Could Poverty, Income Inequalities in US Lead to UK-Like Riots?

POSTED BY: Niki2
UPDATED: Wednesday, August 17, 2011 03:18
VIEWED: 3125
PAGE 1 of 1

NIKI2

Friday, August 12, 2011 4:56 PM (P)

We've been thinking about this, haven't we?

Quote:
Americans have watched in astonishment, along with the rest of the world, the violence that's erupted in England as young, disaffected Britons take to the streets to vent their rage.

But could it happen in the United States as it grapples with a 25 per cent youth unemployment rate and a double-dip recession potentially in the offing?

The current bleak landscape in the United States is littered with all the same disturbing elements at play in the U.K. _ racial tensions, high unemployment, a growing income gap between rich and poor, a gloomy economic outlook and a feeling of hopelessness among youth.

Recent statistics reveal that 39.2 per cent of black teens and 36.2 per cent of Hispanic youth are jobless. In New York City, black and Hispanic youths are twice as likely to drop out of school as their peers, have a poverty rate that is 50 per cent higher than other ethnicities, experience an unemployment rate that is 60 per cent higher, and make up more than 90 per cent of young murder victims and perpetrators.

Although the biggest riots in the United States have involved race and civil rights, some observers think throwing a Great Depression-esque economic situation into the mix could spur America's youth to rise up too.

"There is a direct correlation between the violence here in Chicago, which is off the charts right now, and the lack of investment in inner cities and inner-city youth," Phillip Jackson, founder of the Million Father March, said in an interview on Wednesday.

"In Chicago and other major American cities, the violent acts are singular and isolated. The violence in London has become collective and focused, but the underlying causes are the same, and as soon as American kids figure that out, we're in trouble."

But others point out that America has evolved in a far different direction than the country it broke away from in the 18th century. Class divisions are not as pronounced as they are in the U.K., they point out, and America's lower classes generally don't regard the upper classes with the seething contempt that their British counterparts do.

"In the U.S., if you're born into a lower socioeconomic class, there is still the perceived possibility of transcending that, of achieving wealth," said Sean Snaith, the director of the University of Central Florida's Institute for Economic Competitiveness.

"The upper classes, the celebrity class, the wealthy _ to the average American, they're what royalty is to the British. Americans consider that something to be admired and held in esteem and awe. So that's a pretty good anesthesia in a lot of ways."

Youth might also be nervous taking to the streets given the tendency of American law enforcement agencies to respond to force with even greater force.

"Our police are much more willing to use brutal force," said Snaith. "There is no bobby mentality here; American police officers carry guns. If there's violence going down, they're going to respond with violence." http://finance.sympatico.ca/home/could_uk_riots_happen_in_the_united_s
tates/6b2ea178 Nightline last night we sat down with PBS and radio talk show host Tavis Smiley and Princeton University professor Dr. Cornel West about their Poverty Tour.
.....
"One percent of the people owning and controlling more wealth than 90% of Americans, that's unsustainable. That math won't hold up long-term. There is a bubbling, there is a restlessness."

"If you don't treat poor and working people with dignity now, chickens are going to come home to roost later," West said. "And it won't be about love and justice. It will be about revenge, hatred, and then we all go under." http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2011/08/smiley-and-west-povert
y-income-inequalities-in-us-could-lead-to-uk-like-riots.html [/quot

WULFENSTAR

Friday, August 12, 2011 5:11 PM (P)

The only places where UK-like riots could happen (for longer than a day) are in places like Chicago, NY, California, and Mass.

Typical liberal strongholds that have high unemployment, low morality, and gun control.

Just in case, tho...

Clean your gun, make sure you have plenty of ammo, food, water, and a secure location.

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

CONCHOBAR71

Friday, August 12, 2011 5:21 PM (P)

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
The only places where UK-like riots could happen (for longer than a day) are in places like Chicago, NY, California, and Mass.

Typical liberal strongholds that have high unemployment, low morality, and gun control.

Just in case, tho...

Clean your gun, make sure you have plenty of ammo, food, water, and a secure location.

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

I have a feeling we aren't far from such events in any state that has larger cities with high unemployment especially as race baiting and class warfare continue to rule our leaderships tenor.

My state has already begun to hear undertones that something is brewing. You're right about the gun control part too. I don't think morality plays a part at all. People who are desperate do stupid things.

Jayne: "Ten percent of nuthin' is...let me do the math here...nuthin' into nuthin'...carry the nuthin'..."

OLDENGLANDDRY

Friday, August 12, 2011 5:29 PM (P)

I know this is slightly off-topic but PN's thread has had enough views. The U.K "Riots" were triggered by a very complex set of back-issues, although Race-alienation and an incresing sense among the youth that they are likely to get away with acts of violence and vandalism only lightly punished were a factor. I'm not sure if this "Fear of our children" sindrome exists in the U.S. The chances of similar riots in America ARE very real, but for very different reasons.
I also wonder if you would see this afterward:

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/heartwarming-stories-from-the-uk-riots.html

WULFENSTAR

Friday, August 12, 2011 5:47 PM (P)

"I have a feeling we aren't far from such events in any state that has larger cities with high unemployment especially as race baiting and class warfare continue to rule our leaderships tenor.

My state has already begun to hear undertones that something is brewing. You're right about the gun control part too. I don't think morality plays a part at all. People who are desperate do stupid things."

By morality I meant this: "I don't think its wrong to burn and loot so long as I get mine". Morality DOES play a big role in riots. Do I burn and loot a store, hurt or kill someone, so I can get something that I want (not need)?

