.”

Nope.

* Trump falsely claimed that, “Our African-American communities are absolutely in the worst shape they’ve ever been in before. Ever. Ever. Ever.”

This is completely false.

 

LIES ABOUT EVENTS

* Birtherism. Yeah, this could go in a few other categories, but I’m placing it here, specifically for his recent statements claiming a new, revisionist account of his birther antics. After 5 years of steady attacks on the legitimacy of President Obama’s citizenship, he declared in September 2016 that Hillary Clinton started the “birther” movement, and that he put it to rest in 2011. You can read about why this is complete fiction here, here, here, here, and here. Oh yeah, and here is Trump still talking about it LAST SUMMER. You, know, years after he claimed to stop. Here are the best pieces on this issue here, here, here, here, here, and here.

* He lied about “Muslims celebrating the collapse of the twin towers on 9/11. He says it was “well covered.” This is completely untrue.

* Trump lied about “13 Syrians trying to get into the US.” They simply requested asylum. That’s it.

* He lied about opposing the Iraq War “before it started.”

* Trump stated that ISIS built a luxury hotel in Syria, when they actually occupied an old hotel in Iraq.

* Trump lied about meeting Vladimir Putin while they were both on 60 Minutes – except that they didn’t film their respective segments from the same country, much less the same room.

* In November 2015, Trump claimed that US forces “only started hitting ISIS oil fields two days ago.” Actually, concentrated attacks had already been occurring for a month at that point, and limited attacks on ISIS oil infrastructure had occurred for a year.

* Trump claimed that 300,000 veterans have died waiting for healthcare from the VA. That number is a completely different figure, unrelated to healthcare waiting lists.

* Trump lied about Germany being “riddled with crime” thanks to the influx of refugees.

* In an attack on wind power, Trump greatly exaggerated the number of eagles killed in California by wind turbine blades. While there certainly are environmental repercussions to wind turbines, the number of birds killed each year tends to greatly exaggerated by those who want to downplay the massive advantages conferred by wind power.

* Trump lied during a discussion of the Black Lives Matter movement. He claimed that there were “moments of silence” called for Micah Johnson, the man who killed five police officers in Dallas. There has been no evidence anything like this has taken place.

* Trump recklessly and falsely speculated that an Iranian scientist was executed because of Hillary Clinton’s hacked emails.

* When discussing the 2015 terror attack in San Bernadino, Trump lied, claiming “Many people saw bombs all over the floor” of an apartment before the attack, but chose not to report it due to “political correctness.” This never happened. He also repeated this lie during the second presidential debate.

* Trump falsely claimed to recommend Ohio for the Republican convention.

* Trump has claimed that “inner city crime” is reaching record levels. Actually, the opposite is true. American crime levels are at historic lows. Crime has been dropping fairly steadily for 25 years. This is absolutely disgusting fear-mongering that might be worse than the Willie Horton garbage that hurt Michael Dukakis in 1988.

* Trump has claimed multiple times that there is no good way of estimating the population of undocumented immigrants, and the true number could be as high as 30 million. However, these estimates are actually pretty accurate, and 30 million is virtually impossible.

 

LIES ABOUT OTHERS

Hillary Clinton

* Trump lied when he stated “Hillary Clinton wants to release all the violent criminals from prisons.”

* Trump resorted to teasing at the old “Bill and Hillary murdered Vince Foster conspiracy theory.

* Trump said that Hillary Clinton’s refugee plan would be more costly than “rebuilding America’s inner cities.”

* Trump lied when he said Hillary deleted references to support the Trans Pacific Partnership from her book.

* Trump claimed “we know nothing about Hillary Clinton’s religion.

* Trump falsely claimed that Hillary Clinton “fillibustered Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac legislation” back in 2008.

* Trump lied when he claimed that Hillary Clinton was the cause of recent increases in the US-China trade imbalance.

* Donald Trump claimed that Hillary Clinton laundered money via Laureate Education.

* Trump grossly exaggerated FBI director James Comey’s comments about Hillary Clinton and her emails.

* Trump has argued that Hillary Clinton was responsible for the growth of ISIS. Sometimes he has also claimed she helped create it. And then, in the first presidential debate, he claimed she’s been fighting ISIS her entire adult life.

* Trump has repeatedly claimed that Hillary Clinton wants to “abolish the 2nd Amendment.” This is both false, and dangerous fear-mongering.

* Trump claimed that Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party conspired to move the debates to coincide with major NFL games. The debates were actually scheduled a year in advance, before the 2016 NFL schedule had been released, and is run by a nonpartisan commission, unrelated to either major party.

* Trump lied that Hillary Clinton planned to “raise taxes on the middle class.” Actually, there have been solid arguments that suggest we should, but the fact remains she hasn’t proposed any such thing.

* Trump claimed that Clinton was “proposing to print instant work permits for millions of illegal immigrants to come in and take everybody’s jobs, including low-income African-Americans.” This is a complete lie.

* Trump falsely claimed that Clinton has planned to “raise taxes on African-American-owned businesses.” Nope. Not even close.

* Trump has claimed that Hillary Clinton wants to shut down family farms and impose “radical regulation.” This is completely untrue, and demonstrates a lack of understanding of farm policy.

* Trump claimed that Hillary Clinton “has no childcare plan.” This is so far from the truth, it’s almost a joke.

* Trump said that Hillary Clinton has “not answered a single question about her immigration plan.” This is a flat lie.

* He frequently changes the numbers on proposed Syrian refugee acceptance, but he recently stated that Hillary Clinton wanted to admit 620,000. This is untrue.

* He also claimed Clinton would offer Social Security benefits to illegal immigrants.

* Trump blatantly lied when he claimed Hillary Clinton wanted to privatize the VA. In fact, this is much more likely to come from a Republican, than from Clinton.

* He claimed Hillary Clinton changed her stance on the Trans Pacific Partnership because of his influence. There is no evidence of that. All the pressure on her came from the Democratic side.

Barack Obama

* In 2011, when he was considering running for president (and eventually chose not to), he claimed he was running even with President Obama in head-to-head polls. This wasn’t remotely true.

* An October 2015 claim by Trump went beyond mere recklessness. He claimed he “heard” and “read in the papers” that President Obama “wants to take away your guns.” This is 100% false. The President has bent over backwards to not make any such claim. He has proposed extremely mild gun control proposals that went nowhere, and had reaffirmed countless times that he has no interest in banning firearms. In addition no newspaper had printed any such claim. This was simply fear-mongering.

* Not only has Trump basically started his political career by calling into question President Obama’s citizenship, but he has also claimed that Obama is a Muslim on multiple occasions.

* Trump posted a slanderous claim on his Facebook page that said Obama supported ISIS in Iraq.

* Trump also claimed that President Obama was the “founder of ISIS,” and spent several days defending and justifying that claim before he finally reversed himself and stated it was all a joke.

Bernie Sanders

* Trump claims that Bernie Sanders would have won the Democratic nomination, if it weren’t for superdelegates. This isn’t true.

Tim Kaine

* Trump claimed that Bob McDonnell, Tim Kaine’s successor as governor of Virginia, accepted “a fraction” of the gifts that Kaine did. Actually, the reverse is true. McDonnell accepted nearly three times as much as Kaine, and only disclosed about half of what he took, unlike Kaine, who disclosed everything.

* Trump lied when he stated that “illegal immigration increased in Virginia while Tim Kaine was governor.”

Elizabeth Warren

* Trump falsely accused Elizabeth Warren of lying about his stance on the federal minimum wage. Actually, he’s been all over the map regarding the minimum wage, it’s difficult to tell what he really advocates.

Ted Cruz

* Trump stated that Ted Cruz “never denied” his father was seen with Lee Harvey Oswald.

Marco Rubio

* He referred to Rubio as “Mark Zuckerberg’s personal Senator” on his website, then flatly denied it during an October 2015 debate.

* Following a long trend of reckless accusations of voter fraud, Trump incorrectly claimed Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush rigged Florida’s primary election system.

John McCain

* Trump claimed that John McCain authored legislation designed to cover up misdeeds with the VA. This is pretty much the opposite of the truth.

Michelle Fields

* Michelle Fields, a writer for Breitbart, alleged she was assaulted by then-Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski. She stated he grabbed her arm when she attempted to leave a rally. There was video footage that appeared to support her claim. Trump baldly lied when he said that she retracted her accusation when the video was released.

 

HORRIBLE STATEMENTS, IGNORANCE, ATTACKS, and SLANDER

* Let’s talk about the first major speech of Trump’s campaign. You remember the one, right? He talks about immigrants from Mexico… and he says, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists, and some, I assume, are good people.”

* Then, in an interview immediately after, he doubled down, “They’re sending us not their finest people. And it’s people from countries other than Mexico also. We have drug dealers coming across, we have rapists, we have killers, we have murderers. I mean, it’s common sense. What do you think they’re going to send us their best people, their finest people? The answer is no.”

