Has U.S. Democracy Been Trumped?

[Chas_P]

 

First: compare Trump's action a couple days back in which in which the National Guard used rubber bullets and tear gas against peaceful protestors -

And later this afternoon, United States Park Police acting Chief Gregory T. Monahan exploded the entire false narrative:

 

On Monday, June 1, the USPP worked with the United States Secret Service to have temporary fencing installed inside Lafayette Park. At approximately 6:33 pm, violent protestors on H Street NW began throwing projectiles including bricks, frozen water bottles and caustic liquids. The protestors also climbed onto a historic building at the north end of Lafayette Park that was destroyed by arson days prior. Intelligence had revealed calls for violence against the police, and officers found caches of glass bottles, baseball bats and metal poles hidden along the street.

 

To curtail the violence that was underway, the USPP, following established policy, issued three warnings over a loudspeaker to alert demonstrators on H Street to evacuate the area. Horse mounted patrol, Civil Disturbance Units and additional personnel were used to clear the area. As many of the protestors became more combative, continued to throw projectiles, and attempted to grab officers’ weapons, officers then employed the use of smoke canisters and pepper balls. No tear gas was used by USPP officers or other assisting law enforcement partners to close the area at Lafayette Park. Subsequently, the fence was installed.

[hrothgar]

Let's assume that I believe ANY of what the NPS police are claiming

 

(Please note: There's a whole bunch of news reporters who were at the scene who dispute these claims)

 

How does any of this detract from the central claims???

 

Is it really matter if the police used pepper spray versus tear gas?

Does the fact that people were climbing on a church justify firing rubber bullets into a crowd?

"Intelligence" suggested that there might be violence?

 

Does anyone actually believe that what was going on in Layfette park is any different than what is happening in 1,001 other locations in Washington?

 

Trump wanted a photo op

He thought it would look good if was brandishing a bible in front of a church

 

He deployed a goon squad to fire on protestors because he cares more about his media narrative than he does about the welfare of American citizens.

[Winstonm]

Yes, but your citation only says that the Biden campaign is complaining. I suppose the Beast agrees.

 

So this is a good opportunity for Biden to show that he can successfully cope with a problem. I suppose the starting point would be to understand why this is happening. Trump complains that the failing NYT is out to get him. That probably wouldn't fly for Biden. He needs to think through just what is happening. Complaining, even if the complaint has some truth to it, only takes him so far. People get enthusiastic about a candidate who can solve problems.

 

 

 

So this is an opportunity.

 

 

 

The sad truth is that Trump is media-savvy and good for ratings and internet clicks. He is accessible and cheap for producers. He has a built-in audience. Even detractors are goaded into clicking onto or reading stories about him. It is Trump, Trump, Trump 24/7.

 

Not everything he tweets or says is newsworthy. At some point the media should ignore him and what he has said. We, the people, should do the same.

 

[barmar]

Just so that we all understand...are you saying that none of the arson, looting, beatings, etc. would ever have happened had Pence been at the helm? Because he would've been had Trump been removed from office. And here's another hypothetical...Let's assume that Hillary was elected in 2016. Would the arsonists, looters, etc be obeying Her Majesty's decrees and staying at home watching Netflix? Or would they have been on the streets setting fire to police cars, government buildings, stealing liquor, Nike shoes, cigarettes, and Louis Vuitton purses?

It's impossible to prove a hypothetical. But I feel quite confident that things would not be nearly as bad with anyone else at the helm.

 

I may not agree with Pence's opinions, but he seems like an intelligent, thoughtful person. If something like this happened on his watch, he would try to calm things down, not fan the flames.

 

Trump is an idiot and bully. He doesn't care about anything except increasing his power and profits.

 

At one time during the campaign he said he could act "presidential" and gave an impersonation of it. So far during his term, every time we needed him to act presidential, he has utterly failed. He ignored the coronavirus threat until it was too late, and since then his actions have been practically useless, although he continues to claim that they were great. His response to the violence this week have been more authoritarian than presidential.

