James Joyner is a Professor of Security Studies. He's a former Army officer and Desert Storm veteran. Views expressed here are his own. Follow James on Twitter @DrJJoyner.
I strongly believe deep in my gut that our military needs to be absolutely apolitical, especially domestically.
Yet, yesterday they got dragged into this nation’s deep domestic fights by the President who neither understands our country’s constitutional setup nor cares. Threatening to use the military for domestic law enforcement is, to me, unforgiveable. It is one thing for the DOD Secretary Esper, who is the civilian head, to be political but for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to be a part of a public charade is alarming and disgraceful.
On the other hand, I offer what is to be a pretty remarkable series of tweets from the highest enlisted officer of the Air Force; Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force Kaleth A. Wright:
I am a Black man who happens to be the Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force.
I am George Floyd…I am Philando Castile, I am Michael Brown, I am Alton Sterling, I am Tamir Rice.
Just like most of the Black Airmen and so many others in our ranks…I am outraged at watching another Black man die on television before our very eyes. What happens all too often in this country to Black men who are subjected to police brutality that ends in death…could happen to me. As shocking as that may sound to some of you…I hope you realize that racism/discrimination/exclusion does not care much about position, titles or stature….so yes, it could happen to you, or one of your friends, or your Airmen, or your NCOIC, your Flight Chief, your Squadron Commander or even your Wing Commander. This, my friends, is my greatest fear, not that I will be killed by a white police officer (believe me my heart starts racing like most other Black men in America when I see those blue lights behind me)…but that I will wake up to a report that one of our Black Airmen has died at the hands of a white police officer.
As I struggle with the Air Force’s own demons that include the racial disparities in military justice and discipline among our youngest Black male Airmen and the clear lack of diversity in our senior officer ranks…I can only look in the mirror for the solution. I, the CMSAF must do better in ensuring every Airmen in our ranks has a fair chance at becoming the best version of themselves. While this is a complicated issue…I, along with every other leader across the force, am responsible for making sure it becomes a reality.
What have I been doing?
Not enough…I have done my share of community service work, been in involved in mentor programs, voted in local, state and national elections, but I’ve come to the conclusion that whatever I have done in the past is just not enough. So, I spent the last week, “plotting, planning, strategizing, organizing and mobilizing” just as Killer Mike, the popular Atlanta rapper and activist encouraged us to do. Twenty-five of my closest friends (White, Black, Asian, enlisted, officer and civilian) and I have an ongoing dialogue where we began by acknowledging our right to be angry about what is happening.
We eventually moved beyond the rage and began to think about what’s next? What could or should we be doing as a group and as individuals to stop this from happening in our communities across these United States? We don’t have all the answers, but we do have some of the most brilliant minds, many, who have first hand experience with this topic and we will continue working towards a solution. While we can’t change the world, we can change the communities we live in and more importantly, those where our Airmen strive to be seen, heard, and treated as human beings. I have also not done enough as your most senior enlisted leader…while we have made progress in many of the areas that impact our Airmen and families; I believe that we have not made much progress in this area of racial injustice and diversity among our ranks. This is why I’m working with General Goldfein, first and foremost to have a full and thorough independent review of our military justice system. We will look to uncover where the problem lies and how we can fix it. We are also working to improve the diversity of our force, especially within the senior ranks. I hope this message triggers responses and ideas from each of you on things we can do better.
What should you be doing?
Like me, acknowledge your right to be upset about what’s happening to our nation. But you must then find a way to move beyond the rage and do what you think is right for the country, for your community, for your sons, daughters, friends and colleagues…for every Black man in this country who could end up like George Floyd. Part of my group’s solution involves helping to bridge the communication and understanding gap between law enforcement and young Black men. You decide what works best for you, where you can have the most meaningful impact and most importantly, what you can stay committed to…we didn’t get here overnight so don’t expect things to change tomorrow…we are in this for the long haul. Vote, protest peacefully, reach out to your local and state officials, to your Air Force leadership and become active in your communities…we need all hands on deck. If you don’t do anything else, I encourage everyone to fight, not just for freedom, justice and equality, but to fight for understanding. You might think you know what it’s like to grow up, exist, survive and even thrive in this country as a Black person…but let me tell you, regardless of how many Black friends you have, or how Black your neighborhood was, or if your spouse or in-laws are Black…you don’t know.
You don’t know the anxiety, the despair, the heartache, the fear, the rage and the disappointment that comes with living in this country, OUR country every single day. So, take the time to talk to someone – your brand new Airmen, your NCOIC or your Flight Commander – about their experiences so that you have a better understanding of who they are, where they come from and what drives them. Frankly, you owe this to every Airmen, but I’m asking you specifically to pay attention to the Black Airmen in your ranks during this trying time. Don’t misunderstand me, they don’t need, nor do they want any special treatment…but they deserve to be treated fairly and equally, both by our United States Air Force and these United States of America…this begins with you, and I am asking, no fighting, for your understanding.
Like you, I don’t have all of the answers, but I am committed to seeing a better future for this nation. A future where Black men must no longer suffer needlessly at the hands of White police officers, and where Black Airmen have the same chance to succeed as their White counterparts. Trust me, I understand this is a difficult topic to talk about…
Difficult…not impossible…
Difficult…but necessary.
Who am I…
I am Kaleth. I am a Black Man who happens to be the Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force and I am committed to making this better.
“The thing that strikes me is that we all see this police violence and racism, and we’ve seen it all before, but nothing changes. That’s why these protests have been so explosive. But without leadership and an understanding of what the problem is, there will never be change. And white Americans have avoided reckoning with this problem forever, because it’s been our privilege to be able to avoid it. That also has to change.”
“It’s unbelievable. If Trump had a brain, even if it was 99 percent cynical, he would come out and say something to unify people. But he doesn’t care about bringing people together. Even now. That’s how deranged he is. It’s all about him. It’s all about what benefits him personally. It’s never about the greater good. And that’s all he’s ever been.”