* Other statements about who is immigrating to the United States from summer 2015:

“Now the Southern border everybody comes in. You just walk by. So we are taking hundreds of thousands of people. Some good people and some rapists and some killers and drug lords and everyone else and they are flowing through the southern border.”

“We don’t have the best coming in, we have people that are criminals, we have people that are crooks, you can certainly have terrorists, you can certainly have Islamic terrorists, you can have anything coming across the border. We don’t do anything about it. So I would say that if I run and if I win, I would certainly start by building a very, very powerful border.”

It shouldn’t have to be noted that immigrants, both legal and otherwise, commit far fewer crimes than native-born citizens, both per capita, and in total.

* Trump attacked John McCain for having been a prisoner of war. Seriously.

“He’s a war hero because he was captured, I like people who weren’t captured. Perhaps he’s a war hero, but right now he’s said some very bad things about a lot of people.”

* During a campaign speech, he read Lindsey Graham’s personal phone number aloud to the crowd. Yep, he doxxed a competitor.

* When two men in Boston beat a homeless Mexican man and specifically stated Trump as their inspiration, Trump was asked about it, and he responded with, “I haven’t heard about that. It would be a shame, but I haven’t heard about that. I will say that people who are following me are very passionate. They love this country and they want this country to be great again. They are passionate. I will say that, and everybody here has reported it.”

* Trump attacked Hillary Clinton as an “enabler” for Bill Clinton’s sexual misbehaviors… many of which are unproven, and many of which Trump himself has likely engaged in.

* He compared Ben Carson’s temper to the behavior of a child molester, and described Carson as “pathological.”

* He also claimed, “I know more about ISIS than the generals, believe me.”

* In the same speech, he ranted about Carson’s then-popularity in Iowa, and stated, “How stupid are the people of Iowa? How stupid are the people of this country to believe this crap?”

* He bragged about being able to shoot someone and not lose support. This is what he really thinks of his supporters.

* Trump called basic questions about ISIS and foreign policy “gotcha questions.” Then Carly Fiorina, herself no expert on these matters, answered each question without problem.

* Martin O’Malley gave a thoughtful apology for using the phrase “All Lives Matter.” As a response to the apology, Donald Trump referred to the apology as, “And then he apologized like a little baby, like a disgusting, little, weak, pathetic baby, and that’s the problem with our country.” Grade school insults from the supposed leader of the Republican Party.

* An adult political figure actually described his future military policy thusly, “I will be so good at the military your head will spin.”

* As a man running on a platform specifically focused on harsh policy toward the Middle East, he remains astoundingly ignorant of even the basics of Middle Eastern politics and events, referring to an interview on foreign policy as just being given “Arab name, Arab name…”

* A physically disabled reporter was mocked by Trump in a childish and cruel manner, and then claimed he was merely imitating someone who acts confused. Anyone who was ever on a playground in America as a youth knows “the retarded guy” act.

* He encouraged his supports to commit acts of violence against protesters and hecklers, and offered to pay the legal fees of those arrested for those crimes.

* Trump defended the Chinese government’s response to Tianamen Square. He referred to the protesters as “rioters” and said the government response, “shows you the power of strength.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/03/11/trump-just-called-tiananmen-square-a-riot-the-communist-party-will-be-pleased/

* Donald Trump bragged about the size of his penis in a nationally televised debate. Seriously, he did that. And I really should be more mature than this, and point out how ridiculous it is for a political figure to do something like that… but I already have. So, I’m going to take the low road – Trump-style – and note that most dudes who brag about their junk tend to be the ones hiding something a bit more modest

*Trump has frequently pulled press credentials on reporters who have been critical of him. 

* Trump directed odd, and largely incorrect praise toward Saddam Hussein. He also claimed that the “world would be much better off” if Hussein and former Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi were still in power.

* Donald Trump doesn’t know how many articles are in the United States Constitution.

* He has expressed admiration for North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un.

* Trump rooted for the housing crisis as a way to make money.

* When NBA player Dwyane Wade’s cousin was murdered, Trump’s reaction was a Tweet that said, “African Americans will vote Trump!”

* Trump suggested deporting Hillary Clinton. Seriously.

* Trump’s claims that the electoral system (and the upcoming election) is “rigged” is both false and dangerous. Trump is creating a dangerous and reckless precedent. He has even expanded on this rhetoric, falsely claiming that US Border Patrol agents are “letting people in to vote.” There are plenty of examples of this here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

* In 1989, five teenagers were charged with a rape in Central Park. They were eventually proven innocent. However, during the height of the case, Trump took out full-page newspaper advertisments advocating for the execution of the eventually exonerated teens. Since that point, he has refused to apologize for his actions at the time.

* Trump stated during the second presidential debate with Hillary Clinton that he would appoint a special prosecutor to investigate her and her emails.

 

RACISM AND BIGOTRY

* Trump has stated that “you need to treat them like shit,” when discussing how he interacts with women.

* Take a look here and then here for a comprehensive (but far from complete) list of horrible things Trump has said about women, both specific and in general. Not only does he endorse treating them like shit, but he has attacked women for biological needs (using the restroom, menstruation, and pumping breast milk), claimed all the women on his reality show flirted with him, and has bragged repeatedly about his sexual prowess. He has also publicly said vile things about Megyn Kelly, Arianna Huffington, Carly Fiorina, Rosie O’Donnell, Brande Roderick, Bette Midler, Gail Collins, Cher, and of course, Hillary Clinton, to name but a few. He has argued sexual assault in the military should be expected when women serve. He has called women gold-diggers, sneaky, dishonest, and has implied that female journalists must be attractive to be successful.

* This could go under the “lies” category, but he also denied saying many of his more sexist statements… fortunately, Twitter provides nice written records.

Phrases like “Hillary got schlonged by Obama” is straightforward misogyny.

During the first presidential debate, Hillary Clinton described some rather harsh words and behavior Trump directed toward former Miss Universe winner Alicia Machado. Instead of denying his words, or downplaying them, he basically doubled down, and spent the rest of the week attacking Ms. Machado, including lying about a sex tape he claimed she made.

Just a month before the election, a tape leaked from a 2005 conversation Trump had with television host Billy Bush. Trump referenced a married woman he “tried to fuck.” He discussed how he hits on women; “You have to grab them by the pussy.” He also said, “If you’re a star, you can do anything you want with women.” When the story broke, his response was basically a “boys will be boys” excuse. Because apparently bragging about sexual assault is merely locker room humor in the world of The Donald.

* He consistently panders to white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and assorted racist riff-raff. He appears to be fearful of alienating white nationalists, by refusing to condemn or reject their support. The incident where he shared a clearly anti-Semitic meme was made all the more egregious when he denied the obvious anti-Jewish messages. It didn’t take long to discover the meme was pulled off an anti-Semitic message board.

* Further pandering to racists occurred when he took his sweet time in disavowing the endorsement of former KKK leader David Duke, claiming he knew nothing about Duke. However, Trump had openly criticized Duke on at least two occasions in the past.

* More example of pandering to racism happened when a man at a town hall meeting referred to President Obama as a Muslim, and expressed concern about the dangers of Muslims. Faced with a similar questioner in 2008, John McCain gently but firmly pushed back against such a statement. Donald Trump responded with, “We are going to be looking at a lot of different things. And a lot of people are saying that, and a lot of people are saying that bad things are happening out there. We are going to be looking at that and plenty of other things.”

* Trump tweeted a graphic which made false claims about blacks murdering whites at a ridiculously high rate. The graph was completely incorrect, and actually reversed the numbers which would show a completely opposite issue.

* Trump defended his proposed Muslim ban by defending Japanese internment during World War II.

He also stated, in reference to Muslims, that there is “ no assimilation for second and third generation Muslim immigrants.” This is absolutely untrue.

* He said Marco Rubio was “in favor of amnesty” because he’s Hispanic.

* Trump frequently refers to Senator Elizabeth Warren as “Pocahontas”

http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/21/opinions/donald-trump-elizabeth-warren-native-american-moya-smith/

* Trump has spent quite a bit of time pandering to anti-Semites, and occasionally making anti-Jewish comments himself.

* Trump stated Federal Judge Gonzalo Curiel couldn’t be impartial toward him because of his Mexican heritage. Judge Curiel was born in the United States.

* In 1973, Trump Management, Fred Trump, and Donald himself were charged with discrimination against African-Americans by the US government. They eventually settled out of court, but the evidence against Trump was damning.

 

TRUMP’S FAILURES

* Trump started Trump Mortgage in 2006, declaring, “I think it’s a great time to start a mortgage company … who knows about financing better than I do?”

The next year, the housing bubble burst.

