I'm not going to "let the other side do what they wish" when what they wish is to kill black people at traffic stops, chain gay men to fences, shoot up synagogues, and so forth. Your "bothsidesism" is fatuous at best, and murderous at worst.
That’s fine, you just need to accept that such a position is never going to lead to a depolarisation of US politics other than via the total eradication of one side or the other.
Just out of curiosity, what's the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"? That doesn't seem like something where there's a compromise halfway in the middle.
That was the whole point of my initial post. The US has two sides that are completely unwilling to give an inch to the other, and that don’t really break down along geographical lines such that splitting into two countries is a realistic option. So what options are left? How does the situation get resolved? Is some form of non-territorial, guerilla civil war inevitable, or is there another way?
When it comes to fascism you either fight it (not necessarily violently), you join it or you die.
You started out attacking me for bothsideism, and now a few hours later here you are being just as gung-ho, fight-or-die, we-must-never-surrender as any of the trumpistas who stormed the capitol. My point is being proved over and over.
No, the US has one side that's completely unwilling to give an inch to the other. The other side seems to think that killing just a few less black folk is okay and that's what the compromise should be.
When it comes to fascism you either fight it (not necessarily violently), you join it or you die.
You started out attacking me for bothsideism, and now a few hours later here you are being just as gung-ho, fight-or-die, we-must-never-surrender as any of the trumpistas who stormed the capitol. My point is being proved over and over.
@Arethosemyfeet 's position is entirely congruent with attacking your 'bothsideism'. There is no side here but fascist and not-fascist. Pick one. We can sort things out once the fash are gone.
Will not really happen, but might people decide to move where people are thinking more like themselves, thus making splitting the country easy. I know of 3 friends who worship Trump to have taken their families and re-located to red states in the past four years.
I'm not going to "let the other side do what they wish" when what they wish is to kill black people at traffic stops, chain gay men to fences, shoot up synagogues, and so forth. Your "bothsidesism" is fatuous at best, and murderous at worst.
That’s fine, you just need to accept that such a position is never going to lead to a depolarisation of US politics other than via the total eradication of one side or the other.
Just out of curiosity, what's the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"? That doesn't seem like something where there's a compromise halfway in the middle.
That was the whole point of my initial post. The US has two sides that are completely unwilling to give an inch to the other, and that don’t really break down along geographical lines such that splitting into two countries is a realistic option. So what options are left? How does the situation get resolved? Is some form of non-territorial, guerilla civil war inevitable, or is there another way?
I'd also like to know your answer to Croesos' question, Marvin - what is the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"?
People, stop thinking of this as a normal court trial. You can’t take him into custody, there’s no bail, there’s no pardon and the only remedies Congress can inflict are removal from office (too late), a ban from future public office, and the loss of the usual post presidential perks. This is the best we can do until January 21, when he ceases to be a sitting president and becomes immediately liable to criminal charges in the ordinary court systems.
Sounds good to me.
Congress will do none of the above. What criminal charges?
I'm not going to "let the other side do what they wish" when what they wish is to kill black people at traffic stops, chain gay men to fences, shoot up synagogues, and so forth. Your "bothsidesism" is fatuous at best, and murderous at worst.
That’s fine, you just need to accept that such a position is never going to lead to a depolarisation of US politics other than via the total eradication of one side or the other.
Just out of curiosity, what's the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"? That doesn't seem like something where there's a compromise halfway in the middle.
That was the whole point of my initial post. The US has two sides that are completely unwilling to give an inch to the other, and that don’t really break down along geographical lines such that splitting into two countries is a realistic option. So what options are left? How does the situation get resolved? Is some form of non-territorial, guerilla civil war inevitable, or is there another way?
I'd also like to know your answer to Croesos' question, Marvin - what is the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"?
I don't know. It's entirely possible that there isn't one. In which case there is no way for the political problems in the US to be resolved other than splitting the country into two so that both sides can have the country they want, or the complete eradication of one side or the other.
It's entirely possible that the country is already so far gone that neither side even wants there to be any other solution. The responses to my posts certainly suggest that. Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo it is, then...