James Martin, SJ@JamesMartinSJ
·
9h
Let me be clear. This is revolting. The Bible is not a prop. A church is not a photo op. Religion is not a political tool. God is not your plaything.
Really? Did you just now figure that out? What took you so long?
At EVERY SINGLE DAWGDAMNED ABORTION CLINIC EVERY SINGLE DAWGDAMNED DAY SINCE Roe v Wade and every time an LGBTQ person tries to live with dignity, never mind having a simple civil commitment ceremony between 2 loving people, otherwise known as same sex marriage which is their right to have.
Last night Donald Trump sent out militarized secret service to fire tear gas and rubber bullets at peaceful protestors in front of a church, violently clearing them off so he could stalk across, hold up a bible and call for violence. This morning I have nothing but contempt for the 90% of white evangelicals who support this deranged President. They measure their worth by how often they shout Jesus, but their hearts are dead set against everything he stood for. If he was alive today they would cheer as Trumps goons gassed and beat him.
Republicans have, as I said, spent decades exploiting racial hostility to win elections despite a policy agenda that hurts workers. But Trump is now pushing that cynical strategy toward a kind of apotheosis.
On one side, he’s effectively inciting violence by his supporters. On the other, he’s very close to calling for a military response to social protest. And at this point, nobody expects any significant pushback from other Republicans.
Now, I don’t think Trump will actually succeed in provoking a race war in the near future, even though he’s clearly itching for an excuse to use force. But the months ahead are still likely to be very, very ugly.
After all, if Trump is encouraging violence and talking about military solutions to overwhelmingly peaceful protests, what will he and his supporters do if he looks likely to lose November’s election?
There is some irony in the city promising to hand out masks and urging protesters to cover their faces. During the last major protests in St. Louis, following the 2017 acquittal of white ex-cop Jason Stockley in the fatal shooting of Anthony Lamar Smith, police targeted protesters who put on masks and goggles to protect themselves from riot cops’ pepper spray and tear gas.
Questioned in federal court about the department’s heavy-handed tactics, St. Louis police Lt. Timothy Sachs testified that the sight of protesters pulling on that kind of protective gear signaled to him they were “wanting some kind of confrontation.”
Now, the city seems to have decided that the unmasked protesters are the dangerous ones.
My social media feeds are full of Trumpies blathering on about Antifa. Like, what? Antifa isn’t even an organization in any real sense. It doesn’t have a structure or a leader or a hierarchy. There might be a dozen people who identify with it in any major city. Most Trumpies probably didn’t even know it existed until three days ago, and most of them confuse Antifa with Black Bloc anarchists. But since Trump has started using Antifa as a bogeyman the way Hitler used the communists, suddenly Antifa is this huge threat.
I’ve never seen a group of people so eager to be played for fools as Trumpies are.
I just watched a video of a cop in St. Louis walking up to an elderly man with a cane and knocking him to the ground with his shield. We have got some deplorable goddam cops.
It’s official now: our department boss is an inconsiderate jerk.
He decided, without consulting his managers or us, to just return everyone to work, saying we’d been “away” too long. Never mind the pandemic, never mind the risks, and never mind we have so fucking little to do we may as well not show up.
Worse yet, while wearing face masks at the office is mandatory, he doesn’t wear one and doesn’t mind if everyone else doesn’t either.
I won’t say I wish he gets COVID-19 and dies. but if he does, he will have deserved it.
@Mikey: I’m no apologist for Republicans. But I would not be so quick to dismiss the idea of anarchists, white supremacists or other radical groups targeting these protests and taking advantage to turn them violent. My wife and I were at the big protest in Baltimore yesterday evening and I didn’t see anyone inciting (but it was early). However I did see three young white men who gave off a very tactical vibe. A lot of equipment and packs strapped on from and back an on their belts, a lot of muscles. I also saw a group of 3-5 black men away from the protest, who gave off a similar vibe, one of them having a 16″ square metal rod with a handle.
Violence and looting feeds itself and grows. Violence attracts the violent in a spiral. We know that from the 60’s in the US and from thousands of other examples. 99.9% of civil rights protestors were peaceful in the US but as time went on fringe groups set off bombs, robbed banks, and eventually became essentially criminal organizations.
Most Trumpies probably didn’t even know it existed until three days ago
Trump and right-wing media have been making Antifa into a sort of ultimate boogeyman for years now–going back at least to Charlottesville. Here’s a reference to it in a Trump speech from mid-2017:
@MarkedMan: Sure, there’s a range of individuals and groups who contributed to the violence, but it’s telling that the only one singled out by Trump is the one with a name that is short for “anti-fascist.”
Amid the over 100 thousand deaths in the pandemic, and protests against police brutality countered by more police brutality, SpaceX launched a manned capsule to the ISS for NASA.
It strikes me as an Ozymandias moment in a way, and an important development in another way. The USSR managed to maintain the Mir space station even while it was collapsing, and then Russia kept it going for a few more years.
Space travel is very expensive, technically demanding, very risky (see Challenger and Columbia), and very limited. It’s also very useful. We depend today on a variety of satellites orbiting the Earth for our daily lives. Aside from communications satellites and GPS satellites, most have no immediate direct impact on most people, but they have a huge indirect impact, in particular Earth resources satellites and weather satellites.
The best analogy to the expense incurred for space travel is one made by Arthur C. Clarke in the days of the Apollo program: imagine if the Queen Elizabeth 2 (the ship), could only transport three people and sank after making one round trip.
This was the rationale for the Space Shuttle as a reusable system. The solid rocket boosters (which killed the Challenger), could be reused up to ten times each. The shuttle itself (formally the orbiter) could be used up to 100 times (none flew close to that many times, there were under 150 shuttle flights total). The massive external fuel tank was disposable, and seen, at the time, as the one big expense (probably not).