* Trump Steaks started in 2007, sold through the Sharper Image catalog. He occasionally still references his steaks, but the actual product was discontinued several years ago. Any steaks he shows off are steaks he bought from someone else.

* Trump Vodka lasted from 2006 through 2011.

* Trump Ice spring water…. yeah….

* Trump the Game. Basically a really dumb Monopoly, it lasted a couple years in the late 80s, and was revived in 2005 when the Apprentice came out. Usually only played for irony.

* GoTrump.com got a nice boost from Travelocity, but still fell apart within a year.

* Trump Magazine was a quarterly lifestyle magazine for rich people that managed to hang on for two years, but 2007 wasn’t a great time to start a magazine discussing luxury items and traveling.

* He owned the New Jersey Generals of the long-defunct USFL.

* Trump Airlines was originally Eastern Air Shuttle. He acquired it in 1988, and attempted to turn it into a luxury brand, which brought the then-27 year old service to financial ruin in 3 short years.

* Trump Entertainment Resorts was the business that ran his casinos… every single one of which failed. That particular arm of his business declared bankruptcy in 1991. And 2004. And 2008 AND 2014. Maybe casinos aren’t a good investment for Donald…

* Then of course, there’s Trump University.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/12-donald-trump-businesses-that-no-longer-exist-204923129.html?soc_src=mediacontentstory&soc_trk=fb

http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2068227_2068229_2068223,00.html

 

MISCELLANEOUS HISTORY

* Tim Kaine correctly noted that in 2009, Trump rolled out the red carpet for Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi, erecting a tent for his visit when nobody else in New York was willing to do so.

* Trump pretended to be a publicist named John Barron (and sometimes John Miller) and made calls to the press under those names, talking up the greatness that is Donald J. Trump.

 

CRIME AND ACCUSATIONS OF CRIME

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/09/donald-trump-scandals/474726/

http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/9/28/12904136/donald-trump-corrupt

* The Trump Foundation is essentially just a scam operation designed to enrich Trump. The “Foundation” accepted donations, and Trump himself used said donations to purchase a portrait – of himself. He also used the foundation to cover his own legal fees.

* In a lovely bit of irony, Trump’s modeling agency was in violation of multiple immigration laws. His treatment of the models in general was deplorable.

* Trump is infamous for not paying those he employs and hires. He’s stiffed multiple contractors and employees over the years.

* Trump has used money donated to his campaign to pay himself and his family.

* Trump University is currently under investigation for fraud. His response was to publicly name his accusers.

* Trump has openly courted the attention and business of mobsters and organized crime figures.

But wait, there’s more!

Donald J. Trump has demonstrated, through 70 years of living, 40 years as a wealthy businessperson, 30 years as a celebrity, a little over a year as a major Republican political figure, and  nearly 3 months as the GOP nominee for POTUS, that he is a liar, cheat, fraud, criminal, accused rapist, molester, phony, and all around fucking asshole. Donald Trump is less qualified than I am to be President, and I’m (as of this writing) about 9 months too young to being Constitutionally qualified to be president. A large percentage of Trump’s proposals qualify him for the Hague, should he be elected and attempt to implement them. As an occasional boxing writer, I keep thinking that boxing is less corrupt than Trump.

Nevertheless, Trump is one of the final contenders for President. This needs to be acknowledged. Please take this threat seriously. Donald Trump would inarguably become the least qualified President in American history. The man makes George W. Bush and James Buchanan look Presidential. Please consider what I wrote before considering him as President. And don’t forget that the next President will likely be responsible for dozens of huge decisions (Roe v Wade, Citizens United, Heller vs DC, etc) that will actually impact your lives. Do you want an experienced decision-maker, or a guy who likes to talk about fucking his daughter?

As always, there are those who tell it better than I do:

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/cover_story/2016/07/donald_trump_is_unfit_to_be_president_here_are_141_reasons_why.html

http://www.gq.com/story/176-reasons-donald-trump-shouldnt-be-president-olbermann

Posted in Governance, Healthcare, History, immigration, Infrastructure, Media, Myths and misconceptions, Politics, Social Justice | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

Edging toward Godwin

Posted on October 5, 2016 by hbreck

donald-trump-scared-of-rhode-islandThis is a quick rant expounding on a thought I posted to Facebook yesterday. I’ve talked repeatedly about fear, and how Trump stokes people’s worries and concerns, and distracts from real problems. Unfortunately, it bears repeating. And repeating. And repeating…

I was listening to an interview this morning on NPR with a Trump supporter. She was expressing her fears, specifically fears of terrorism committed by Muslims. The interviewer pointed out that most mass shootings in the United States are carried out by white men. He asked her if that made her feel any better.

Admittedly, that’s kind of an odd question, and the correct answer probably should be no (but for different reasons than what she stated). Anyway, she said no, but her reason was, “I don’t believe it.”

And that’s what it seems to come down to this election. I can find plenty of research substantiating that point – that statistically, the threat of Islamic terrorism is actually quite low in the United States. Especially compared to other, more real dangers.

But you have a guy like Trump, stirring up fear and resentment. It’s no different than McCarthyism, or the justification for Japanese internment, or the yellow peril, or any other instance when fear of the Other is stoked to justify bigotry and Draconian policies.

So the sweet little old Mormon lady tells the NPR announcer that she wants to be kept safe. And who can blame her? She’s been told for the past 8 years that her president is a dangerous Muslim foreigner. Even if she doesn’t believe that specific lie, it helps set the stage for everything else. She’s been told, to varying degrees, that 9/11 was perpetrated by dark-skinned hordes on the other side of the planet, all just itching to destroy the land of the free. She’s told that cities are rife with crime and poverty and lawlessness, only made worse by those permissive, secular liberals.

Despite a recent uptick, crime is still at historic lows. Accidents involving furniture are deadlier than Muslims in America. And scapegoating an entire religion is more likely to fuel anti-American sentiment among the extremists than to pacify it.

But this person on NPR doesn’t believe it. She knows what she feels. And whatever else one thinks about Donald Trump, he is particularly skilled at emotional appeals. Even if you hate the guy, he’s still manipulating your emotions. He tells you trade is the cause of slow economic growth – even though that’s overly simplistic – and some people will nod their heads. Yeah, that makes sense. And he’s just the man to bring the jobs back – even though manufacturing will never be what it once was (and he can do nothing about it). He’ll tell you the know-it-alls are bringing the country down with burdensome regulations and global warming hoaxes. Don’t believe the statistics, or any evidence. Go with what feels right. Things aren’t going so well for you? Trump can tell you who’s to blame. And he’ll tell you who can fix it. Of course, he won’t tell you how, but you trust him. I mean, he’s rich and successful, right? So he knows how to get shit done.

Trump has few plans, incoherent and often contradictory policy positions, and has demonstrated a poor understanding of how governments are run. On paper, he should be a candidate along the lines of Lyndon LaRouche, or maybe Pat Buchanan at best. Not somebody to take seriously. But here he is, one step from the Presidency. And it’s because he knows fear. He knows how to make you feel. He can explain your troubles. And he’ll make you feel like he’s the only hope. That’s a demagogue. He’s a reactionary, bigoted, anti-intellectual demagogue.

He will tell you things that are absolutely untrue. He takes advantage of real worries and concerns, then tells you who is really to blame. And if you remember when your whiteness, or your maleness, or your heterosexuality once garnered more authority – you may be inclined to think the world is falling apart. And it sure looks like those foreigners and minorities and gay people are benefiting. So yeah, this brash businessman is just what we need.

Is this exactly the same as Hitler? Is he authoritarian in that same sense? Well, no, not really. However, could his appeals to emotion, his embrace of anti-intellectualism, his constant redirection of blame, his fear mongering, and his bigotry, all be a step in that direction? It certainly seems so. When was the last time a major party nominee advocated registering every member of a major religion? When was the last time a nominee supported deporting more than 10 million people en masse? When was the last time a nominee made openly racist statements in defense of authoritarian policies and proposals? When was the last time a nominee openly called for violence against political opponents? When was the last time a nominee called for reinstating policies already deemed violations of civil liberties, as well as the Constitution? When was the last time a nominee claimed that he was the only hope for national salvation?

And as of this morning he has a 28 percent chance of becoming President. That could be a lot worse. But if he were just a bit less charismatic, he would have a zero percent chance. If he wasn’t resonating with those who feel left out and overwhelmed – those who know there are problems, but don’t necessarily know how to fix them – then he wouldn’t have been nominated in the first place. He probably won’t become President. But it’s still possible. And that’s mostly because he knows how to focus our fears. And yes, the parallels with dictators of the past are real.

Posted in foreign policy, Governance, immigration, Law Enforcement, Politics, Quick post, Rant | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

The Politics of Fear

Posted on September 26, 2016 by hbreck

donald-trump_3372655eWhy are people voting for Trump?

Fear. More than anything else, the reason is fear.