 

When he was elected I thought "this sucks, but the country has survived sucky presidents before, we'll get past it". I don't think any of us could have imagined just how disastrous it would be, and now I'm not so sure how well we'll recover. And if he does get reelected, it's game over for the country. It's been a nice 2.5 centuries, but the wonderful experiment in American democracy will have failed.

[cherdano]

• The account by Monahan was disputed by every single journalist who witnessed it.
  
• The denial about using tear gas is something to behold. Not, they didn't use tear gas! They used pepper balls! Which create smoke upon explosion that causes strong eye irritation!! AND THAT'S NOT TEAR GAS!!! JUST GAS CREATING TEARS!!!! (Except the CDC classifies it as...tear gas)
  
• Bill Barr ordered Lafayette park to be cleared according to a report in ....Fox news.... Or see the Washington post for a much more detailed account if you can bare it: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/06/02/timeline-clearing-lafayette-square/
  

 

Of course the insanity of it all is that intentionally and unnecessarily causing people gathered in a large crowd to start coughing in the times of covid-19 is essentially attempted murder.

 

Anyway, chas_p's defenses of President Bleach seem getting more whimsical by the day. Good news. Maybe he has been looking at Biden-Trump polling lately?

[hrothgar]

[*]The account by Monahan was disputed by every single journalist who witnessed it.

 

“The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

[Winstonm]

"The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command."

 

 

In his address to the convention in Kansas City, Trump defended his decision to slap tariffs on the U.S.'s trading partners. As Trump told the crowd that "it's all working out," he warned those in the audience against believing what they see in the news.

 

"What you're seeing and what you're reading is not what's happening," Trump said

[Chas_P]

 

Is it really matter if the police used pepper spray versus tear gas?

 

He deployed a goon squad to fire on protestors because he cares more about his media narrative than he does about the welfare of American citizens.

You're right. Setting fire to St. Johns church and throwing bricks at the police is all just part of "peaceful" protesting. They really should have sprinkled them with rose petals.

[johnu]

No grift is too big, or too small for the Grifter in Chief

 

President Trump tried to register to vote in Florida using an out-of-state address

 

President Trump originally tried to register to vote in Florida while claiming his “legal residence” was in another part of the country — Washington, D.C. — according to Florida elections records.

Doing his part to prove that there is widespread fraud in vote by mail election :rolleyes:

 

Trump, however, has sent confusing signals about his official state of residence beyond the recent change on his Florida voter-registration forms. On Monday, he declared, “I live in Manhattan,” during a call with the nation’s governors about the response to unrest related to protests over the death of an unarmed black man who had been held down by police in Minneapolis.

Fanboys of the Manchurian President should be encouraged that the Psychopath in Chief named a city in the USA and not a "foreign" city as his official residence.

 

Questions about the legality of Trump’s change of domicile surfaced in the past few weeks during an otherwise mundane fight he’s been waging since 2018 to persuade Palm Beach to let him build a dock at Mar-a-Lago.

 

Trump initially made the request, which is being considered by the Palm Beach City Council, saying it was needed to enhance security to protect him. He later changed the request, saying Mar-a-Lago is his “personal residence” and that the dock would be “for private family use only.” According to Mar-a-Lago’s website, he maintains “private quarters” at the club. Trump calls Mar-a-Lago his “Winter White House” and has traveled there more than two dozen times during his presidency, staying there well over 100 days, according to a Washington Post tally.

 

Opponents of the dock unearthed an agreement with the city that Trump signed in the early 1990s converting Mar-a-Lago’s use from a single-family residence to a private club. At the time, his attorney told the council that he would not live at the club, but would have use of the facilities like any other member. The agreement also bans members from staying at the club for more than 21 days a year spread over three nonconsecutive visits.