But space travel requires a lot of energy, expended in a short period of time. This means a lot of fuel burned quickly at very high temperatures. This, in turn, takes a heavy toll on components. Meaning they have to be refurbished after each use. Then, too, the actual shuttle heated up a lot when re-entering the atmosphere. Capsules before it used an ablative heat shield. This was not good for a reusable craft, so heat resistant tiles were developed instead (damage to which killed Columbia). These, too, along with the shuttle’s main engines, required extensive refurbishing between flights.
Long story short, the Shuttle was way more expensive to operate than the disposable launchers it intended to replace.
Bummer.
Along come private companies, Blue Origin, SpaceX, Scaled Composites/Virgin Galactic, Rocket Lab, and many others, with their own ideas for space launchers. Some are reusable, some not. All intend to make money someday (I doubt any have made a penny yet), and that means lowering the cost of launching matter into orbit (and presumably beyond).
Their advantage over NASA, and for that matter over other state space agencies, is their diversity. Each company can develop their own ideas and see how they work out. SpaceX has done remarkably well with reusability, especially as far as recovering whole first stages economically. Scaled Composites successfully tested a hybrid rocket (solid fuel and liquid oxidizer) .
What I fear is that they will progress much as aircraft manufacturers did: whittling down gradually at first and then suddenly, until there are only two major players left, and two or three small fry at the edges. Boeing was far more innovative and nimble before it swallowed McDonnell Douglas.
Last night Donald Trump sent out militarized secret service to fire tear gas and rubber bullets at peaceful protestors in front of a church, violently clearing them off so he could stalk across, hold up a bible and call for violence.
It’s even worse then that: part of the reason Trump was alone for his photo op was because they also teargassed the clergy of the church itself and chased them off the property too
@Kathy: There are a lot of bad bosses and companies around.
My Daughter in Law, who is an engineer in oil and gas in Houston was working online for a month or so. Called physically into the office a couple of Mondays ago only to be told she was being laid off by Jun 19th. In the meantime, whe was forced to take vacation days so she wouldn’t get a cash payout. Then last Thursday she was told she had to give a presentation to the President on Tuesday and was expected to work over the weekend to get it done even though she was mandated to take vacation days on Friday and Monday. Let’s just say she said no in a way that was far more polite than I would’ve been.
In the meantime they also had an outbreak of COVID-19 on the factory floor.
Wolfgang Leonard v. Markus Wolf
Mitt Romney v. Lindsey Graham
In english, the word collaborator has a double meaning. A colleague can be described as a collaborator in a neutral or positive sense. But the other definition of collaborator, relevant here, is different: someone who works with the enemy, with the occupying power, with the dictatorial regime. In this negative sense, collaborator is closely related to another set of words: collusion, complicity, connivance. This negative meaning gained currency during the Second World War, when it was widely used to describe Europeans who cooperated with Nazi occupiers. At base, the ugly meaning of collaborator carries an implication of treason: betrayal of one’s nation, of one’s ideology, of one’s morality, of one’s values.
Since the Second World War, historians and political scientists have tried to explain why some people in extreme circumstances become collaborators and others do not. The late Harvard scholar Stanley Hoffmann had firsthand knowledge of the subject—as a child, he and his mother hid from the Nazis in Lamalou-les-Bains, a village in the south of France. But he was modest about his own conclusions, noting that “a careful historian would have—almost—to write a huge series of case histories; for there seem to have been almost as many collaborationisms as there were proponents or practitioners of collaboration.” Still, Hoffmann made a stab at classification, beginning with a division of collaborators into “voluntary” and “involuntary.” Many people in the latter group had no choice. Forced into a “reluctant recognition of necessity,” they could not avoid dealing with the Nazi occupiers who were running their country.
To the american reader, references to Vichy France, East Germany, fascists, and Communists may seem over-the-top, even ludicrous. But dig a little deeper, and the analogy makes sense. The point is not to compare Trump to Hitler or Stalin; the point is to compare the experiences of high-ranking members of the American Republican Party, especially those who work most closely with the White House, to the experiences of Frenchmen in 1940, or of East Germans in 1945, or of Czesław Miłosz in 1947. These are experiences of people who are forced to accept an alien ideology or a set of values that are in sharp conflict with their own.
And there is video of this fight, so awesome. If neither gator had their morning cup of coffee or tea I could see why they were a bit snappish towards each other.
@Bill:
When we moved to Sarasota we moved into an apartment complex fronting one of the endless small lakes. I called 911 to report a crocodile. The 911 operator, (no doubt covering their mouthpiece and yelling, I got another one!) informed me that they were alligators and not crocodiles. Then she asked me how big it was. I said how the hell would I know? She said you measure from the tip of the nose to the bumps of the eyes and multiply. I asked how the hell I was supposed to measure that distance. . . and about then I began to hear suppressed laughter and hung up.
Those planning for the next pandemic, there’s more bad news. apparently doctors are prescribing antibiotics for COVID-19. This is incredibly irresponsible because 1) antibiotics do absolutely nothing against viral diseases, and 2) overuse of antibiotics promotes resistance in bacteria.
Already antibiotic-resistant bacteria are a problem. Giving antibiotics for no purpose makes things worse. Though it’s worth mentioning the worst misuse of antibiotics is feeding them to cattle to get them to grow larger faster. it’s not worth the effects on the world’s microbiome.
Bacteria mostly reproduce my mitosis, meaning they split in two. This is how cells reproduce, including human cells (those that reproduce, like skin cells or stomach lining cells among many more). So you’d think what affects one bacterium won’t affect others, except those that descend from it.
But that’s not the case. Bacteria have their DNA in a nucleus, like most cells do, but they also have plasmids, these are small structures of separate DNA, which give bacteria additional abilities. It’s common for one bacterium to exchange plasmids with other bacteria, even with different species.
So while giving bovine symbiotic gut bacteria resistance to antibiotics is harmless, these “good” bacteria can pass it on to infectious ones. There are also harmless bacteria passing through, like soil bacteria, which can pick up these plasmids and pass them on in turn.
