megaplayboy

It's helpful when the deplorables do things out in the open. One of the counterprotesters was a Fed Ex employee and police officer--now an ex Fed Ex employee, apparently.

Well, what is likely to happen is that some municipalities will bypass union contracts by "dismantling" and then reconstituting departments, state and federal legislators will pass laws imposing new requirements and restrictions, and the next presidential administration is likely to return to DOJ civil rights actions against city departments, forcing consent decrees modifying police conduct. There is definitely greater political and public pressure on police forces to change now, and the unions are facing a dilemma--dig in, or give up a little bit to lower the pressure and hope the unity of the movement fizzles out and the public moves on again.

Assuming we haven't worked out megascale astro-stellar maintenance sometime in the next couple billion years.

There are libertarians of all stripes, yes, but in practice they either vote Republican or Libertarian. They don't generally pull the lever for Democrats, in my experience.

True. You could have a "social work force", a "regulatory force" and a "serious crime investigation force". Only the last one would need to be armed.

Baphomite!

It is fascinating how "liberal" Republicans have completely disappeared in my lifetime(they're all "centrist" or "conservative" Democrats now), and now "moderate-to-conservative" Republicans have become an endangered species. The base is now either hardline/hardcore conservative or some flavor of "conservative with libertarian views" or "libertarian with conservative views". That's great for them, I suppose, but it doesn't get you to overall majority support in the nation at large. Instead you're stuck at 40-45% or so. It doesn't seem like a formula for long-term political success(at least not in a functioning democratic republic).

Not sure whether to run in terror or get my pokeball ready.

2012 Republican presidential nominee and current United States Senator Willard Mitt Romney(R-UT), marching with protesters in DC and saying the words "black lives matter" may not seem like a big deal, but it's a hell of a signal as to where the country has moved. It's not all bad news folks. Minneapolis is heading towards disbanding their municipal police department and replacing it with a new model. If that works out, police unions around the country are going to have some tough decisions ahead of them. I'd recommend that they change their policies in order to let the "bad apples" all go. But that's just me.

But muh energy stock portfolio!

1000+ deaths in the past 24 hours. Seems to be creeping back up a bit. I don't think most people understand that this thing can come back strong, and be even worse than it was in April.

It sounds like a lot of unverified speculation. I'm sure there's probably some damaging stuff in the report, but that guy's getting way out over his skis there.

And yet I'd still peg him as among the five best Republican presidents in US history. (which might also say something about most of the field of competitors...) To the extent that there was a Reconstruction Era, Grant was president while most of it was happening, and that's to his credit that he didn't abandon the project. It's to the detriment of the 19th Century GOP that they were willing to abandon it in 1876 in order to hold onto the presidency...

If something "historically awful" happens this week, internet forums will be rife with "terms of service violations" directed towards one particular current resident of DC. But it probably won't last longer than one week.

This depresses and discourages me in ways that a pandemic and recession never could. Over and over and over again for, what, 50-60 years? And we're going to pretend to do something about it, and then a few years later there's another string of dead bodies of people of color strewn about by people ostensibly employed to protect and serve them. ENOUGH.

America.exe appears to have stopped working. I tried turning it off and on again, and reinstalling the operating system. Nope. What now? My monitor is starting to smoke...

Congress can pass a law that overrides or overwrites some of the now clearly excessive protections for police officers found in union contracts. The DOJ can sue cities in order to set up consent decrees regarding police conduct. They could even tie federal funds to standardized mental health/personality and background screening processes for police and sheriffs departments. And Congress could end or curb qualified immunity for police officers as well. Really, all it takes is(in practice) for 60% of white people and 60% of white politicians to agree that this is a serious problem worth a lasting, effective solution, and let the chips fall where they may.

Someone said that "slavery is the original sin, which white people have never forgiven black people for."

I have said, repeatedly, that cynicism and apathy are the natural enemies of progress. Because it takes hard work, persistence and a willingness to deal with resistance and setbacks, to achieve real social progress. And a LOT of optimism!

W2 Nuns and Roses

5 most days. Sometimes 7, 9, 10 or 12 when I'm making lists.

It's a world of laughterA world of TANKSIt's a world of hopesAnd a world of TANKS

I think what we consider "intelligence" is some mix of innate capability and acquired and refined skill at utilizing that capability. And as has been said, there are likely multiple types of intelligences--social, emotional, verbal, mathematical, problem-solving, physical(how to dance or perform athletically)--and to reduce things to a simple score, while appealing at some primal level, doesn't really capture the complexity of the concept. We can certainly point to people for whom the terms "bright", "smart", "brilliant" or even "genius" seem highly appropriate, but there's not necessarily a 1:1 correspondence between those traits and IQ scores.

Perhaps it's to atone for all the horrible stuff he did as CEO of Microsoft?