People, stop thinking of this as a normal court trial. You can’t take him into custody, there’s no bail, there’s no pardon and the only remedies Congress can inflict are removal from office (too late), a ban from future public office, and the loss of the usual post presidential perks. This is the best we can do until January 21, when he ceases to be a sitting president and becomes immediately liable to criminal charges in the ordinary court systems.
Sounds good to me.
Congress will do none of the above. What criminal charges?
Those awaiting him after next week, for tax fraud, assaulting women, and I know not what else - at least, so US Shipmates have indicated in the past.
As to Congress, and again I await correction, I understood that the ban on standing for public office in the future, and the loss of post-presidency perks, were automatically the result of a successful impeachment (but the whole process is a bit complicated, so I may be wrong).
ISTM that those results would be a suitable punishment, if that's all that can be achieved.
I'm not going to "let the other side do what they wish" when what they wish is to kill black people at traffic stops, chain gay men to fences, shoot up synagogues, and so forth. Your "bothsidesism" is fatuous at best, and murderous at worst.
That’s fine, you just need to accept that such a position is never going to lead to a depolarisation of US politics other than via the total eradication of one side or the other.
Just out of curiosity, what's the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"? That doesn't seem like something where there's a compromise halfway in the middle.
That was the whole point of my initial post. The US has two sides that are completely unwilling to give an inch to the other, and that don’t really break down along geographical lines such that splitting into two countries is a realistic option. So what options are left? How does the situation get resolved? Is some form of non-territorial, guerilla civil war inevitable, or is there another way?
I'd also like to know your answer to Croesos' question, Marvin - what is the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"?
I don't know. It's entirely possible that there isn't one.
Entirely possible? Entirely possible?
Fucking hell. It's entirely possible you're a fucking disgrace.
It's entirely possible that the country is already so far gone that neither side even wants there to be any other solution. The responses to my posts certainly suggest that. Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo it is, then...
Or rather Reconstruction 2: this time with added de-Nazification.
I'm not going to "let the other side do what they wish" when what they wish is to kill black people at traffic stops, chain gay men to fences, shoot up synagogues, and so forth. Your "bothsidesism" is fatuous at best, and murderous at worst.
That’s fine, you just need to accept that such a position is never going to lead to a depolarisation of US politics other than via the total eradication of one side or the other.
Just out of curiosity, what's the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"? That doesn't seem like something where there's a compromise halfway in the middle.
That was the whole point of my initial post. The US has two sides that are completely unwilling to give an inch to the other, and that don’t really break down along geographical lines such that splitting into two countries is a realistic option. So what options are left? How does the situation get resolved? Is some form of non-territorial, guerilla civil war inevitable, or is there another way?
I'd also like to know your answer to Croesos' question, Marvin - what is the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"?
I don't know. It's entirely possible that there isn't one. In which case there is no way for the political problems in the US to be resolved other than splitting the country into two so that both sides can have the country they want, or the complete eradication of one side or the other.
It's entirely possible that the country is already so far gone that neither side even wants there to be any other solution. The responses to my posts certainly suggest that. Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo it is, then...
For fuck’s sake, Marvin. Do you not know what the word “lynching” means?
James Comey was on Colbert the other night, and had what I thought was a persuasive argument against federal criminal charges against Trump. Appearing in federal court in DC will allow him to Be On The Teevee literally every day for the next three years. Which is exactly what his narcissism wants.
He didn't see a problem with allowing the State of New York to pursue the tax charges.
James Comey was on Colbert the other night, and had what I thought was a persuasive argument against federal criminal charges against Trump. Appearing in federal court in DC will allow him to Be On The Teevee literally every day for the next three years. Which is exactly what his narcissism wants.
He didn't see a problem with allowing the State of New York to pursue the tax charges.
His narcissism wants adulation, not merely attention. Being subjected to actual scrutiny and forced to answer questions and threatened with contempt of court when he starts ranting about fraud and hoaxes instead of doing so (or taking the 5th) will likely result in him imploding on live TV. Trump has rarely (never?) been on TV in a situation he didn't almost completely control, I don't think he'd cope well with being properly interrogated. Recall the lengths his team went to to stop him answering questions from the Muller investigation for fear he'd perjure himself before he even sat down.
@Marvin the Martian in the 1930s. "What's the middle ground between gassing Jews and not gassing Jews?" "I don't know. It's entirely possible there isn't one."