I listened to NPR interview a couple who were planning on voting for Trump. They kept repeating certain points. They talked about how they didn’t feel right encouraging their children to have children “with the country the way it is.”

They talked about things falling apart. They talked about being afraid to go to the movie theater, or into Atlanta, for fear of being shot. They talked about waves of immigrants, they talked about the flow of immigrants. They mentioned that Donald Trump plans to shut off the flow. They worried about their jobs being taken by immigrants.

They worried about Hillary Clinton. They were preparing to join a militia, worried that they would have to fight a civil war, should she be elected.

Every single thing they worried about, are not actually serious problems in this country. Crime is at historic lows. A citizen is far less likely to be shot now, than in the seventies and eighties.

Illegal immigration has been at a net-zero level for several years. Studies show that legal and illegal immigrants commit fewer crimes per capita than native born citizens. And most jobs taken by undocumented workers are not jobs already occupied by native citizens.

And finally, worries about the despotism of Hillary Clinton sound a lot like the worries about Obama, which never resulted in anything but increased gun sales and lots of paranoia.

These Trump supporters cited things that were all completely untrue about the state of the country. And yet, it’s true for them. They see it, they feel it, they know it’s true. And Trump confirms what the media keeps blasting at them every day. They feed off of it.

This is not to say that the country is running perfectly, either. While the national debt is not quite the boogeyman that people make it out to be, it is growing, and it is something to be resolved at some point. Income and wealth inequality are at their highest levels since the Gilded Age, and there doesn’t seem to be any improvement on the horizon. The economy is shifting, and certain jobs that people relied on are simply disappearing, maybe partly due to trade, but mostly due to changing technology. The American infrastructure is crumbling, and very little money is being devoted toward repairing it. While overall crime is as low as its ever been, Americans still shoot each other far more often than in any other advanced democracy.

I’m not a Pollyanna. I am aware that we face challenges in America, and around the world. But Trump is fueling fear and paranoia on issues that simply aren’t worth the fear.

The Great Recession, increased automation, stagnant wages – these have caused people (like the fearful couple mentioned above) real problems.

It creates a certain effect. People have real problems.

So then, Fox News screams about Obama “letting in the illegals,” and all the news networks pretty much ignore Trump’s constant stream of lies and exaggerations, and people say, “That must be it. I can’t get a factory job anymore because of illegals.”

“There’s a crime surge in Chicago, so I must be in constant danger.”

And so on.

I’ve written before about how the reality of life in 21st century America doesn’t jibe with our perceptions of it. Ask most people on the street, they will likely tell you that crime is rampant, terrorists lurk around every corner, and the government isn’t helping. Well, maybe that last part is true. It hasn’t helped that the party running the national legislature has refused to work with the executive branch on anything, all while saying they are merely representing their constituents interests. And of course, they are telling their constituents that the nation is falling apart, and Obama/liberals/gays/political correctness/immigrants/ACA/etc is to blame. And Trump reinforces it, and the media reports mostly bad news, and then you get a great smokescreen for the obstructionists who aren’t actually interested in governing. And people on the other side of the ideological spectrum see the current executive branch as weak on the issues that matter to them, and basically a traitor to progressivism.

The country chugs along. The real problems continue to exist and fester. People ignore them in favor of imagined calamities, and the blame shifts the wrong way. And a pathologically dishonest, fear-mongering, failed businessman is inexplicably competitive with a cautious, boring bureaucrat with historic levels of knowledge and experience, but an inability to shake (mostly exaggerated) accusations of corruption. The charlatan feeds on fears and triggers emotions. And people who are suffering fall for it. They aren’t suffering from crime or immigration or terror attacks. But when that’s the culprit their shown, what else do they have?

There isn’t one simple reason why Donald Trump has a chance at the White House. However, the underlying emotion might just be fear.

Posted in immigration, Infrastructure, Media, Politics, Quick post, Rant | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Liberals for Gary Johnson?

Posted on September 17, 2016 by hbreck

1184px-gary_johnson_by_gage_skidmore_4Every Presidential election is mostly a two-person race – from a practical standpoint, anyway. Occasionally a third party candidate does make some noise. In 2000, Ralph Nader got a lot of attention, and shook up the race, arguably weakening Democratic nominee Al Gore – but he only ended up with 2.7% of the vote nationwide. In 1992 and 1996, Independent candidate and businessman Ross Perot managed 19 and 9 percent respectively. These were impressive showings on the surface, though he never won a single state, and only came in 2nd out of 3 in a couple of them. In 1980, former Republican John Anderson started strong, polling as high as 14 percent, but faded down the stretch, and ended up with closer to 6 percent of the vote. In addition, George Wallace, Strom Thurmond, Bob LaFollette, Eugene Debs, and Teddy Roosevelt have all been impactful as third party candidates over the last century or so.

But with the exception of a former President – Roosevelt – none were serious threats for the White House. Their appeal was usually due to an outsider message. They often ran primarily on the notion of not being Democrats or Republicans. In some cases, their ideology was within the mainstream (Anderson, Roosevelt). In others, they tended to be more left or right, or something else altogether.

Since 1972, the Libertarian Party has fielded candidates for President in every election. They are arguably the most successful third party of the last 40 years, though that is a pretty low bar. They attempt to eschew the traditional right-left ideological labeling, though they have tended to appeal more to those on the right than on the left. “Socially liberal and economically conservative” is often the mantra, but that’s usually misleading, especially for the most ideologically pure libertarians. Libertarians are “socially liberal” in that they favor decriminalization or outright legalization of drugs, and they are supportive of improved civil liberties. Sometimes they are more open-minded than social conservatives on LGBT issues, and are sometimes less dogmatic about abortion. They are usually anti-war and anti-interventionism. But that is usually where the idea of “social liberalism” ends. Libertarians also believe that representative democratic governments should have no role in assisting or protecting the individual. Health care, consumer protection, environmental protection, food and drug safety – these are all better served by the free market. The government inevitably does more harm than good, and acts as a drag on the markets. These are hardly liberal positions.

They are more accurately described as anti-government. At its heart, libertarianism argues that individuals and businesses rarely (if ever) oppress, and that governments are either unnecessary, or at best, a necessary evil to be limited to the bare minimum. Only governments can restrict individual liberty in any sort of meaningful way, and no matter how one is run, they always do. Libertarians tend to ignore or reject the notion of the social contract, and believe that unregulated capitalism is the truest path to freedom and prosperity.

Gary Johnson, former governor of New Mexico, is running for the second straight election as the Libertarian Party nominee for President. In 2012, he managed around 1% of the vote, which was actually an historically great result for the LP. But this year, Governor Johnson appears to be doing better. Plenty of people are dissatisfied with the Democratic and Republican nominees this time around. Donald Trump has repelled a lot of traditional Republicans, and hasn’t done all that well with independents. Hillary Clinton has always struggled to find common ground with the American right (though she did enjoy solid relationships with some of GOP while in the Senate), and was attacked with enthusiasm by the left while being challenged by Senator Bernie Sanders, a self-proclaimed “socialist.”

Since Sanders was defeated by Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primaries, most of his supporters have moved over to support Clinton, although many have done so reluctantly. Still, a significant percentage (polls have varied) have refused to back Clinton, often for ideological reasons, though many still hold to discredited conspiracy theories of electoral malfeasance by either her and/or the DNC. Either way, many have resolved to write in Bernie – the “Bernie or Bust” contingent – and many have turned toward third party options.

Green Party nominee Jill Stein appears to be the most logical option for many. She occupies an ideological space somewhat to the left of Bernie Sanders, and has taken up the Ralph Nader position that there is no appreciable difference between the two major candidates. Like Johnson, she also ran in 2012, and like him, is polling better now than she was that year. However, she is still polling well short of the 5% needed for the Green Party to receive federal election funding in 2020. Some Bernie supporters may be on the Steinwagon, but not all of them.

Gary Johnson, on the other hand, may have peeled quite a few Bernie fans away from Hillary Clinton. It’s not completely crazy. A significant percentage of Bernie supporters weren’t necessarily Democrats. Many weren’t even political liberals. Some just liked Bernie as an alternative to the mainstream. Many liked specific issues such as campaign finance reform, breaking up banks, or the general theme of ending corruption and cronyism. Bernie appealed to many based on more than just ideology. So it’s reasonable to assume that potential Libertarian voters lurked among the Berners.

However, on occasion, actual liberals have expressed support for Johnson. This also happened with Ron Paul in 2008, and to a lesser extent, Rand Paul this year. These aren’t the only people I’m speaking to, but they may be the ones I have the biggest problem with. They see Hillary Clinton (and mainstream Democrats in general) as either ideologically compromised, or hopelessly corrupt (or both), and generally beyond redemption. While Jill Stein appeals to many of them, they also have noticed the former governor who speaks frequently of civil liberties, reduced militarism, and marijuana, and don’t look any deeper.