This is why I hate people who tell me to “take something” when I get a cold. there’s nothing to take that will “cure” the cold or reduce the time it takes for the body’s defenses to deal with it; except rest and fluids, but rest is seen as unnecessary with a cold.
78% of Americans think the anger of protestors is partially or fully justified. Even more shockingly, 54% of Americans think the ACTIONS of protestors are partially or fully justified:
Armed group of white supremacists wanders a neighborhood after curfew yelling racial slurs, police do nothing until they attack a black person with a bat, at which point the police arrested the victim:
this is just insane: there’s a curfew in philly right now, and there’s a gang of white people with bats and other weapons roving around fishtown. the police kindly asked them to disperse and then arrested a black person who had a bat thrown at him. pic.twitter.com/3JaipH1VVq— mindy #DSA4USPS (@lil_yenta) June 2, 2020
That’s how we got to this situation, you blame the victim. Look at this way, to this point the police haven’t killed the victim, so we’re making progress.
Armed group of white supremacists wanders a neighborhood after curfew yelling racial slurs, police do nothing until they attack a black person with a bat, at which point the police arrested the victim
I happened to be listening to a talk radio show today and someone made a very intelligent suggestion that could go a long way to helping prevent these sort of things. A lot of the protesters are winding up in front of the police stations. Many police departments in these big cities are in need of officers.
They should set up a tent and tables where people can fill out applications to become a police officer. There would be officers there who could answer their questions they might have. It would be a sort of “put your money where your mouth is” sort of thing.
“Pay’s not great, but the benefits are”.
I got to thinking about what a good idea that is. It could also create some sensible dialogue, conversations, and cool things down.
@Scott: Chief Wright and Gen Goldfein have made very good reforms in the Air Force to make it harder for sociopaths to game the system and get promoted into leadership positions they have no business being in. They both retire this summer.
This is a really good setting of the table for Gen Brown and his handpicked CMSgt when they hit the seat. I once worked a project for Gen Brown and he is a tremendous leader but I’m not completely certain how overt he will be about putting more distance between AirForce and Navy (who I feel is the Mississippi of the Services when it comes to equal rights.)
Black officers in my experience never talked about such things as you could never trust who was a “company man” and who would try to smear you as an agitator. We all wanted to be seen as officers first, promoted on merit…but the flip side is when there are open discussions had about race, the implications for those who are elevated after is that they weren’t selected for merit but for political correctness. The reality is, many of the white officers selected for the best jobs are also there for political correctness…the good ole boy politics of an institutional nature.
It was, and probably still is, very hard to find senior black officers to mentor you, because of the perception of racial favoritism. There were still, however, a handful white officers that would mentor and train you on how to have a successful career and lead by example. It was usually best to only observe Senior black officers and take notes…but it was white officers that engaged me to explain the whys and hows to distinguish yourself from your average peer.
Of course, yours truly is conditioned to be the change, so I reached out to numerous young black officers to let them know I was a resource of “to do” and “dont do” they could use to refine their own leadership style. I did the same for white, female, asian, etc…because one day they would be in charge of people of color. And I wanted to, at least on a subconscious level, have them see me in their troops of color.
“This is an awful man, waving a book he hasn’t read, in front of a church he doesn’t attend, invoking laws he doesn’t understand, against fellow Americans he sees as enemies, wielding a military he dodged serving, to protect power he gained via accepting foreign interference, exploiting fear and anger he loves to stoke, after failing to address a pandemic he was warned about, and building it all on a bed of constant lies and childish inanity.”
— Robert Hendrickson, Rector at St. Philip’s Episcopal Church in Tucson, Arizona.
During an appearance on “Meet the Press” last week, Bray argued that “when pushed, self-defense is a legitimate response to white supremacist and neo-Nazi violence.”
“We’ve tried ignoring neo-Nazis in the past. We’ve seen how that turned out in the ’20s and ’30s,” Bray told host Chuck Todd. “A lot of people are under attack, and sometimes they need to be able to defend themselves. It’s a privileged position to say you never have to defend yourself from these kinds of monsters.”
Stand your ground, right?
See, this is one of the outcomes of property rights run amok, and the refusal to stop blurring the bright line between violence defined by (threatened) harm to a person and property destruction.
Something extraordinary has happened in foreign policy, not that we have time to notice. Trump insisted on making the G7 in-person, overruling earlier suggestions it could be virtual.
Angela Merkel said nope. Trump backed down.
Trump insisted on bringing his master, Putin, back to the G7.
A while back I watched on Netflix a documentary called Alt-Right: Age of Rage, which included a profile of Daryle Lamont Jenkins, who may be the most prominent person associated with Antifa. His focus is on doxxing–revealing the personal info of white supremacists who try to remain anonymous. He’s also been involved in helping some white supremacists reform and escape from the movement. Here’s one article about him:
@CSK: Thanks for your reply and attention to my report. That idea seemed to get a lot of support based on the comments made by radio listeners. Many people are in cities that are short on police. It looks like a win – win. The police get more officers and the people get a chance to make a change. Many police departments now have black chiefs or deputy sheriffs. It is nef Gillo longer the days of Chief Gillespie and Detective Virgil Tibbs.
Many a police officer has moved up to the State Bureaus of Investigation and the Federal Bureau of Investivgation. Some have gone on to law school and wound up being lawyers, district attorneys, and judges. Some have gone into police science and work in the forensics or as profilers.
Read “The Bone Collector”
Thanks for your comments.
@Tyrell:
I know; I worked as a consultant for a state and a municipal law enforcement agency, and, as you say, many of the officers held undergraduate and graduate degrees. Some were J.D.s. Others held Ph.D.s in criminology. And a great many of them were African-American and Hispanic. But, given how fraught the current situation is, I do not think that setting up recruiting tables outside police stations at this time is a very good idea.