This shit doesn't belong here at all. I'm genuinely appalled.
I understood that the ban on standing for public office in the future, and the loss of post-presidency perks, were automatically the result of a successful impeachment (but the whole process is a bit complicated, so I may be wrong).
Any pie in which the government has its thumb is much more than "a bit complicated." Otherwise every doctor's office in the whole country would be dispensing covid vaccine by now.
@Marvin the Martian in the 1930s. "What's the middle ground between gassing Jews and not gassing Jews?" "I don't know. It's entirely possible there isn't one."
This shit doesn't belong here at all. I'm genuinely appalled.
Remember that the eventual solution to that problem was World War 2. Tens of millions of people died. If that's where denying even the possibility of a middle ground takes us then is asking whether one might somehow be found really so far beyond the pale?
And again, I'm not saying I know where that middle ground is or even if it exists. It's just that I don't want there to be another bloody war, and that seems to be where a lot of this "wipe them out" rhetoric is going.
It was not, it is a myth that ww2 was fought to stop genocide.
Quite. If Hitler had kept to running his country how we wanted, he'd probably have been left to it. Middle ground you see - just don't bother us and we won't bother you.
IIRC there was a (perhaps non-serious) suggestion, some time ago (at the beginning of the Reign of The Mad Orange God-King?), that California should secede from the Union.
Another possible breakaway, I suppose, might be Texas.
And again, I'm not saying I know where that middle ground is or even if it exists.
That you even think there might be a middle ground is horrific. Your moral compass is not just adrift, it's been smashed and thrown in the bin. And I'm almost certain that you did the smashing and the binning.
It's just that I don't want there to be another bloody war, and that seems to be where a lot of this "wipe them out" rhetoric is going.
Maybe you should stop ascribing “wipe them out” rhetoric to people who aren’t using it.
How else should I interpret phrases like "We can sort things out once the fash are gone."? It seems like a fairly unambiguous call to wipe out the fash to me. And I'm almost certain that's how Doc Tor intended it as well.
Sounds like the two country option may be the best bet then.
Hardly. It wouldn't have worked out too well in an unmolested Germany for anyone Jewish, gay, disabled, Roma, the list goes on...
And it wouldn't work out well for anyone black, gay, trans, atheist or otherwise despised in Trumpland, either.
OK, fair enough.
So we can't let them have their own country where they can follow whatever beliefs they like, and we can't let them follow their beliefs in our countries either. And they're not going to just spontaneously disappear or stop trying to live according to their beliefs. What do we do? Lock them all up? Forcibly change their beliefs? Kill them?
Prosecute when they break the law. Leave them to believe whatever small-minded misanthropic shit they want to in private. Don't vote for them. Encourage others not to. Expose the true extent of their unpleasantness.
Sounds like the two country option may be the best bet then.
Hardly. It wouldn't have worked out too well in an unmolested Germany for anyone Jewish, gay, disabled, Roma, the list goes on...
And it wouldn't work out well for anyone black, gay, trans, atheist or otherwise despised in Trumpland, either.
OK, fair enough.
So we can't let them have their own country where they can follow whatever beliefs they like, and we can't let them follow their beliefs in our countries either. And they're not going to just spontaneously disappear or stop trying to live according to their beliefs. What do we do? Lock them all up? Forcibly change their beliefs? Kill them?
Well, if their “belief” is (e.g.) that they should be allowed to lynch black people and they act on it, why shouldn’t they go to prison? Does that seem so crazy to you?
If I decide that murder is my preferred lifestyle, are you going to argue my right to act in accordance with my beliefs?
Hardly. It wouldn't have worked out too well in an unmolested Germany for anyone Jewish, gay, disabled, Roma, the list goes on...
And it wouldn't work out well for anyone black, gay, trans, atheist or otherwise despised in Trumpland, either.
OK, fair enough.
So we can't let them have their own country where they can follow whatever beliefs they like, and we can't let them follow their beliefs in our countries either. And they're not going to just spontaneously disappear or stop trying to live according to their beliefs. What do we do? Lock them all up? Forcibly change their beliefs? Kill them?