That’s what I wish to discuss.

Gary Johnson has spent quite a lot of time discussing those issues, because the actual positions of the Libertarian Party – as well as his campaign – paint a much different picture. One that is about as far from Bernie Sanders’ idea of America as one can get and still be American. Maybe even farther than Donald Trump.

I should preface this with the Libertarian Party itself and its relationship with Johnson. He is by far the most mainstream and “moderate” candidate they have nominated for the Presidency. And he faced bizzare and aggressive opposition during his run for the nomination. The Libertarian Convention featured some strange and radical individuals who lambasted Johnson for a lack of ideological purity. His experience and relative moderation were not assets to many of the Libertarian true-believers.

First of all, Gary Johnson has not actually been a libertarian, (either large or small “L”) for all that long. He was elected as the Republican governor of New Mexico back in 1994, running on a rather extreme “tough-on-crime” platform. He was a big proponent of prison privatization, and many of his policies helped contribute to increases in prison violence. He also was a huge fan of school privatization, and continues to rail against public schools. After reelection in 1998, he suddenly started preaching the gospel of legal weed, though by 2016, he’s not exactly a leader on the topic, as several states have either decriminalized or outright legalized marijuana, and it appears eventual national legalization is inevitable.

Even as recently as late 2011, Johnson was a Republican, where he initially threw his hat into the ring as a Republican presidential candidate. It wasn’t until he realized he wasn’t going to make noise in the primaries that he switched his affiliation to Libertarian. His positions that year were largely in line with the (small l) libertarian wing of the Republican Party, although he did “come out” in favor of marriage equality at that point. He claims this year to have been committed for a long time to equal rights for gay Americans, though the earliest he seems to have publicly expressed this has been 2011, making him progressive for a Republican, but not exactly a national leader on the topic.

This is primarily addressed to those liberals and progressives that are struggling to get on board the concept of Hillary Clinton, and who like the idea of Johnson, at least on the surface. But this also applies to everyone else, too. Please take a look at some of Johnson’s “moderate for a libertarian” positions, and decide if that’s a leader you would want to elect.

Gary Johnson is adamantly against all deficit spending, and has pledged to push for a balanced budget amendment.

He argues that the federal deficit and national debt are enormous problems, and no amount of deficit spending will be passed by his administration. Of course, the problem is that deficits actually aren’t the boogeyman that he believes, and that some spending is often necessary. Deficit spending is (in part) what ended the Great Recession (also the Great Depression, but that’s a longer story). Any decent economist would argue that forcing a balanced budget without any revenue increases would be absolutely disastrous for the economy. Can you say Great Recession Part 2?

The current status of the EU, as well as the sluggish growth of the American economy is further evidence of the problems with fiscal austerity. Unfortunately, this is an area where Johnson toes the ideological line and allows for zero compromise.

It should also be noted that the state debt of New Mexico more than doubled under his watch. So, there’s that.

Gary Johnson is a proponent of the eventual repeal of all income taxes, to be replaced with a single consumption tax.

With the current levels of spending, this would be laughably insufficient for running the country, and would create debts far exceeding the current rate.

Of course, he advocates massive cuts in spending… but it remains unclear whether or not the money collected would still be enough. Maintaining current spending levels would likely require a consumption tax in the range of 60 percent, which could be disastrous for lower income families and individuals. Even with major cuts to the federal budget, the consumption tax would necessarily have to be far higher than any current sales taxes. These are inherently regressive. If the consumption tax itself had different brackets, and were made progressive, it might alleviate some of these issues, but Johnson has made it clear he wants just a single rate, though he hasn’t specified what that might be.

In 2012, he advocated a 23% flat tax, and a 43% cut in federal spending. An article published in Slate mentioned that for this election, Johnson is advocating an immediate 20% cut in spending. I haven’t seen if he plans to eventually reach his 2012 pledge of 43%. The size of the cut is of course still ludicrous, but moreso, he refuses any phasing of the change, and wants to jump straight in the deep end, seemingly without any grasp of the economic impact this will have.

He advocates simplifying the tax code and closing loopholes, which is laudable, but he also makes the classic conservative mistake that equates the actual number of income tax brackets with said complexity. While he has switched what should be taxed (consumption vs income), he still is pushing the same old single-rate flat tax that the far right has been screaming about for years.

He advocates eliminating all corporate income taxes altogether. While one could make an argument for reducing corporate taxes to better incentivize businesses paying them, complete elimination would amount to an enormous corporate handout, as well as a huge decrease in revenue.

Gary Johnson wants to greatly decrease regulation on business, but he offers virtually no specifics. He only derides “excessive regulation” while paying lip service to retaining some regulations, but with no details.

He also favors complete deregulation of banking. After all, banking deregulation worked so well before.

He has officially called for “auditing” the Federal Reserve. This is all he suggests on his platform page. But in speeches and interviews, he has acknowledged wanting to “end the Fed,” a popular sentiment on the fringes of the far right. Also a misguided sentiment.

He advocates abolishing the Department of Education, and has spent years pushing for more privatization of schools. He has stated “education is best provided by the free market.”

He acknowledges the role of humans impacting global warming, but argues that the government should do little-to-nothing about it.

Beyond global warming, his statements and proposals on science-related issues are mixed-to-poor. He isn’t a science-denier like Trump, and he hasn’t pandered to some of the goofier anti-science ideas like Stein, but he is adamantly opposed to government funding of research and development, has no proposals at all for the future of NASA, and has stated that fracking should be increased, as well as coal power plants.

He is adamantly against any sort of universal or government-paid healthcare, and would not only eliminate the Affordable Care Act, but would ensure that a public option never occurs under his watch. He would scrap Medicare and Medicaid. Anyone receiving free or subsidized healthcare would be on their own.

He stated in an interview with Reason in January that he would call to ban the wearing of burkas and hijabs, and then the very next day changed his stance.

He believes in removing pretty much all laws and regulations regarding firearms, despite the mountains of evidence that states this would cause a massive increase in gun-related deaths.

Oh, what else?

He opposes the minimum wage entirely. He would get rid of it, not just reduce it. Bernie fans, take note of that one in particular, along with the banking deregulation.

He advocates right-to-work laws, and is about as anti-union as it gets. The rights of workers are pretty much nonexistent in his world.

The Libertarian platform endorses eventually phasing out Social Security altogether. Social Security (it shouldn’t have to be noted), is by far the most successful antipoverty program in American history. The Libertarian Party clashes with Johnson somewhat on this, as he has stated he generally supports Social Security, but believes it shouldn’t be funded with payroll taxes, and instead could be covered by his consumption tax. This is a fiscally ludicrous notion, unless he plans on drastically scaling back benefits. But he hasn’t called for the outright end to the program, either.

As I touched on earlier, as governor of New Mexico, Johnson governed on the notion that government’s primary job was to do as little as possible, and cede as many services as possible to the private sector. This was met with disastrous results with prisons. The overall economic record of New Mexico was mixed, in part because Johnson was largely opposed by Democratic legislative majorities, and didn’t get a whole lot accomplished, though he did use his veto pen more than any other governor at the time. Schools remained a weak point in New Mexico throughout his terms, and never improved while he was governor.

Oh yeah, and I shouldn’t forget about Aleppo.

It’s already been covered quite a bit by the media, and he certainly acknowledged his mistake, but the fact is that a Presidential candidate who wants to be taken seriously couldn’t answer a question about one of the big issues he would face as president. It really was a major deal.

Johnson seems like a good guy. He’s certainly the most interesting personality in the current Presidential race, and it appears he would be a blast to hang out with. He built his own home in Taos, NM (a wonderful little town). He’s climbed the Seven Summits. He runs ultramarathons. He paraglides. He’s smoked weed. Yeah, I would hang out with him. That charm and persona help his cause, especially among liberal-minded people. And yes, personality matters. A little.

However, Gary Johnson might be ideologically further from Bernie Sanders than Donald Trump is. Sure, he wants to legalize pot. And he’s an advocate for cutting back on the military. But otherwise, they are polar opposites. A Gary Johnson presidency would mean no free tuition for college. He wouldn’t “break up the banks.” Instead, he would eliminate regulations on them. He has waffled a little on background checks, but for the most part, firearm access would become substantially easier. He would drastically cut all social services – somewhere between 20 and 43 percent. And he would do it all at once, with no phasing. He would make taxes much more of a burden on the poor, and much easier on the rich. He would make sure nobody received free or discounted healthcare – at least not by the government. He would do little to offset climate change. He would eliminate many government institutions, with only “the free market” to pick up the slack.