I personally don't see the problem here. Laws and legal agreements are for poor people, not billionaires. :rolleyes:

[johnu]

Trump Denies, Then Admits, Going to White House Bunker During Protest

 

President Trump on Wednesday first denied and then acknowledged that he had gone to a secure bunker in the White House as protesters demonstrated nearby but said he went there for an “inspection,” not because of concerns over his safety.

Yes, sure we are in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic that has kill 105000+ people in the US, and nationwide demonstrations of the murder of George Floyd. Despite that, the Grifter in Chief took time off from tweeting and watching Fox Propaganda TV to take a trip down to the White House Bunker-a-Logo to check the paint job and carpeting to see whether some serious changes needed to be made. The Manchurian President has the nation's interests at the forefront in these difficult times.

[hrothgar]

You're right. Setting fire to St. Johns church and throwing bricks at the police is all just part of "peaceful" protesting. They really should have sprinkled them with rose petals.

 

 

The fire at St John's church happened on Sunday night you ignorant piece of shiite.

 

The was a long time before Trump's little stroll...

 

Your continually attempts to whitewash these actions are pathetic

[cherdano]

I bet the story below will matter much more for the outcome of the election than whether gas causing tears should be called tear gas, what Biden said and how loudly, or whether that gets him on the WP front page.

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2020/05/trumps-executive-order-isnt-about-twitter/612349/

Zeynep Tufekci explains that Trump's executive order on the infamous Section 230 has just one purpose - to keep a threat hanging over facebook to ensure they will keep cooperating well with the Trump campaign, or right-wing content in general.

[Zelandakh]

Trump Denies, Then Admits, Going to White House Bunker During Protest

President Trump on Wednesday first denied and then acknowledged that he had gone to a secure bunker in the White House as protesters demonstrated nearby but said he went there for an “inspection,” not because of concerns over his safety.

No doubt the 8-9 military vehicles full of Home Guard soldiers deployed onto Pennsylvania Avenue were similarly there for exercises, long-planned and completely unrelated to anything going on in the immediate vicinity.

[hrothgar]

When I joined the military, some 50 years ago, I swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstance to violate the Constitutional rights of their fellow citizens—much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander-in-chief, with military leadership standing alongside.

 

James Mattis

Secretary of Defense January, 2017 --> January 2019

 

 

Full text

 

IN UNION THERE IS STRENGTH

I have watched this week’s unfolding events, angry and appalled. The words “Equal Justice Under Law” are carved in the pediment of the United States Supreme Court. This is precisely what protesters are rightly demanding. It is a wholesome and unifying demand—one that all of us should be able to get behind. We must not be distracted by a small number of lawbreakers. The protests are defined by tens of thousands of people of conscience who are insisting that we live up to our values—our values as people and our values as a nation.

 

When I joined the military, some 50 years ago, I swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstance to violate the Constitutional rights of their fellow citizens—much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander-in-chief, with military leadership standing alongside.

 

We must reject any thinking of our cities as a “battlespace” that our uniformed military is called upon to “dominate.” At home, we should use our military only when requested to do so, on very rare occasions, by state governors. Militarizing our response, as we witnessed in Washington, D.C., sets up a conflict—a false conflict—between the military and civilian society. It erodes the moral ground that ensures a trusted bond between men and women in uniform and the society they are sworn to protect, and of which they themselves are a part. Keeping public order rests with civilian state and local leaders who best understand their communities and are answerable to them.

[Winstonm]

The fire at St John's church happened on Sunday night you ignorant piece of shiite.

 

The was a long time before Trump's little stroll...

 

Your continually attempts to whitewash these actions are pathetic

For a much larger portion of this country than there should be by any religious, moral, or humanitarian standard, the protesters have committed a heinous and unforgivable crime: complaining while black. It is the underlying crime Trump claimed was Obamagate: presidenting while black.

 

Neither of those crimes to be confused with the real capital crime: breathing while black.

 

I have one thing only to say to all you racist Pieces of Shite: Die soon.