Well, if their “belief” is (e.g.) that they should be allowed to lynch black people and they act on it, why shouldn’t they go to prison? Does that seem so crazy to you?
If I decide that murder is my preferred lifestyle, are you going to argue my right to act in accordance with my beliefs?
This is the form such "compromises" always seem to take. You're supposed to recognize as legitimate @Marvin the Martian's right to lynch black people and @Marvin the Martian will recognize your right to criticize him for lynching black people. And thus peace and comity is restored. Unless you're black. If you're black you're not regarded as an active participant in this transaction, just a bargaining chip whose rights and safety can be traded away in pursuit of a desolation called "peace".
This is the form such "compromises" always seem to take. You're supposed to recognize as legitimate @Marvin the Martian's right to lynch black people and @Marvin the Martian will recognize your right to criticize him for lynching black people. And thus peace and comity is restored. Unless you're black. If you're black you're not regarded as an active participant in this transaction, just a bargaining chip whose rights and safety can be traded away in pursuit of a desolation called "peace".
Then multiply this for LGBTQ+, women who don't want to be barefoot and pregnant and dependent upon a man, Muslims, Hispanics/Latinos/Latinas, and anybody else who threatens the fragile cishet white masculinity of their leaders. Which is very fragile indeed.
It's just that I don't want there to be another bloody war, and that seems to be where a lot of this "wipe them out" rhetoric is going.
Maybe you should stop ascribing “wipe them out” rhetoric to people who aren’t using it.
How else should I interpret phrases like "We can sort things out once the fash are gone."? It seems like a fairly unambiguous call to wipe out the fash to me. And I'm almost certain that's how Doc Tor intended it as well.
Oh do fuck off.
The difference between the fascists and the anti-fascists? The antifascists would much rather sit at home with a nice cup of tea, and perhaps a biscuit, and all it would take would be for the fascists to sit at home as well. But no, they keep doing that marching and murdering thing, and the police seem curiously impotent at stopping them, so it's up to ordinary decent people to chase them home again.
The idea that I want to kill them all is simply a product of your diseased mind. Get a grip.
Sounds like the two country option may be the best bet then.
Hardly. It wouldn't have worked out too well in an unmolested Germany for anyone Jewish, gay, disabled, Roma, the list goes on...
And it wouldn't work out well for anyone black, gay, trans, atheist or otherwise despised in Trumpland, either.
OK, fair enough.
So we can't let them have their own country where they can follow whatever beliefs they like, and we can't let them follow their beliefs in our countries either. And they're not going to just spontaneously disappear or stop trying to live according to their beliefs. What do we do? Lock them all up? Forcibly change their beliefs? Kill them?
How is locking them up or changing their beliefs worse than creating a country where they're free to terrorize and murder Black people (and anyone else who is not a cishet white man)? Because we already had chattel slavery in the South, and there was a war to end that shit.
Time to put another nail in that coffin, and if that means locking up a bunch of attempted murderers, I'm good. We have the jail space: we can let out all the non-violent Black (and brown) people who got locked up on racist charges.
James Comey was on Colbert the other night, and had what I thought was a persuasive argument against federal criminal charges against Trump. Appearing in federal court in DC will allow him to Be On The Teevee literally every day for the next three years. Which is exactly what his narcissism wants.
He didn't see a problem with allowing the State of New York to pursue the tax charges.
His narcissism wants adulation, not merely attention. Being subjected to actual scrutiny and forced to answer questions and threatened with contempt of court when he starts ranting about fraud and hoaxes instead of doing so (or taking the 5th) will likely result in him imploding on live TV. Trump has rarely (never?) been on TV in a situation he didn't almost completely control, I don't think he'd cope well with being properly interrogated. Recall the lengths his team went to to stop him answering questions from the Muller investigation for fear he'd perjure himself before he even sat down.
This is correct IMHO. In a courtroom he would not be able to screech over the judge, prosecutor, etc. as he did with the first presidential debate. Such behavior would earn him contempt of court charges in a heartbeat. And I don't think he knows any other way to behave.
As for him being plastered across the TV, that's likely no matter whether it's federal or state charges, and the state ones (and civil suits) are surely going forward. Plus the judges and/or news media might decide "enough is enough" and ring the curtain down on the video side of it.