I brought the antibiotics for a cold once when chatting with an MD, and he said often the immune system weakens with a cold and bacteria can cause an infection. this made no sense to me, so I asked then how a weakened immune system still fought off the cold successfully. I got no answer.
you’d think they’d care about resistant bacteria, because eventually they’ll have to treat patients with such infections. Some do. A couple of years ago a dermatologist gave me an antibiotic prescription after draining a small abscess, but warned me not to even begin to take it if I wasn’t going to do the full course as prescribed. he explained taking only part can promote resistant bacteria.
Which I forgot to mention in the previous post. Some people given an antibiotic stop taking it when they feel better, and that also aids in resistance.
@OzarkHillbilly: No, they’re just looking for carte blanche to thump on anyone they see. (No, I didn’t know that 80-year-old woman was just out shopping, she was wearing a face mask. I thought she was Antifa.)
A ebook* I published last summer had Wolf in it though he appeared in just one scene.
For about 15 years I have had a Cold War story idea where he’d be one of the main characters. It is very complicated and I lost the little bit I had written in a computer crash 10 years ago. I have so many story ideas, this one will probably never make it to print.
*- I actually spun it off from my Cold War story idea. About ten people who’d be involved in that are featured in my espionage ebook set between 1988 and 1998.
@CSK: Thanks for your attention to my report. Maybe they could start recruitment efforts in the communities and schools, I agree that all police are needed right now to keep order.
I put a list of police reform ideas on the other day. I will briefly list them:
1- Go back to being civilian police, not some sort of para-military force in the way they look and act.
2- Heavy community activity and visibility – know the residents by their first name. Create a partnership with community associations.
3- Continuing education through local colleges and universities.
4- Learn new low key, defusing types of apprehension, and control.
5- Use of new technology to safely contain a suspect.
6- Work with the F.B.I. to learn psychological interrogation and profiling methods.
Yeah, I’m kind of having fun going down this rabbit hole TBH. I wouldn’t pay it much mind, except the dude looks so out of place. From what I can see, that looks like high-end tactical gear that he is wearing.
He appears in the background in several videos. People piecing together his movements imply that he seems to deliberately loiter, and then begins moving again after tear gas has been deployed.
Oh, and a Masarati is idling around different places. Neither the guy’s outfit, nor the high-end sports car make sense. If you’re doing a covert op, why dress like that? Who brings a Masarati to a protest?
@Kurtz:
I think the umbrella and the gas mask are to draw attention to himself. (The gas mask also hides his face quite effectively.) Whatever, it’s bizarre and, frankly, eerie.
It seems like Trump is very serious about moving the Republican convention out of North Carolina. My advice to Charlotte would be to say “So long and don’t let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.” For what the Republican convention will be like this year, see “1968 Democratic Convention” and look at what that did to the Democratic Party for the next 8 years. By all means, let this toxic waste site go to a deep Trump state, where they will appreciate the Republicans bringing riots to their doorstep.
My advice to the Republicans: skip over Nashville, which is a beautiful city trying to make advancements. Bring it to Philadelphia MS, where the locals won’t hesitate to show what they are made of.
I would add that figuring out the best agency and methods to handle mental health emergencies. That man who died in Dallas while the police mocked him shows the need for that. The cover-up after…
There needs to be a way to prosecute bad cops as well. I’m not sure of a solution. But I have trouble seeing them as civilians in the current environment. The civil court system seems inappropriate, because many cops don’t seem to seem to behave like civilians subject to the Rule of Law.
@Michael Reynolds: That is interesting. I have relatives who went through a park in the Everglades last year. They saw people taking selfies with alligators, and on some parts of the trail they went on they had to step over or around them.
The Florida headline of the day-
Florida woman hears pounding at her front door, finds 2 alligators fighting
I strongly believe deep in my gut that our military needs to be absolutely apolitical, especially domestically.
Yet, yesterday they got dragged into this nation’s deep domestic fights by the President who neither understands our country’s constitutional setup nor cares. Threatening to use the military for domestic law enforcement is, to me, unforgiveable. It is one thing for the DOD Secretary Esper, who is the civilian head, to be political but for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to be a part of a public charade is alarming and disgraceful.
On the other hand, I offer what is to be a pretty remarkable series of tweets from the highest enlisted officer of the Air Force; Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force Kaleth A. Wright:
https://twitter.com/cmsaf18?lang=en
Some words from my favorite basketball coach:
Gregg Popovich: ‘The System Has to Change’
Popovich/Kerr 2020. I could live with that.
Popovich? Talk about short press conferences. Granted, would be better than the ranter in chief.
Steve
Really? Did you just now figure that out? What took you so long?
At EVERY SINGLE DAWGDAMNED ABORTION CLINIC EVERY SINGLE DAWGDAMNED DAY SINCE Roe v Wade and every time an LGBTQ person tries to live with dignity, never mind having a simple civil commitment ceremony between 2 loving people, otherwise known as same sex marriage which is their right to have.
Last night Donald Trump sent out militarized secret service to fire tear gas and rubber bullets at peaceful protestors in front of a church, violently clearing them off so he could stalk across, hold up a bible and call for violence. This morning I have nothing but contempt for the 90% of white evangelicals who support this deranged President. They measure their worth by how often they shout Jesus, but their hearts are dead set against everything he stood for. If he was alive today they would cheer as Trumps goons gassed and beat him.
Paul Krugman:
Mayor Says St. Louis Will Distribute Face Masks at Protests
My social media feeds are full of Trumpies blathering on about Antifa. Like, what? Antifa isn’t even an organization in any real sense. It doesn’t have a structure or a leader or a hierarchy. There might be a dozen people who identify with it in any major city. Most Trumpies probably didn’t even know it existed until three days ago, and most of them confuse Antifa with Black Bloc anarchists. But since Trump has started using Antifa as a bogeyman the way Hitler used the communists, suddenly Antifa is this huge threat.