[johnu]

No doubt the 8-9 military vehicles full of Home Guard soldiers deployed onto Pennsylvania Avenue were similarly there for exercises, long-planned and completely unrelated to anything going on in the immediate vicinity.

Reliable sources say that the Manchurian President would have walked out to greet those soldiers but his bone spurs were acting up. He heard from his friend Jim that there was a foot massage place in Bunker-a-Lago so he went there instead.

[Chas_P]

The fire at St John's church happened on Sunday night you ignorant piece of shiite.

And when did the brick-throwing, bottle-throwing occur O Wise and Worldly One?

[Chas_P]

 

I have one thing only to say to all you racist Pieces of Shite: Die soon.[/size]

I have looked at as many videos as I can find and, from what I can see, a sizeable portion of the rabble rousers were white. So were they there seeking "justice"? Or were they there to raise hell and destroy stuff (like the Lincoln Memorial)?

[y66]

Alexander Burns and Maggie Haberman at NYT:

 

President Trump is facing the bleakest outlook for his re-election bid so far, with his polling numbers plunging in both public and private surveys and his campaign beginning to worry about his standing in states like Ohio and Iowa that he carried by wide margins four years ago.

 

The Trump campaign has recently undertaken a multimillion-dollar advertising effort in those two states as well as Arizona in hopes of improving his standing, while also shaking up his political operation and turning new attention to states like Georgia that were once considered reliably Republican. In private, Mr. Trump has expressed concern that his campaign is not battle-ready for the general election, while Republicans are concerned about whether the president can emerge in a strong position from the national crises battering the country.

 

Mr. Trump has been consistently unpopular as president with a majority of Americans; his advisers have long seen his effort to win a new term as depending on the loyalty of his conservative base and the Republican-friendly tilt of the Electoral College — factors that could allow the president to capture another thin victory despite the strong possibility of losing the popular vote again.

 

But amid the human and economic devastation of the coronavirus pandemic and now a wave of demonstrations and social unrest in American cities, Mr. Trump has fallen significantly behind his Democratic challenger, Joseph R. Biden Jr.

 

In private polling conducted by Mr. Trump’s campaign, the president is now well behind Mr. Biden, according to people briefed on the most recent round of results. Multiple public surveys this week have found Mr. Trump trailing Mr. Biden, the former vice president, by double-digit margins, including a Monmouth University poll published on Wednesday that showed Mr. Biden ahead by 11 percentage points.

 

The presidential election is still five months away and Mr. Trump, despite his political vulnerability, retains some important assets as a candidate. While Mr. Biden’s fund-raising efforts have picked up momentum, Mr. Trump is sitting on a considerably larger war chest and is resuming in-person fund-raising next week. There is almost no open dissent within the Republican Party, giving Mr. Trump a solid political foundation on the right from which he can attempt to rebuild his strength before the fall campaign.

 

Tim Murtaugh, a spokesman for Mr. Trump’s campaign, said in a statement that the race remained highly competitive.

 

“Our internal data consistently shows the president running strong against a defined Joe Biden in all of our key states,” Mr. Murtaugh said, using a term that typically refers to polling that tests positive and negative messages about both candidates.

 

But Mr. Trump’s belligerent response to protests after the killing of George Floyd, a black man, while in the custody of white police officers in Minneapolis, appears to have worsened his political position even further, officials in both parties said. On an almost daily basis, he has issued a combination of wild threats and complaints about news media coverage and other personal grievances.

 

“There is no obvious strategy in terms of message,” said Rob Stutzman, a Republican strategist based in California. “The president defaults to base messages regardless of strategy, thus the campaign becomes a base-driven campaign.”

 

Signs of anxiety inside the Trump team are evident across the electoral map. Over the past few weeks, the president’s operation has spent about $1.7 million on advertising in just three states he carried in 2016 — Ohio, Iowa and Arizona — that it had hoped would not be competitive at all this year. Much of that sum went to a concentrated two-week barrage in Ohio, according to the media-tracking firm Advertising Analytics.