Pragmatically, only one I can think of is forbidding the lynching of anyone--and strictly enforcing that, and sending violators to prison. Don't lynch African Americans. Don't lynch anyone. Those white people who think that would be a shame might consider that demographics are shifting; lots of non-whites want justice and revenge; and lyncher/lynchee roles might reverse.
So stopping all lynching might be safer for even the monsters who do it--and *that* might get through some of their twisty heads.
How is locking them up or changing their beliefs worse than creating a country where they're free to terrorize and murder Black people (and anyone else who is not a cishet white man)?
My assumption about creating a new country is that we could ensure there aren’t any black people there right from the start. Let them have their whites-only paradise, and leave them to it. With the added bonus that the rest of us can get on with life without any of the racists around.
How is locking them up or changing their beliefs worse than creating a country where they're free to terrorize and murder Black people (and anyone else who is not a cishet white man)?
My assumption about creating a new country is that we could ensure there aren’t any black people there right from the start. Let them have their whites-only paradise, and leave them to it. With the added bonus that the rest of us can get on with life without any of the racists around.
Ah, so you think forced population transfers are the way forward, but prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale? Your "compromise" position looks a lot like fascism. Plus, your "solution" might keep black people safer but it wouldn't help the gay, female, trans and/or atheist kids of the white supremacists.
How is locking them up or changing their beliefs worse than creating a country where they're free to terrorize and murder Black people (and anyone else who is not a cishet white man)?
My assumption about creating a new country is that we could ensure there aren’t any black people there right from the start. Let them have their whites-only paradise, and leave them to it. With the added bonus that the rest of us can get on with life without any of the racists around.
Looks like apartheid to me. It doesn’t work, even for the oppressors.
How is locking them up or changing their beliefs worse than creating a country where they're free to terrorize and murder Black people (and anyone else who is not a cishet white man)?
My assumption about creating a new country is that we could ensure there aren’t any black people there right from the start. Let them have their whites-only paradise, and leave them to it. With the added bonus that the rest of us can get on with life without any of the racists around.
The rest of “us”, says the guy who was musing about an acceptable middle ground between lynching and not lynching.
Ah, so you think forced population transfers are the way forward, but prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale?
I never said prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale.
Your "compromise" position looks a lot like fascism. Plus, your "solution" might keep black people safer but it wouldn't help the gay, female, trans and/or atheist kids of the white supremacists.
So the only option you’re willing to contemplate is total suppression of the white supremacists. Fine. Enjoy your war.
So the only option you’re willing to contemplate is total suppression of the white supremacists. Fine. Enjoy your war.
Right. Because partial and half-hearted suppression of white supremacism has been working really well.
It's not about enjoying war. It's about not enjoying seeing evil prevail.
Chamberlain thought he had found the middle ground with Hitler as he waved his little white paper after visiting Germany back in 1938, proclaiming 'peace in our time'. But by that time the general population of the nation had effectively compromised on how much violence directed towards the 'other' (Jews, black people, gay people etc) it was willing to tolerate. Democratically elected Nazism had legitimated the right to demonstrate hatred towards these groups, with the proviso that they themselves were NOT to be subjected to such demonstrations of intolerance or hatred; the surrounding nations considered that a 'domestic' matter for Germany alone. Britain's very shaky start to the fighting in WWII was a direct result of being caught out when the war began, because it had underestimated the effect of Germany's 'domestic' policies on a wider Europe.
Too late to close Pandora's box. That's what it feels like with the US. Theoretically, it's one thing to 'allow' destructive intolerance to be tolerated under the banner of free speech, freedom of conscience etc. But 'theoretically' destructive intolerance of the type shown in the Capitol Hill riots justifies the rioter to himself as being peculiarly free to break laws which others should keep.
So far as the US goes there are laws about living peacefully, not rioting, or inciting to riot etc, and outlawing racism-based violence etc. How can it be controversial to submit law-breakers to the rule of law? And yet that's precisely what is happening under the direct influence of President Trump.
So far as the US goes there are laws about living peacefully, not rioting, or inciting to riot etc, and outlawing racism-based violence etc. How can it be controversial to submit law-breakers to the rule of law? And yet that's precisely what is happening under the direct influence of President Trump.