If all of this sounds good to you, well, then by all means, go for it. He’s your guy. It sounds like he needs to read more Upton Sinclair and less Ayn Rand, but that’s just me. However, if you are a liberal or progressive or even a centrist, and you think Hillary Clinton is too corrupt, dishonest, or not ideologically pure enough to get your vote – well, you can do a lot better than Gary Johnson. Write Bernie in. Vote for Rocky Anderson. Take a breath and let me or someone else change your mind on Hillary. But Gary Johnson? Seriously? Nice guy, but take a deeper look at what he believes. Definitely take a look at what his party believes. And if you are someone who doesn’t agree with Republicans on economic issues, remember that on those topics, he will have their full support. There is a lot of damage that could be done under President Johnson.

I have a piece on the human garbage fire that is Donald Trump in the works, and my final thoughts on Hillary Clinton, hopefully in a few weeks. As for now though, if you don’t like Clinton or Trump, don’t assume that Johnson will be any better, just because he seems like he would be cool to share a joint with. There really is so much at stake here.

I’m endorsing Gary Johnson for Cool Public Figure. But not President.

As always, links to better-written articles are below:

http://critiques.us/index.php?title=Critiques_Of_Libertarianism

http://prospect.org/article/libertarian-delusion

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/281399-5-things-the-libertarian-party-stands-for

http://civilliberty.about.com/od/libertarianpolitics/qt/libert_platform.htm

https://www.lp.org/platform

https://www.johnsonweld.com/issues

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/gary-johnson-is-here-to-tell-you-youre-a-libertarian/

http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/nation-politics/thinking-of-voting-for-jill-stein-or-gary-johnson-here-are-their-policy-positions/

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/07/presidential-hopeful-gary-johnson-is-no-libertarian-hes-a-pro-pot-trump

https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/gary-johnson-swindle/

http://www.vox.com/2016/8/3/12367358/trump-republicans-gary-johnson

http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/fringe-libertarian-why-gary-johnson-isnt-going-find-many-progressives-who-can-be-duped

http://m.dailykos.com/stories/2016/8/28/1564628/-It-s-time-to-talk-about-Gary-Johnson

https://benjaminstudebaker.com/2016/07/29/gary-johnson-is-worse-than-donald-trump/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_third_party_performances_in_United_States_presidential_elections

Posted in Elected yet unelectable, Governance, Myths and misconceptions, Politics | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

The Only Thing We Have To Fear…

Posted on August 23, 2016 by hbreck

Slovenska_vojska_tudi_med_vikendom_v_velikem_številu_pri_podpori_Policiji_01_B

Since 2011, the nation of Syria has been in flames.

While much violence occurred during the uprisings of the Arab Spring, it was specifically Syria where the violence turned into an all-out war. Since 2011, more than a quarter million people have died, and around half of the 22 million citizens of the country have become displaced from their homes. Infrastructure and services have been obliterated. And millions of now-homeless people have become refugees. Syria is near Europe, and the Europeans have, with varying degrees of enthusiasm, taken the brunt of the exodus from what is basically a pile of rubble that people continue to burn down.

However, the United States is in many ways the ultimate immigrant nation, and has long been a destination for refugees from all corners of the globe. We admit 50,000 or so people each year claiming refugee status. The United States has a robust system for admitting immigrants, a thorough vetting process (more on that later), the world’s largest economy, and plenty of room. We are ideally suited for assisting Europe and the Middle East with the Syrian refugee crisis, and many politicians (including the Democratic nominee for president) have recognized this.

Of course, there are those in the US that are objecting strongly to the potential influx of Syrian refugees. Ordinary citizens have expressed concern about the potential for terrorism. Republican politicians have spent enormous amounts of time and effort frightening Americans with tales of Islamic terror.

So, there are still people freaking out about Syrian refugees. Many have claimed they haven’t been “properly vetted.”

Much of the anti-refugee rhetoric has mirrored the general anti-immigrant sentiment coming from certain aspects of the Republican party, as well as the right-leaning parts of the media.

While FBI director James Comey acknowledged the system isn’t perfect, the process itself is highly intensive – far more than in any other country.

Since 9/11, the entire refugee background check process has been overhauled and enhanced. It can take anywhere from 18 to 24 months for an individual seeking refugee status to actually be cleared and admitted into the general population. That’s up to 2 years. Multiple checks and references are made, and there are plenty of interviews as well. It’s truly in-depth.

There is an excellent step by step explanation of the entire process here.

Furthermore, fully half of all individuals seeking refuge are eventually turned back. It’s not as if going through the whole process is any sort of guarantee to admission. All of the aforementioned steps inevitably weed out quite a few individuals throughout the process. If anything, there can be an argument for the process being a little too stringent.

Fears of potential troublemakers within the refugee population are generally unfounded. Most of the refugees coming from Syria are women and children, for starters. Only 2% are men of “combat age.” And there has been no evidence to suggest that a significant percentage of the young men are inherent risks.

Any group of people will have its bad apples. It’s ridiculous to imply that the bad apples that may be speckled in among the Syrians would be any worse than the bad apples among any other refugee groups.

I’ve spoken with those who are critical of allowing refugees to enter the country. Many of them aren’t inherently xenophobic. Many have stated that they simply want their children to be safe. How does one argue against that? Of course we want our children to be safe. And when all somebody sees on the news is war, terror, crime, and fear… well, it’s understandable why Syrian refugees can seem scary.

Political figures who have been opponents of refugee admission have appealed to those emotional responses. They emphasize the dangers posed by potential extremists. People like Donald Trump want you to be worried about your children. But it’s not because he cares about your children. His entire campaign, and now the entire 2016 GOP platform, it’s based on fear. Fear of Muslims, Mexicans, Black Lives Matter, China, crime, and terror. Fear of the Other.

Many people are uncomfortable with their place in the world. Many people are scared of change. Trump has tapped into that fear, and has legitimized the ugliness that is often generated by those fears. When people are afraid, they’re more likely to respond favorably to a strongman figure. Authoritarianism suddenly feels safe. In fact, it doesn’t feel like authoritarianism at all to many.

Here’s the thing. Your children aren’t in any danger from refugees. No more than they are in danger from a multitude of homegrown threats. Adding more refugees to the population is actually more likely to aid a decrease in overall crime. Immigrants are statistically less likely to commit crime and mayhem than naturalized citizens.

It’s a lot more dangerous to walk among native American citizens than any group of refugees.

Your children are in far greater danger from gun violence, traffic crashes, animal attacks, illness, extreme weather, household accidents, and parental abuse than Syrians escaping war.

Since 9/11, around three quarters of a million refugees have been admitted to the United States, and a grand total of three of them have been charged with terror-related crimes.

American citizens have committed acts of terror at a higher rate than that.

The modern homegrown right-wing militia (and general extremist) movements have been responsible for more than twice as many deaths as Muslim extremists in the US since 9/11.

Gun violence kills more than 30,000 Americans every year. Homes with a gun stored on premises are significantly more likely to be the scene of a homicide or suicide. Your kids are in more danger of gun violence by a friend or family member (or themselves) than from Syrian refugees.

It’s not just crime, though.

In the last few years, vehicle collisions have been outpaced by firearms as a killer of Americans. Nevertheless, a little more than 30,000 people in the United States die every year from more than 5 million total crashes. 2 and half million injuries occur from these crashes. And this actually represents a huge drop in fatalities (per capita) from the 1969 peak. Now, around 10 people die per year per 100,000 compared with 26 per 100k back then. But even with that drop, the equivalent of the population of Fairbanks, Alaska, dies every year in car accidents, and the population of Chicago is injured.

Even on a smaller scale, there are plenty of other threats more deadly to Americans than Islamic terrorism.

130 people die a year colliding with deer.

Nearly 100 people die each year from bee and wasp stings.

30-40 people are killed by dogs.

20-25 are killed by cows.

Worldwide, mosquitoes are responsible for more than 600,000 deaths a year. That’s the population of Denver.

Hippos kill nearly 3000 in Africa alone every year.

Back to Americans, you know what else is dangerous? Furniture. 30 Americans die every year, and nearly 40,000 are injured, thanks to falls from chairs and tables, collapsing shelves, and so on. Maybe the GOP should open hearings against IKEA.

How about the flu? Yep, that common illness that so many people shrug off actually kills tens of thousands of Americans every year. In a particularly deadly 2004, 48,000 people died from the flu. That would completely fill most Major League baseball stadiums beyond capacity.

How about our diets? 610,000 Americans – the approximate population of Denver again – die each year from heart disease.

Perhaps we should worry more about what we feed our children, and how much exercise they get, than about ISIS.

I’ll admit to being a little unfair here. Terrorism is a real threat, and it has killed Americans. Obviously we should screen people who enter the United States. We should investigate to make sure they don’t pose a threat to our lives and livelihoods.

Guess what, though? We already do. Thoroughly. As mentioned at the start of this piece, it’s actually really difficult to declare oneself as a refugee and then gain entry into the US general population. Legitimate threats and an enormous tragedy helped spur this process.