 

The spending in Ohio startled many Republicans, given that four years ago Mr. Trump defeated Hillary Clinton there by eight percentage points.

 

Perhaps just as telling were two trips last month to Georgia by Vice President Mike Pence. The state has become a source of nagging concern to Republicans, both because of the stakes in the presidential race and because there are two Senate seats up for election this year, including one held by a highly unpopular appointee, Senator Kelly Loeffler, who has been snared in a personal financial scandal.

 

The fact that any of those states is competitive at this point looms as a significant hurdle to Mr. Trump’s re-election. Should he lose a state like Georgia, with its 16 Electoral College votes, or Arizona, with 11, it could blow a hole in Mr. Trump’s map even if he were to hold other battleground states like Florida, North Carolina and Wisconsin.

 

A set of state-level polls released on Wednesday by Fox News found Mr. Biden leading Mr. Trump in Arizona by four percentage points, and slightly ahead of Mr. Trump in Ohio as well. The former vice president held a nine-point lead in Wisconsin, where Mr. Trump eked out a win over Mrs. Clinton in 2016.

 

Aaron Pickrell, a Democratic strategist in Ohio who helped steer former President Barack Obama’s campaigns there, said Mr. Trump’s decision to shift money into the state suggested just how precarious his overall position was. Mr. Pickrell said there were now conversations among national Democrats about whether to commit resources to contesting a state that most effectively gave up on after Mrs. Clinton’s thumping defeat there.

 

“I don’t think anybody will dispute the fact that if Trump loses Ohio, there’s no path at all,” Mr. Pickrell said. “We’re not going to be a tipping-point state this time, but I think Joe Biden can win here and I think the Trump campaign sees that.”

 

Polls released on Wednesday show another troubling sign for Mr. Trump: His numbers have flagged recently among white voters, driven by a continued erosion of support from those with college degrees. The latest Monmouth survey found Mr. Trump with the support of just 52 percent of white voters nationwide — five percentage points lower than his share in 2016, according to exit polls.

 

There are also at least faint signs of renewed discomfort with Mr. Trump among a sliver of suburban Republican primary voters who could doom him altogether if they were to shift to Mr. Biden in November.

 

In a few states with primary elections this week, a smattering of suburban counties registered substantial, though far from strong, protest votes against the president from his fellow Republicans.

 

In Maryland, for instance, more than a tenth of Republican primary voters cast their ballots for Bill Weld, the former governor of Massachusetts who ended his quixotic campaign in March after registering in the low single digits in a string of primaries. With most precincts reporting, Mr. Weld was drawing more than 20 percent of the primary vote in two populous and diverse suburban counties outside Washington, D.C., that are rich with racially diverse and highly educated voters who have grown increasingly uncomfortable with the G.O.P. under Mr. Trump.

 

In Indiana, Mr. Weld took nearly 13 percent of the vote in Hamilton County, a suburb of Indianapolis, while in New Mexico a similar share of voters in Bernalillo County, home to Albuquerque, voted for an uncommitted slate of Republican delegates rather than for Mr. Trump.

 

In many of the states that voted on Tuesday, however, including Pennsylvania and Montana, there were only scant signs of protest voting, underscoring the extent of Mr. Trump’s dominance within his party even in a period of extraordinary political adversity. And his advisers point to the relatively high turnout on the Republican side in some states, like New Mexico, as a sign that Mr. Trump’s base is still intensely engaged.

 

It is not clear how fully Mr. Trump grasps the depths of his political peril; when he was asked on Wednesday about trailing Mr. Biden in the polls, he replied, “I have other polls where I’m winning,” though he did not cite one. At times, his allies have taken unusual steps to try to calm his frustration, including commissioning and then leaking a poll last month that suggested that Mr. Trump had gained ground rapidly on Mr. Biden, people familiar with the efforts said, even as other Republican and nonpartisan polling showed the president’s numbers stagnant.