Yes, I completely agree. And I’m asking if there’s any way to deescalate the situation or reverse the course the US is on. A question which apparently makes me as bad as the worst facist.
Ah, so you think forced population transfers are the way forward, but prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale?
I never said prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale.
Your "compromise" position looks a lot like fascism. Plus, your "solution" might keep black people safer but it wouldn't help the gay, female, trans and/or atheist kids of the white supremacists.
So the only option you’re willing to contemplate is total suppression of the white supremacists. Fine. Enjoy your war.
If you allow fascism to flourish you get war eventually anyway. If you fight it you have a chance of stopping it escalating to that point.
So the only option you’re willing to contemplate is total suppression of the white supremacists. Fine. Enjoy your war.
It would be your war too. I just don't know which side you'd be on.
The same one as you, against the fascists and racists. Honest.
That doesn’t mean I want to fight it though. I’d much rather try to find a way we can all just live together. Or at least live. Something like the Good Friday Agreement did for politics in Northern Ireland.
Ah, so you think forced population transfers are the way forward, but prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale?
I never said prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale.
Your "compromise" position looks a lot like fascism. Plus, your "solution" might keep black people safer but it wouldn't help the gay, female, trans and/or atheist kids of the white supremacists.
So the only option you’re willing to contemplate is total suppression of the white supremacists. Fine. Enjoy your war.
If you allow fascism to flourish you get war eventually anyway. If you fight it you have a chance of stopping it escalating to that point.
So fighting is the only way to avoid having to fight? Is this one of those “to save your life you must lose it” things?
So the only option you’re willing to contemplate is total suppression of the white supremacists. Fine. Enjoy your war.
It would be your war too. I just don't know which side you'd be on.
The same one as you, against the fascists and racists. Honest.
That doesn’t mean I want to fight it though. I’d much rather try to find a way we can all just live together. Or at least live. Something like the Good Friday Agreement did for politics in Northern Ireland.
Did you miss the bit where the IRA (and UDFagreed to stop murdering people?
Ah, so you think forced population transfers are the way forward, but prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale?
I never said prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale.
Your "compromise" position looks a lot like fascism. Plus, your "solution" might keep black people safer but it wouldn't help the gay, female, trans and/or atheist kids of the white supremacists.
So the only option you’re willing to contemplate is total suppression of the white supremacists. Fine. Enjoy your war.
If you allow fascism to flourish you get war eventually anyway. If you fight it you have a chance of stopping it escalating to that point.
So fighting is the only way to avoid having to fight? Is this one of those “to save your life you must lose it” things?
There are lots of forms of fighting that fall a long way short of outright war. In British anti-fascist history the Battle of Cable Street is probably the prototypical example, but UAF have faced down BNP, EDL and other far right thugs on British streets within the last couple of decades.
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That was the whole point of my initial post. The US has two sides that are completely unwilling to give an inch to the other, and that don’t really break down along geographical lines such that splitting into two countries is a realistic option. So what options are left? How does the situation get resolved? Is some form of non-territorial, guerilla civil war inevitable, or is there another way?
You started out attacking me for bothsideism, and now a few hours later here you are being just as gung-ho, fight-or-die, we-must-never-surrender as any of the trumpistas who stormed the capitol. My point is being proved over and over.
@Arethosemyfeet 's position is entirely congruent with attacking your 'bothsideism'. There is no side here but fascist and not-fascist. Pick one. We can sort things out once the fash are gone.
I'd also like to know your answer to Croesos' question, Marvin - what is the depolarized middle ground between "lynching black people" and "not lynching black people"?
Congress will do none of the above. What criminal charges?
I don't know. It's entirely possible that there isn't one. In which case there is no way for the political problems in the US to be resolved other than splitting the country into two so that both sides can have the country they want, or the complete eradication of one side or the other.
It's entirely possible that the country is already so far gone that neither side even wants there to be any other solution. The responses to my posts certainly suggest that. Civil War 2: Electric Boogaloo it is, then...
Those awaiting him after next week, for tax fraud, assaulting women, and I know not what else - at least, so US Shipmates have indicated in the past.