At this point, the risk of death, destruction, and mayhem caused by Syrian refugees really isn’t what we should be thinking of. It should be the images of dead and injured children. Images of destroyed cities. Images of masses of displaced people, crowded on boats. These are the people we are arguing over. These are the people who have no homes, nothing to go back to. They are displaced from their lives. It is within our capability to help. It is something America has done for years. We have taken in more than 100,000 Iraqi refugees that were largely displaced by our own actions. We accepted 800,000 Vietnamese after the Vietnam war.

This is humanitarianism at its most basic. There are people we can help. We have a precedent of helping people. We have the means to do prevent and reduce risks from those people. There is even a strong national security argument for accepting more refugees. Relations with the Middle East as a whole are generally shaky for the United States. Many people from Muslim majority nations view America with distrust at best. Helping those displaced by conflict from that part of the world will help relations and understanding.

So, with all that said, what’s the hold-up? Is it cowardice? Is it politics? Is it the kind of gridlock that has defined Washington DC of the Obama Era?

Why are we still making excuses? The danger is minimal. The advantages are powerful. And the simple fact is that we have an obligation as humans to help those in need, when possible. Don’t turn your backs on those in need. Don’t succumb to fear and paranoia. That’s where the real danger lies. FDR warned us of that 83 years ago. It still holds true today.

As always here are further links explaining this better than I can:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2015/11/20/infographic-screening-process-refugee-entry-united-states

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/nov/15/jeb-bush/jeb-bush-it-takes-almost-year-refugee-be-processed/

http://www.factcheck.org/2016/08/false-gop-theme-unvetted-refugees/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/07/02/surprise-donald-trump-is-wrong-about-immigrants-and-crime/

http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-mythical-connection-between-immigrants-and-crime-1436916798

http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2012/06/public-study-illegal-immigrants-commit-less-crime-than-americans/

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/oct/05/viral-image/fact-checking-comparison-gun-deaths-and-terrorism-/

http://www.pri.org/stories/2016-08-08/it-s-now-clear-most-syrian-refugees-coming-united-states-are-women-and-children

http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/animals/stories/11-animals-more-likely-to-kill-you-than-sharks

http://io9.gizmodo.com/cows-are-deadlier-than-you-ever-knew-1690950434

http://www.vox.com/2016/8/18/12387600/susan-rice-vox

http://www.vox.com/2014/10/17/6988377/threats-to-americans-ranked-ebola-isis-russia-furniture

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/06/americans-are-as-likely-to-be-killed-by-their-own-furniture-as-by-terrorism/258156/

Posted in foreign policy, immigration, Media, Myths and misconceptions, Politics | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

White defensiveness

Posted on July 7, 2016 by hbreck

“Not all cops” and “blue lives matter” is just as stupid as “not all men” and “all lives matter.”

It’s defensive deflection. It’s someone (usually of a privileged group), taking the fact that certain groups are disproportionately victimized, as a personal affront.

Well, get over yourselves.

This isn’t about you, personally.

Obviously, any reasonable person is aware that all lives matter and not all cops and so on and so on. That’s not the point at all. If you live in America, and you are anything other than a cis straight white male, you’ve been dealt some major societal disadvantages.

As we just saw yet again yesterday (and the day before), black men are killed by police in far higher numbers (proportionally) than other groups. The proper reaction to this fact isn’t to freak out about those poor cops. It’s not to rant and rave about riots. It’s definitely not to try to smear Alton Sterling or Philando Castile.

The proper reaction – this is mostly directed at white people – is to try to figure out how to stop this from happening again. All that anger, all that defensiveness… that’s a lot of misapplied energy that could go into calling out racism and policy mistreatment where it exists.

If you read this, and want to immediately argue and deny it, or start digging for statistics to prove me wrong –  you’re the problem I’m talking about. And you’re NOT LISTENING.

If someone tells you there’s a boot on their neck, you don’t tell them, “It’s not my boot,” or “maybe you did something to deserve it,” or, “I don’t see any boot.” If you say any of those things, then it might as well be your boot.

A lot of people take this personally. But that just makes it about them. Which is part of the initial problem!

As a white person, you have things better in America than everyone else. This is simply a fact. Not an attack. A fact.

There’s no shame in having privilege… as long as that privilege is used to make the world a better place. White people, use your disproportionate power and influence to help change our system. Quit hiding behind a wall of denial and defense. Talk to people.

More importantly, listen to them.
When in doubt, listen.
When not in doubt, listen.

That’s how learning starts.

Posted in Civil Rights, Law Enforcement, Quick post, Rant, Social Justice | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Police as Executioners

Posted on July 6, 2016 by hbreck

In Baton Rouge this past Tuesday, police shot 37 year-old Alton Sterling as he lay on the ground with no weapons in his hands. The father of five was murdered. There’s no other way to describe it. He was physically assaulted, knocked to the ground, and shot to death as he lay defenseless.

And, like several other prominent deaths in recent years, it was captured on video.

Almost as soon as news of the slaying was released, there were those railing against his criminal record, his supposed sins and failings. Once again, “police have a hard job,” and “not all cops are bad” were refrains from the social media warriors.

And once again, people of color have been given another reason to feel marginalized and under constant threat. Once again, all Americans have another reason to distrust interactions with police, but especially those who aren’t white males.

Once again, police were seen killing someone for no reason.

Police in America have the authority (and weapons) to employ deadly force if deemed necessary. From a purely statistical standpoint, deadly force from police has actually been reduced from decades past. However, in this age of instantaneous information, we now know when police blatantly betray their public trust and murder those who were not a threat. And reduced or not, it still occurs, and is still a serious problem. People are speaking up now. The Black Lives Matter movements has arisen from the outrage over police shooting unarmed (mostly) black citizens. Sometimes unrest of a more violent kind emerges. Is it a good thing? Maybe not, but people (especially privileged white people) shouldn’t be surprised when a group that’s had a boot on their neck for centuries finally gets sick of the damn boot and tries to do something about it.

Are some police shootings justified? Probably. It’s difficult to argue that someone shooting at a cop has a good argument for being victims if they are shot in return. But that’s not what we’re talking about.

In 2015, police killed nearly 1000 people across America. 90 of those were unarmed. In recent years, that ratio has held, and about 1 in 10 people killed by police have not been armed. When police are already armed with so much – their authority, their words, their training (both physical and mental), batons, tasers, pepper spray, AND firearms –  it’s difficult to justify those situations where someone with no weapons at all is killed. And now, with powerful cameras in almost everyone’s pocket, it’s harder for police to get away with it. Well, at least until it’s time for prosecution. Then they seem to frequently get away with it, video evidence be damned.

And blacks (and other POCs) are disproportionately more likely to be killed in confrontations by police, even moreso when unarmed. This suggests systemic bias. It’s not that unarmed whites aren’t killed by police, but the odds are a far worse for black and Latino citizens.

Of course unrest is going to happen. When people feel oppressed, they’re bound to push back eventually. Instead of denying the oppression, defenders of these shootings should be trying to understand the oppression, and helping to change it. Being privileged isn’t the problem. It’s when the privileged deny their status, and refuse to use their advantages to help improve the common good.

What needs to happen? Better training for police? Fewer weapons? More body cameras? More oversight? Actual prosecution of these incidents?

Probably all of the above, but perhaps the biggest issue is cultural. Police departments often don’t comprise members of the community they police. Many departments aren’t demographically representative of their cities. This was brought to light especially with the events in Ferguson, Missouri, where a majority black city was policed by a majority white force. And that makes a huge difference. People are more likely to treat their fellow citizens as “others” when they have no stake in them.

But there’s got to be more even still. We need to rethink how police departments work. We need to reconsider the level of authority they are entrusted with, and how they are trained to respond. Instead of merely reacting to crime, police departments should put more effort into proactively addressing the causes of crime. And those politicians who appropriate funds for police departments need to understand that simply throwing more armed and badged bodies at a rough neighborhood isn’t likely to improve that neighborhood. There is no one solution to the problem, but much of it requires more effort by our political system. Which in turn requires more effort by voters.

In the next few weeks, I’ll be writing more about this, and I’ll be touching on the legislative aspect of the legal system.

Meanwhile, unarmed people are still being butchered. They deserve to be remembered.

This is an incomplete list, but I want to mention at least a few people who were horribly slaughtered in recent years by those who have been trusted with protecting them. Please remember that part. The police are specifically granted power to – among other things –  keep the citizens safe. Instead, they did the opposite, and have appeared to single individuals out for racial reasons, and killed, instead of protected. And thus far, most have not been prosecuted, and those that have been charged have largely been acquitted.

Please take some time, click on these links, and learn about these lives snuffed out. The first step for justice for these people is for the public to be aware of what’s happened. Read and learn and speak up.