 

But Mr. Trump has been lashing out for weeks at some of his political lieutenants, according to people briefed on his reactions, who were not authorized to speak publicly. He blamed them for the difficulty of the campaign, comparing them unfavorably to the operation surrounding Mr. Biden. The president has complained that his fund-raising advantage has diminished, and indeed some of Mr. Trump’s advisers were caught off guard when Mr. Biden raised nearly as much money as the president in April.

 

“Biden has a team of killers and all I’ve got is a defense,” Mr. Trump has said to allies, taking a decidedly different view of the Biden campaign than most Republicans as well as a good number of Democrats.

 

Mr. Trump’s campaign has already carried out an organizational shake-up, elevating a trusted adviser, Bill Stepien, to the role of deputy campaign manager and giving him an expansive portfolio. The move came after Mr. Trump spent much of the spring railing bitterly about his campaign manager, Brad Parscale, and other Republicans raised questions about whether Mr. Parscale had sufficient political experience and knowledge to steer a presidential campaign.

 

Mr. Parscale’s job is safe, several officials insisted, but other changes on the campaign could happen in the coming weeks, according to people close to Mr. Trump.

 

Across the Republican Party, there is a mood of intense apprehension and hope — though not optimism — that Mr. Trump can stabilize his candidacy and rebuild his political position as he did after several political crises in 2016.

 

But Republicans also acknowledge that Mr. Trump has seldom, if ever, faced a moment as difficult as this one, for the country or for his campaign, especially given his erratic handling of the twin crises facing the country.

 

Like many Republicans, including top officials in Mr. Trump’s campaign and administration, Mr. Stutzman, the strategist, saw the president’s impulses as a largely unfixable problem: “He’s too defective to have any other strategy than to be who he is,” Mr. Stutzman said.

[hrothgar]

I have looked at as many videos as I can find and, from what I can see, a sizeable portion of the rabble rousers were white.

 

Chas, people aren't called you a racist based on your last couple of posts

 

People label you a racist based on your long term posting history

This isn't a hat that you can put on and take off.

 

ITS WHO YOU ARE and people are going to react as such.

[hrothgar]

And when did the brick-throwing, bottle-throwing occur O Wise and Worldly One?

 

Once again, multiple reporters on the scene dispute whether there was brick and bottle throwing.

 

But, at the end of the day, it does actually matter?

 

If there was brick and bottle throwing, this was a predictable outcome of Trump's administration to clear the park for a photo opportunity. And, please note, before this all happened, Trump had been grandstanding about how American governors need to "get tough" with the crowds in their cities. Trump made a deliberate choice to do this. And he didn't do this out of any real necessity, rather this was to enable a ridiculous photo op.

 

The past few days have seen example after example in which peaceful protests were broken up by police and military who were using excessive force.

 

When TV news crews and cameramen are repeatedly being shot / being beaten with truncheons /being punched in the face... These are clear and obvious examples in which the police are using excessive force. And there are examples of such behaviour on tape from all over the District and all over the country.

 

 

FWIW, I wouldn't be at all surprised if police decisions to attack crowds leads to individuals striking back. But here, once again, the proximate trigger is the decision to use force to try and disperse crowds.

[y66]

t's hard to get across what a big deal it is that former Defense Secretary James Mattis has not only publicly criticized President Donald Trump, but done so in extremely strong terms. In a statement issued Wednesday, Mattis talked about “those in office who would make a mockery of our Constitution,” and said that “We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership.” He added that Trump was engaged in a “deliberate attempt” to “divide us,” something he says no other president in his lifetime has done. (For the record, Mattis is 69, so he’s talking about everyone since Harry Truman.)

 

I’m not sure that we’ve ever had a former cabinet secretary criticize a president he or she served this harshly, and certainly not one who was still in office and up for re-election. It’s all the more striking coming from a retired general, a group that tends to be relatively hesitant to jump into politics. Nor is Mattis standing alone. Trump’s conduct this week — in particular his militarized response to what still amounts to a lot of peaceful protest and a small amount of criminal activity — has also been denounced by former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen and even some of those currently in office.