I’ve never seen a group of people so eager to be played for fools as Trumpies are.
I just watched a video of a cop in St. Louis walking up to an elderly man with a cane and knocking him to the ground with his shield. We have got some deplorable goddam cops.
I could really go for a nice, boring “infrastructure week” right now.
Australian Prime Minister calls for investigation after US cops assault foreign journalists
It’s official now: our department boss is an inconsiderate jerk.
He decided, without consulting his managers or us, to just return everyone to work, saying we’d been “away” too long. Never mind the pandemic, never mind the risks, and never mind we have so fucking little to do we may as well not show up.
Worse yet, while wearing face masks at the office is mandatory, he doesn’t wear one and doesn’t mind if everyone else doesn’t either.
I won’t say I wish he gets COVID-19 and dies. but if he does, he will have deserved it.
@Mikey: I’m no apologist for Republicans. But I would not be so quick to dismiss the idea of anarchists, white supremacists or other radical groups targeting these protests and taking advantage to turn them violent. My wife and I were at the big protest in Baltimore yesterday evening and I didn’t see anyone inciting (but it was early). However I did see three young white men who gave off a very tactical vibe. A lot of equipment and packs strapped on from and back an on their belts, a lot of muscles. I also saw a group of 3-5 black men away from the protest, who gave off a similar vibe, one of them having a 16″ square metal rod with a handle.
Violence and looting feeds itself and grows. Violence attracts the violent in a spiral. We know that from the 60’s in the US and from thousands of other examples. 99.9% of civil rights protestors were peaceful in the US but as time went on fringe groups set off bombs, robbed banks, and eventually became essentially criminal organizations.
How about that? There are elections today.
@Mikey:
Trump and right-wing media have been making Antifa into a sort of ultimate boogeyman for years now–going back at least to Charlottesville. Here’s a reference to it in a Trump speech from mid-2017:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSzdd1PHz2k&feature=youtu.be&t=33
@Kylopod: Huh. Well I guess I was wrong about that.
I stand by the rest, though.
@MarkedMan: Sure, there’s a range of individuals and groups who contributed to the violence, but it’s telling that the only one singled out by Trump is the one with a name that is short for “anti-fascist.”
@Mikey: Right wing Senators (like the loathsome Ted Cruz) have been banging on Antifa for years now.
Amid the over 100 thousand deaths in the pandemic, and protests against police brutality countered by more police brutality, SpaceX launched a manned capsule to the ISS for NASA.
It strikes me as an Ozymandias moment in a way, and an important development in another way. The USSR managed to maintain the Mir space station even while it was collapsing, and then Russia kept it going for a few more years.
Space travel is very expensive, technically demanding, very risky (see Challenger and Columbia), and very limited. It’s also very useful. We depend today on a variety of satellites orbiting the Earth for our daily lives. Aside from communications satellites and GPS satellites, most have no immediate direct impact on most people, but they have a huge indirect impact, in particular Earth resources satellites and weather satellites.
The best analogy to the expense incurred for space travel is one made by Arthur C. Clarke in the days of the Apollo program: imagine if the Queen Elizabeth 2 (the ship), could only transport three people and sank after making one round trip.
This was the rationale for the Space Shuttle as a reusable system. The solid rocket boosters (which killed the Challenger), could be reused up to ten times each. The shuttle itself (formally the orbiter) could be used up to 100 times (none flew close to that many times, there were under 150 shuttle flights total). The massive external fuel tank was disposable, and seen, at the time, as the one big expense (probably not).
But space travel requires a lot of energy, expended in a short period of time. This means a lot of fuel burned quickly at very high temperatures. This, in turn, takes a heavy toll on components. Meaning they have to be refurbished after each use. Then, too, the actual shuttle heated up a lot when re-entering the atmosphere. Capsules before it used an ablative heat shield. This was not good for a reusable craft, so heat resistant tiles were developed instead (damage to which killed Columbia). These, too, along with the shuttle’s main engines, required extensive refurbishing between flights.
Long story short, the Shuttle was way more expensive to operate than the disposable launchers it intended to replace.
Bummer.
Along come private companies, Blue Origin, SpaceX, Scaled Composites/Virgin Galactic, Rocket Lab, and many others, with their own ideas for space launchers. Some are reusable, some not. All intend to make money someday (I doubt any have made a penny yet), and that means lowering the cost of launching matter into orbit (and presumably beyond).
Their advantage over NASA, and for that matter over other state space agencies, is their diversity. Each company can develop their own ideas and see how they work out. SpaceX has done remarkably well with reusability, especially as far as recovering whole first stages economically. Scaled Composites successfully tested a hybrid rocket (solid fuel and liquid oxidizer) .
What I fear is that they will progress much as aircraft manufacturers did: whittling down gradually at first and then suddenly, until there are only two major players left, and two or three small fry at the edges. Boeing was far more innovative and nimble before it swallowed McDonnell Douglas.
@MarkedMan:
It’s even worse then that: part of the reason Trump was alone for his photo op was because they also teargassed the clergy of the church itself and chased them off the property too
@Kathy: There are a lot of bad bosses and companies around.
My Daughter in Law, who is an engineer in oil and gas in Houston was working online for a month or so. Called physically into the office a couple of Mondays ago only to be told she was being laid off by Jun 19th. In the meantime, whe was forced to take vacation days so she wouldn’t get a cash payout. Then last Thursday she was told she had to give a presentation to the President on Tuesday and was expected to work over the weekend to get it done even though she was mandated to take vacation days on Friday and Monday. Let’s just say she said no in a way that was far more polite than I would’ve been.
In the meantime they also had an outbreak of COVID-19 on the factory floor.
@Scott:
That sounds more like sadism than bad management.
History Will Judge the Complicit
Wolfgang Leonard v. Markus Wolf
Mitt Romney v. Lindsey Graham
@Bill:
And there is video of this fight, so awesome. If neither gator had their morning cup of coffee or tea I could see why they were a bit snappish towards each other.