Posted in Civil Rights, Law Enforcement, Social Justice | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Brexit Lemmings

Posted on June 30, 2016 by hbreck

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So, last week, the United Kingdom did it. They voted narrowly to leave the European Union.

Well, kind of.

Okay, actually, they didn’t. This was a referendum among the citizenry to ascertain popular opinion about the EU. The actual process of leaving the EU requires the British government to invoke Article 50 of the 2007 Lisbon Treaty and declare official intent to leave the European Union. And then from there is a two to ten year process in which the British government has to hammer out trade, transport, and military deals with each of the 27 remaining countries in the Union.

Article 50 is also a somewhat vague document, and has not actually been used yet, so nobody completely knows just how it will work. But for the moment, the UK has not actually triggered it just yet. So, for now, everything about exiting the EU is speculative.

It’s interesting to me that the British nativists that voted to leave the EU apparently didn’t think about what that would mean for the integrity of their country. Not just the negative economic impacts (which I think they underestimated), but the fact that Scotland and Northern Ireland may very well break away – and then rejoin the EU. England and Wales alone – without an EU membership – is a weaker and less influential nation than the United Kingdom as we knew it just last week.

Are there decent arguments for Britain leaving the EU? Perhaps.

But most of those weren’t addressed by the LEAVE campaign. Instead, simple dog-whistle politics came into play, with a strong undercurrent of xenophobia guiding the anti-EU crowd.

“They’re taking our jobs” is a refrain all too familiar to American voters, who have been duped by fear-mongers into shaking with terror at the brown horde swarming over our southern border, taking our jobs, committing horrific crimes, and depressing our economy.

Or not, as it turns out.

Net migration from Mexico is almost zero at this point.

It also has been known for years that immigrants are actually less likely to commit crime than the general population.

They’re also more likely to pay more into the system (via taxes) than they receive back (services) than native citizens.

Of course, immigration isn’t exactly the same in the UK, and the open-border policy of the European Union sometimes leads to greater tensions in smaller areas. But studies have shown that areas with large amounts of immigrants have actually seen reduced crime levels, not more. And the supposed strain on services is as overstated there as it is in the US.

The UK is a significantly LESS ethnically diverse nation than the US, but tensions are often just as high. Perhaps the smaller land area plays a role – people tend to be crowded into smaller areas, which can aid unrest.

In any event, politicians (particularly, but not exclusively Tory) in the UK have spent months stoking fears of immigration problems, telling voters that remaining in the European Union would only bring more of these issues. Human excrement launcher and former London mayor Boris Johnson told his country thanks to the EU, the sky was falling, and the only way to hold it up was to kick out those awful multi-culturalists from the Continent.

Economic and regulatory claims were used as well, albeit often in simplistic and exaggerated ways. The famous example of multiple regulations on pillows (among other items) was greatly overstated, while ignoring the benefits of easy commerce.

Unintended (or possibly even intended) consequences were ignored and glossed over by the LEAVE campaign. “Short-sighted” is the best way to describe the various LEAVE advocates… well, maybe after “racist,” “ignorant,” “dishonest,” and “fear-mongering,” of course.

Regardless, short-sightedness is a particularly dangerous mentality.

This sort of mentality – where immediate fears trump long-term planning – is the same problem that causes some of the United States’ biggest issues:

  • Congressional Republicans deny the very existence of climate change, and those that do admit it’s a real thing either downplay it, or claim that nothing can or should be done. Meanwhile, the extreme problems that will result from ignoring it are going to greatly impact their children and grandchildren. They are pissing away their future based on fear and greed. Fear of regulation, fear of angering corporate backers, and apparently fear of an electorate that’s actually more liberal than many of the representatives they elect.
  • The constant drumbeat from the right for trickle-down economics… this incessant march toward flattening and reducing taxes, while cutting only the tiny slivers of government spending that helps citizens (while increasing the military budget) greatly boosts the deficits they rail against. It’s an amusing irony that Republicans frequently win elections deriding “tax and spend” policies of their Democratic opponents, all while pursuing fiscal policies that have already failed them on both the national level and state levels. This short-sightedness is entirely about helping their special interests (large businesses and the richest individual citizens) gain as much as possible in the sort-term, while ignoring any sort of long-term economic gain. Reaganomics increased inequality (decreasing overall wages in all but the top income quintile), increased the budget deficit (and then the national debt). It has long since been shown that significantly reducing taxes on the rich does *not* drive economic activity enough to make up for the revenue loss. This has been proven, but is STILL treated as fiscal orthodoxy by most nationally-elected Republicans.
  • Nuclear proliferation, and the current nuclear deterrence policy. The entire Cold War was an exercise in paranoia and… yep, you guessed it, short-sightedness. Constructing tens of thousands of nuclear weapons (when a couple hundred would still annihilate most of the planet) was an example of immediately gratifying fear and militarism, while ignoring the long-term consequences. Right now, 25 years after the Cold War ended, with multiple arms treaties and arsenal reductions since then, the United States still has several thousand nuclear weapons on hair-triggers, ready to destroy almost every major city and military installation east of the Black Sea. We still have the capability to destroy ourselves several times over, despite the multitude of near-misses and close calls throughout the 20th century. If more Americans knew just how many times we nearly nuked ourselves over the years, there would be much more popular support for disarmament. As it stands, our nuclear policy, from 1945 up to now, is a great example of not looking to the future.

Can we see into the future? No, of course not. Trying to predict with certainty what will or won’t happen is nearly impossible. But we can certainly analyze what MIGHT happen and what is statistically most likely to occur.

Splitting from the European Union would, as mentioned in the link above, require up to a decade of political and diplomatic uncertainty. While the UK would likely still remain militarily allied with most of Europe (as well as the US), there is no guarantee of what might end up happening once all is said and done. The overall economic stability of the continent has already been affected, and will likely remain weaker for some time to come.

The UK, as it stands, has (depending on the method of measurement) the fourth or fifth largest economy in the world, and the fourth or fifth largest military. That’s just the UK by itself, without the EU.  While not part of the shared currency, the UK is still deeply intertwined economically with the rest of Europe, and cutting down those ties will weaken both Europe and the UK, at least for several years.

Meanwhile, within Britain itself, much turmoil is occurring. Scotland is only a year removed from attempting to split from the UK, and it was a close call then. The Scots are significantly more liberal and Euro-friendly than the rest of the UK, and voted overwhelmingly to stay in the EU. Many in Scotland are already calling for a new referendum to leave the Kingdom, and become a fully independent nation – one which would almost immediately petition to join the EU.

Just across the North Channel in Northern Ireland, citizens there have reacted in a similar manner to the Scots. They also voted to remain in the EU, and now as a reaction to the “Brexit” vote, have begun discussing reunification with the rest of Ireland.

So, in theory, leaving the EU would also mean the UK itself could dissolve. Losing Scotland and Northern Ireland would be damaging to the British economy and infrastructure. 11% of the British population and more than a third of its physical territory would be gone. The economic impact of 7 million people leaving the labor force would be huge.

A significant percentage of the British military is based in Scotland, especially the Navy, and much of the British nuclear arsenal.

The Scots would certainly annex much of the UK’s military resources (though they have already stated they don’t want the nukes), leaving England and Wales to have to rebuild that aspect as well.

Finally, there’s the matter regarding immigration – the centerpiece of the LEAVE campaign. There actually isn’t a great deal of evidence yet that leaving the EU will greatly reduce net immigration to whatever remains of the UK.

Belonging to EU meant the UK had an open border with the other EU countries. However, the UK actually controlled its own immigration from non-EU states, which amounted to around half of total immigration. And if the UK remains in the European Economic Area, the same way non-member Norway is, than very little may actually change from an immigration standpoint.

Buyer’s remorse

So, there’s a lot to consider with the UK leaving the EU. Both politicians and voters appear to have not fully considered the consequences of their decision. Indeed, many Brits have apparently admitted to making a mistake in voting LEAVE, and an astounding number seem to have not fully understood what they were voting for.

So, we come back to short-sightedness. That, and a general lack of… we’ll say careful consideration, for the outcome of big decisions. We screw that kind of thing up in America all the time. The Brits have gotten a taste of that this month.

UK Prime Minster David Cameron came into office promising to hold a “Brexit” vote. Then he spent the whole time leading up to the vote fighting for the REMAIN side. Aaaand… it bit him hard, right in the ass. Now THAT’S short-sighted.

Will it turn out alright in the end? Maybe. But – should they have put themselves into this uncertain mess so blindly? Hey, we do it. And we’ll get a chance to do it again this November.

In an interconnected world of 7.3 billion people, major political decisions can impact EVERYONE. We can’t afford to be selfish. This is chess we’re playing. We can’t just move a bishop across the board without thinking about that pawn on the other side, defended by its own bishop. Everything has a reaction. Maybe we should start looking before we leap.

 

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