As to Congress, and again I await correction, I understood that the ban on standing for public office in the future, and the loss of post-presidency perks, were automatically the result of a successful impeachment (but the whole process is a bit complicated, so I may be wrong).
ISTM that those results would be a suitable punishment, if that's all that can be achieved.
Entirely possible? Entirely possible?
Fucking hell. It's entirely possible you're a fucking disgrace.
Or rather Reconstruction 2: this time with added de-Nazification.
He didn't see a problem with allowing the State of New York to pursue the tax charges.
His narcissism wants adulation, not merely attention. Being subjected to actual scrutiny and forced to answer questions and threatened with contempt of court when he starts ranting about fraud and hoaxes instead of doing so (or taking the 5th) will likely result in him imploding on live TV. Trump has rarely (never?) been on TV in a situation he didn't almost completely control, I don't think he'd cope well with being properly interrogated. Recall the lengths his team went to to stop him answering questions from the Muller investigation for fear he'd perjure himself before he even sat down.
This shit doesn't belong here at all. I'm genuinely appalled.
Any pie in which the government has its thumb is much more than "a bit complicated." Otherwise every doctor's office in the whole country would be dispensing covid vaccine by now.
But yes, I agree.
Remember that the eventual solution to that problem was World War 2. Tens of millions of people died. If that's where denying even the possibility of a middle ground takes us then is asking whether one might somehow be found really so far beyond the pale?
And again, I'm not saying I know where that middle ground is or even if it exists. It's just that I don't want there to be another bloody war, and that seems to be where a lot of this "wipe them out" rhetoric is going.
How do you see it playing out?
Quite. If Hitler had kept to running his country how we wanted, he'd probably have been left to it. Middle ground you see - just don't bother us and we won't bother you.
Another possible breakaway, I suppose, might be Texas.
That you even think there might be a middle ground is horrific. Your moral compass is not just adrift, it's been smashed and thrown in the bin. And I'm almost certain that you did the smashing and the binning.
Get some fucking help.
Hardly. It wouldn't have worked out too well in an unmolested Germany for anyone Jewish, gay, disabled, Roma, the list goes on...
And it wouldn't work out well for anyone black, gay, trans, atheist or otherwise despised in Trumpland, either.
Maybe you should stop ascribing “wipe them out” rhetoric to people who aren’t using it.
How else should I interpret phrases like "We can sort things out once the fash are gone."? It seems like a fairly unambiguous call to wipe out the fash to me. And I'm almost certain that's how Doc Tor intended it as well.
OK, fair enough.
So we can't let them have their own country where they can follow whatever beliefs they like, and we can't let them follow their beliefs in our countries either. And they're not going to just spontaneously disappear or stop trying to live according to their beliefs. What do we do? Lock them all up? Forcibly change their beliefs? Kill them?
Well, if their “belief” is (e.g.) that they should be allowed to lynch black people and they act on it, why shouldn’t they go to prison? Does that seem so crazy to you?
If I decide that murder is my preferred lifestyle, are you going to argue my right to act in accordance with my beliefs?
This is the form such "compromises" always seem to take. You're supposed to recognize as legitimate @Marvin the Martian's right to lynch black people and @Marvin the Martian will recognize your right to criticize him for lynching black people. And thus peace and comity is restored. Unless you're black. If you're black you're not regarded as an active participant in this transaction, just a bargaining chip whose rights and safety can be traded away in pursuit of a desolation called "peace".
Then multiply this for LGBTQ+, women who don't want to be barefoot and pregnant and dependent upon a man, Muslims, Hispanics/Latinos/Latinas, and anybody else who threatens the fragile cishet white masculinity of their leaders. Which is very fragile indeed.
Oh do fuck off.
The difference between the fascists and the anti-fascists? The antifascists would much rather sit at home with a nice cup of tea, and perhaps a biscuit, and all it would take would be for the fascists to sit at home as well. But no, they keep doing that marching and murdering thing, and the police seem curiously impotent at stopping them, so it's up to ordinary decent people to chase them home again.
The idea that I want to kill them all is simply a product of your diseased mind. Get a grip.
How is locking them up or changing their beliefs worse than creating a country where they're free to terrorize and murder Black people (and anyone else who is not a cishet white man)? Because we already had chattel slavery in the South, and there was a war to end that shit.