 

Mattis’s criticism probably won’t directly affect public opinion; there just aren’t a lot of people who pay close enough attention to the news to hear what he said and who are also open to changing their minds. But it will still prove consequential. Although some Republicans will join Trump in denouncing Mattis, others will hesitate or be even less inclined to defend the president’s actions than they had been (and most hadn’t exactly been leaping to the microphones to support him in any event). Democrats were already going to condemn Trump, but they’ll likely do so more harshly now. And those who aren’t aligned with either party may well feel that a “neutral” stance now requires more criticism of the president, given that it’s not just protesters who are judging him harshly.

 

Meanwhile, the list of Donald Trump’s terrible personnel choices according to Donald Trump gets one name longer, as the president reacted predictably by bashing Mattis. That list now includes a defense secretary, a secretary of state, an attorney general, at least one national security adviser and at least two White House chiefs of staff. Again, there are very few people who are otherwise undecided about Trump who would be swayed by what an awful job — according to Trump himself — he has done appointing people for the most important positions in government. But it’s a remarkable record nonetheless.

[y66]

It sickened me yesterday to see security personnel—including members of the National Guard—forcibly and violently clear a path through Lafayette Square to accommodate the president's visit outside St. John's Church. I have to date been reticent to speak out on issues surrounding President Trump's leadership, but we are at an inflection point, and the events of the past few weeks have made it impossible to remain silent.

 

Whatever Trump's goal in conducting his visit, he laid bare his disdain for the rights of peaceful protest in this country, gave succor to the leaders of other countries who take comfort in our domestic strife, and risked further politicizing the men and women of our armed forces.

 

There was little good in the stunt.

 

While no one should ever condone the violence, vandalism, and looting that has exploded across our city streets, neither should anyone lose sight of the larger and deeper concerns about institutional racism that have ignited this rage.

 

As a white man, I cannot claim perfect understanding of the fear and anger that African Americans feel today. But as someone who has been around for a while, I know enough—and I’ve seen enough—to understand that those feelings are real and that they are all too painfully founded.

 

We must, as citizens, address head-on the issue of police brutality and sustained injustices against the African American community. We must, as citizens, support and defend the right—indeed, the solemn obligation—to peacefully assemble and to be heard. These are not mutually exclusive pursuits.

 

And neither of these pursuits will be made easier or safer by an overly aggressive use of our military, active duty or National Guard. The United States has a long and, to be fair, sometimes troubled history of using the armed forces to enforce domestic laws. The issue for us today is not whether this authority exists, but whether it will be wisely administered.

 

I remain confident in the professionalism of our men and women in uniform. They will serve with skill and with compassion. They will obey lawful orders. But I am less confident in the soundness of the orders they will be given by this commander in chief, and I am not convinced that the conditions on our streets, as bad as they are, have risen to the level that justifies a heavy reliance on military troops. Certainly, we have not crossed the threshold that would make it appropriate to invoke the provisions of the Insurrection Act.

 

Furthermore, I am deeply worried that as they execute their orders, the members of our military will be co-opted for political purposes.

 

Even in the midst of the carnage we are witnessing, we must endeavor to see American cities and towns as our homes and our neighborhoods. They are not “battle spaces” to be dominated, and must never become so.

 

We must ensure that African Americans—indeed, all Americans—are given the same rights under the Constitution, the same justice under the law, and the same consideration we give to members of our own family. Our fellow citizens are not the enemy, and must never become so.

 

Too many foreign and domestic policy choices have become militarized; too many military missions have become politicized.

 

This is not the time for stunts. This is the time for leadership.

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/american-cities-are-not-battlespaces/612553/

[Winstonm]

The mouse that squeals is connected to the tail you just stepped step on.

[Cyberyeti]

When even Pat Robertson is telling Trump this is unacceptable ... https://edition.cnn.com/2020/06/03/politics/pat-robertson-donald-trump/index.html