@Kathy: Fortunately, she already has a new job with a company that had previously offered her a job.
@Bill:
When we moved to Sarasota we moved into an apartment complex fronting one of the endless small lakes. I called 911 to report a crocodile. The 911 operator, (no doubt covering their mouthpiece and yelling, I got another one!) informed me that they were alligators and not crocodiles. Then she asked me how big it was. I said how the hell would I know? She said you measure from the tip of the nose to the bumps of the eyes and multiply. I asked how the hell I was supposed to measure that distance. . . and about then I began to hear suppressed laughter and hung up.
Those planning for the next pandemic, there’s more bad news. apparently doctors are prescribing antibiotics for COVID-19. This is incredibly irresponsible because 1) antibiotics do absolutely nothing against viral diseases, and 2) overuse of antibiotics promotes resistance in bacteria.
Already antibiotic-resistant bacteria are a problem. Giving antibiotics for no purpose makes things worse. Though it’s worth mentioning the worst misuse of antibiotics is feeding them to cattle to get them to grow larger faster. it’s not worth the effects on the world’s microbiome.
Bacteria mostly reproduce my mitosis, meaning they split in two. This is how cells reproduce, including human cells (those that reproduce, like skin cells or stomach lining cells among many more). So you’d think what affects one bacterium won’t affect others, except those that descend from it.
But that’s not the case. Bacteria have their DNA in a nucleus, like most cells do, but they also have plasmids, these are small structures of separate DNA, which give bacteria additional abilities. It’s common for one bacterium to exchange plasmids with other bacteria, even with different species.
So while giving bovine symbiotic gut bacteria resistance to antibiotics is harmless, these “good” bacteria can pass it on to infectious ones. There are also harmless bacteria passing through, like soil bacteria, which can pick up these plasmids and pass them on in turn.
This is why I hate people who tell me to “take something” when I get a cold. there’s nothing to take that will “cure” the cold or reduce the time it takes for the body’s defenses to deal with it; except rest and fluids, but rest is seen as unnecessary with a cold.
78% of Americans think the anger of protestors is partially or fully justified. Even more shockingly, 54% of Americans think the ACTIONS of protestors are partially or fully justified:
Protestors’ Anger Justified Even If Actions May Not Be
Armed group of white supremacists wanders a neighborhood after curfew yelling racial slurs, police do nothing until they attack a black person with a bat, at which point the police arrested the victim:
@Bill:
Is it the mating season? Were they squabbling over a woman?
@Stormy Dragon:
That’s how we got to this situation, you blame the victim. Look at this way, to this point the police haven’t killed the victim, so we’re making progress.
@Kathy: What quack doctors don’t already know that and are prescribing antibiotics?! Other than Trump’s personal ones, I mean.
@Stormy Dragon:
Some of those that work forces are the same that burn crosses….
I happened to be listening to a talk radio show today and someone made a very intelligent suggestion that could go a long way to helping prevent these sort of things. A lot of the protesters are winding up in front of the police stations. Many police departments in these big cities are in need of officers.
They should set up a tent and tables where people can fill out applications to become a police officer. There would be officers there who could answer their questions they might have. It would be a sort of “put your money where your mouth is” sort of thing.
“Pay’s not great, but the benefits are”.
I got to thinking about what a good idea that is. It could also create some sensible dialogue, conversations, and cool things down.
@Tyrell:
I assume you’re being ironic.
@Scott: Chief Wright and Gen Goldfein have made very good reforms in the Air Force to make it harder for sociopaths to game the system and get promoted into leadership positions they have no business being in. They both retire this summer.
This is a really good setting of the table for Gen Brown and his handpicked CMSgt when they hit the seat. I once worked a project for Gen Brown and he is a tremendous leader but I’m not completely certain how overt he will be about putting more distance between AirForce and Navy (who I feel is the Mississippi of the Services when it comes to equal rights.)
Black officers in my experience never talked about such things as you could never trust who was a “company man” and who would try to smear you as an agitator. We all wanted to be seen as officers first, promoted on merit…but the flip side is when there are open discussions had about race, the implications for those who are elevated after is that they weren’t selected for merit but for political correctness. The reality is, many of the white officers selected for the best jobs are also there for political correctness…the good ole boy politics of an institutional nature.
It was, and probably still is, very hard to find senior black officers to mentor you, because of the perception of racial favoritism. There were still, however, a handful white officers that would mentor and train you on how to have a successful career and lead by example. It was usually best to only observe Senior black officers and take notes…but it was white officers that engaged me to explain the whys and hows to distinguish yourself from your average peer.
Of course, yours truly is conditioned to be the change, so I reached out to numerous young black officers to let them know I was a resource of “to do” and “dont do” they could use to refine their own leadership style. I did the same for white, female, asian, etc…because one day they would be in charge of people of color. And I wanted to, at least on a subconscious level, have them see me in their troops of color.
I kept seeing pictures of Keith Ellison holding Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook all over nutjob Twitter.
Ah, interest piqued. I found this.
Stand your ground, right?
See, this is one of the outcomes of property rights run amok, and the refusal to stop blurring the bright line between violence defined by (threatened) harm to a person and property destruction.
Language matters.
Something extraordinary has happened in foreign policy, not that we have time to notice. Trump insisted on making the G7 in-person, overruling earlier suggestions it could be virtual.
Angela Merkel said nope. Trump backed down.
Trump insisted on bringing his master, Putin, back to the G7.
BoJo of all people, said he’d veto that.
The world is sick of Trump.