Time to put another nail in that coffin, and if that means locking up a bunch of attempted murderers, I'm good. We have the jail space: we can let out all the non-violent Black (and brown) people who got locked up on racist charges.
This is correct IMHO. In a courtroom he would not be able to screech over the judge, prosecutor, etc. as he did with the first presidential debate. Such behavior would earn him contempt of court charges in a heartbeat. And I don't think he knows any other way to behave.
As for him being plastered across the TV, that's likely no matter whether it's federal or state charges, and the state ones (and civil suits) are surely going forward. Plus the judges and/or news media might decide "enough is enough" and ring the curtain down on the video side of it.
Even Trump will be old news, eventually...
Pragmatically, only one I can think of is forbidding the lynching of anyone--and strictly enforcing that, and sending violators to prison. Don't lynch African Americans. Don't lynch anyone. Those white people who think that would be a shame might consider that demographics are shifting; lots of non-whites want justice and revenge; and lyncher/lynchee roles might reverse.
So stopping all lynching might be safer for even the monsters who do it--and *that* might get through some of their twisty heads.
Though not many of them.
My assumption about creating a new country is that we could ensure there aren’t any black people there right from the start. Let them have their whites-only paradise, and leave them to it. With the added bonus that the rest of us can get on with life without any of the racists around.
Ah, so you think forced population transfers are the way forward, but prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale? Your "compromise" position looks a lot like fascism. Plus, your "solution" might keep black people safer but it wouldn't help the gay, female, trans and/or atheist kids of the white supremacists.
Looks like apartheid to me. It doesn’t work, even for the oppressors.
It seems to have worked for Australia.
I never said prosecuting people for attempted murder is beyond the pale.
So the only option you’re willing to contemplate is total suppression of the white supremacists. Fine. Enjoy your war.
Right. Because partial and half-hearted suppression of white supremacism has been working really well.
It's not about enjoying war. It's about not enjoying seeing evil prevail.
Chamberlain thought he had found the middle ground with Hitler as he waved his little white paper after visiting Germany back in 1938, proclaiming 'peace in our time'. But by that time the general population of the nation had effectively compromised on how much violence directed towards the 'other' (Jews, black people, gay people etc) it was willing to tolerate. Democratically elected Nazism had legitimated the right to demonstrate hatred towards these groups, with the proviso that they themselves were NOT to be subjected to such demonstrations of intolerance or hatred; the surrounding nations considered that a 'domestic' matter for Germany alone. Britain's very shaky start to the fighting in WWII was a direct result of being caught out when the war began, because it had underestimated the effect of Germany's 'domestic' policies on a wider Europe.
Too late to close Pandora's box. That's what it feels like with the US. Theoretically, it's one thing to 'allow' destructive intolerance to be tolerated under the banner of free speech, freedom of conscience etc. But 'theoretically' destructive intolerance of the type shown in the Capitol Hill riots justifies the rioter to himself as being peculiarly free to break laws which others should keep.
So far as the US goes there are laws about living peacefully, not rioting, or inciting to riot etc, and outlawing racism-based violence etc. How can it be controversial to submit law-breakers to the rule of law? And yet that's precisely what is happening under the direct influence of President Trump.
It would be your war too. I just don't know which side you'd be on.
Yes, I completely agree. And I’m asking if there’s any way to deescalate the situation or reverse the course the US is on. A question which apparently makes me as bad as the worst facist.
If you allow fascism to flourish you get war eventually anyway. If you fight it you have a chance of stopping it escalating to that point.
The same one as you, against the fascists and racists. Honest.
That doesn’t mean I want to fight it though. I’d much rather try to find a way we can all just live together. Or at least live. Something like the Good Friday Agreement did for politics in Northern Ireland.
So fighting is the only way to avoid having to fight? Is this one of those “to save your life you must lose it” things?
You're literally shilling for White Nationalists in your posts. Please forgive my scepticism.
Did you miss the bit where the IRA (and UDFagreed to stop murdering people?
There are lots of forms of fighting that fall a long way short of outright war. In British anti-fascist history the Battle of Cable Street is probably the prototypical example, but UAF have faced down BNP, EDL and other far right thugs on British streets within the last couple of decades.