A while back I watched on Netflix a documentary called Alt-Right: Age of Rage, which included a profile of Daryle Lamont Jenkins, who may be the most prominent person associated with Antifa. His focus is on doxxing–revealing the personal info of white supremacists who try to remain anonymous. He’s also been involved in helping some white supremacists reform and escape from the movement. Here’s one article about him:
https://www.wired.com/2017/03/meet-daryle-lamont-jenkins-insatiable-doxxer-fascists-nazis/
Here’s the Wikipedia article on him:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daryle_Lamont_Jenkins
@CSK: Thanks for your reply and attention to my report. That idea seemed to get a lot of support based on the comments made by radio listeners. Many people are in cities that are short on police. It looks like a win – win. The police get more officers and the people get a chance to make a change. Many police departments now have black chiefs or deputy sheriffs. It is nef Gillo longer the days of Chief Gillespie and Detective Virgil Tibbs.
Many a police officer has moved up to the State Bureaus of Investigation and the Federal Bureau of Investivgation. Some have gone on to law school and wound up being lawyers, district attorneys, and judges. Some have gone into police science and work in the forensics or as profilers.
Read “The Bone Collector”
Thanks for your comments.
@Tyrell:
I know; I worked as a consultant for a state and a municipal law enforcement agency, and, as you say, many of the officers held undergraduate and graduate degrees. Some were J.D.s. Others held Ph.D.s in criminology. And a great many of them were African-American and Hispanic. But, given how fraught the current situation is, I do not think that setting up recruiting tables outside police stations at this time is a very good idea.
@Michael Reynolds:
I can very clearly visualize Trump trotting tamely at the end of a leash grasped in Putin’s hand.
@reid:
Doctors just have a medical degree.
I brought the antibiotics for a cold once when chatting with an MD, and he said often the immune system weakens with a cold and bacteria can cause an infection. this made no sense to me, so I asked then how a weakened immune system still fought off the cold successfully. I got no answer.
you’d think they’d care about resistant bacteria, because eventually they’ll have to treat patients with such infections. Some do. A couple of years ago a dermatologist gave me an antibiotic prescription after draining a small abscess, but warned me not to even begin to take it if I wasn’t going to do the full course as prescribed. he explained taking only part can promote resistant bacteria.
Which I forgot to mention in the previous post. Some people given an antibiotic stop taking it when they feel better, and that also aids in resistance.
Anybody else see the Umbrella Man?
I saw some reference in a comment thread, and my first thought was, “The JFK guy? He’s alive?”
But no, that’s not it.
@Kurtz:
I saw this video yesterday. The St. Paul police strenuously deny that Umbrella Man is one of their cops. Who knows?
@OzarkHillbilly: No, they’re just looking for carte blanche to thump on anyone they see. (No, I didn’t know that 80-year-old woman was just out shopping, she was wearing a face mask. I thought she was Antifa.)
@Teve: And here I thought that my reply to Ozark might be too over the top by having an elderly person in it. Shows what I know. 🙁
Or they will be criticized for being weak on crime and know better than to make that mistake again.
A ebook* I published last summer had Wolf in it though he appeared in just one scene.
For about 15 years I have had a Cold War story idea where he’d be one of the main characters. It is very complicated and I lost the little bit I had written in a computer crash 10 years ago. I have so many story ideas, this one will probably never make it to print.
*- I actually spun it off from my Cold War story idea. About ten people who’d be involved in that are featured in my espionage ebook set between 1988 and 1998.
@CSK: Thanks for your attention to my report. Maybe they could start recruitment efforts in the communities and schools, I agree that all police are needed right now to keep order.
I put a list of police reform ideas on the other day. I will briefly list them:
1- Go back to being civilian police, not some sort of para-military force in the way they look and act.
2- Heavy community activity and visibility – know the residents by their first name. Create a partnership with community associations.
3- Continuing education through local colleges and universities.
4- Learn new low key, defusing types of apprehension, and control.
5- Use of new technology to safely contain a suspect.
6- Work with the F.B.I. to learn psychological interrogation and profiling methods.
@CSK:
Yeah, I’m kind of having fun going down this rabbit hole TBH. I wouldn’t pay it much mind, except the dude looks so out of place. From what I can see, that looks like high-end tactical gear that he is wearing.
He appears in the background in several videos. People piecing together his movements imply that he seems to deliberately loiter, and then begins moving again after tear gas has been deployed.
Oh, and a Masarati is idling around different places. Neither the guy’s outfit, nor the high-end sports car make sense. If you’re doing a covert op, why dress like that? Who brings a Masarati to a protest?
And why am I doing this?
@Kurtz:
I think the umbrella and the gas mask are to draw attention to himself. (The gas mask also hides his face quite effectively.) Whatever, it’s bizarre and, frankly, eerie.
It seems like Trump is very serious about moving the Republican convention out of North Carolina. My advice to Charlotte would be to say “So long and don’t let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.” For what the Republican convention will be like this year, see “1968 Democratic Convention” and look at what that did to the Democratic Party for the next 8 years. By all means, let this toxic waste site go to a deep Trump state, where they will appreciate the Republicans bringing riots to their doorstep.
My advice to the Republicans: skip over Nashville, which is a beautiful city trying to make advancements. Bring it to Philadelphia MS, where the locals won’t hesitate to show what they are made of.
@CSK:
No doubt.
@Tyrell:
I can co-sign those as a start.
I would add that figuring out the best agency and methods to handle mental health emergencies. That man who died in Dallas while the police mocked him shows the need for that. The cover-up after…
There needs to be a way to prosecute bad cops as well. I’m not sure of a solution. But I have trouble seeing them as civilians in the current environment. The civil court system seems inappropriate, because many cops don’t seem to seem to behave like civilians subject to the Rule of Law.
I’ve probly talked to this before. IDGAF. Why a black man talked to the KKK.
@Michael Reynolds: That is interesting. I have relatives who went through a park in the Everglades last year. They saw people taking selfies with alligators, and on some parts of the trail they went on they had to step over or around them.
@Kurtz: Umbrella man is fascinating. So much control in a chaotic situation. And so evil.
The harder they come
The harder they’ll fall
@Mister Bluster: Let this be the first of many.
Let Mitch McConnell come next, alongside Trump.
I have had e-fucking-nough of this bullshit.