I would have more respect for a looter (barely, but still) if during a riot they took medicine, food, even ammo... instead of Jordans, big screen Tvs, Ipods, or FuBu.

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

WULFENSTAR

Friday, August 12, 2011 5:53 PM (P)

"I know this is slightly off-topic but PN's thread has had enough views. The U.K "Riots" were triggered by a very complex set of back-issues, although Race-alienation and an incresing sense among the youth that they are likely to get away with acts of violence and vandalism only lightly punished were a factor. I'm not sure if this "Fear of our children" sindrome exists in the U.S. The chances of similar riots in America ARE very real, but for very different reasons.
I also wonder if you would see this afterward: "

Britain is one of the most closely "monitored" societies in all of the Western worlds. CCTV, and the like.

I just think they realized that the "watchers" don't have the ability to track and prosecute them all.

But the police-state there is trying. Kicking in doors, grabbing people.

I've said it before here. When the LA riots happened, the proper response was what the Koreans did.

They defended their property, and their livelihood.

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

CONCHOBAR71

Friday, August 12, 2011 6:48 PM (P)

All good points :) Although the argument can be made that those who are committing violence against another may not necessarily be the norm.

Actions taken against the "Man" or corporate ownings may be considered (rationalization I know..bad bad rationalization) an act of reciprocation, even though that store front owner "may" not be guilty of some transgression, the corporate products and commodities (Gas, Oil, Food, TVs etc..) sold there produced record profit gains for those producers and many people hold extreme resentment against those big companies and those who sell them. It doesn't make it right, but immorality is kind of a homogenous thing, depending on the culture and society.

I know here in NY, there have been several instances where severe price gouging has occurred by gas station owners. Even the Pricechopper Gas rebates (grocery purchases = gas savings) have been changed, manipulated, ignored or played with by the local Pakistani owners (most of our gas stations are owned and operated locally here by men of Pakistani and Middle Eastern descent). It has gotten so bad at times, that I have witnessed fist fights break out when someone calls the owners on it.

If people feel wronged, it becomes less about morality and more about vigilantism.

It's scary actually.

Jayne: "Ten percent of nuthin' is...let me do the math here...nuthin' into nuthin'...carry the nuthin'..."

WULFENSTAR

Friday, August 12, 2011 7:34 PM (P)

Same sort of things happened during Katrina.

You want to get out? Sure, just come by the friendly gas-station and pay 20 bucks a gallon....

then there was the "mayor", using the cops to disarm people. EXACTLY when they NEEDED to be armed...INSTEAD of helping folks evacuate.

I agree. Its scary.

Yet, whenever liberals get out of control, when the cancer of their beliefs begin to rage.. there are always those who stand against the darkness.

Tho I am hopeful that this may always be true, I know it takes simple people willing to fight.

Also, corny as it is.. even Chuck Norris is on board. :)

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

M52NICKERSON

Friday, August 12, 2011 7:46 PM (P)

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:They defended their property, and their livelihood.

You do realize that in the US you can't use lethal force to defend property. You can only use lethal force when you or others lives are at risk.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

WULFENSTAR

Friday, August 12, 2011 7:49 PM (P)

"You do realize that in the US you can't use lethal force to defend property. You can only use lethal force when you or others lives are at risk."

Depends on the state you are in.

Not a native, eh?

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"

CONCHOBAR71

Friday, August 12, 2011 8:06 PM (P)

Quote:
Originally posted by m52nickerson:
Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:They defended their property, and their livelihood.

You do realize that in the US you can't use lethal force to defend property. You can only use lethal force when you or others lives are at risk.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

Pennsylvania Uniform Firearms Act

Title 18, §505. Use of Force in Self-Protection.

(a) Use of force justifiable for protection of the person.—The use of force upon or toward another person is justifiable when the actor believes that such force is immediately necessary for the purpose of protecting himself against the use of unlawful force by such other person on the present occasion.

(b) Limitations on justifying necessity for use of force. —

(1) The use of force is not justifiable under this section:

(i) to resist an arrest which the actor knows is being made by a peace officer, although the arrest is unlawful; or

(ii) to resist force used by the occupier or possessor of property or by another person on his behalf, where the actor knows that the person using the force is doing so under a claim of right to protect the property, except that this limitation shall not apply if:

(A) the actor is a public officer acting in the performance of his duties or a person lawfully assisting him therein or a person making or assisting in a lawful arrest;

(B) the actor has been unlawfully dispossessed of the property and is making a reentry or recaption justified by section 507 of this title (relating to use of force for the protection of property); or

(C) the actor believes that such force is necessary to protect himself against death or serious bodily injury.

(2) The use of deadly force is not justifiable under this section unless the actor believes that such force is necessary to protect himself against death, serious bodily injury, kidnapping or sexual intercourse compelled by force or threat; nor is it justifiable if:

(i) the actor, with the intent of causing death or serious bodily injury, provoked the use of force against himself in the same encounter; or

(ii) the actor knows that he can avoid the necessity of using such force with complete safety by retreating or by surrendering possession of a thing to a person asserting a claim of right thereto or by complying with a demand that he abstain from any action which he has no duty to take, except that:

(A) the actor is not obliged to retreat from his dwelling or place of work, unless he was the initial aggressor or is assailed in his place of work by another person whose place of work the actor knows it to be; and

(B) a public officer justified in using force in the performance of his duties or a person justified in using force in his assistance or a person justified in using force in making an arrest or preventing an escape is not obliged to desist from efforts to perform such duty, effect such arrest or prevent such escape because of resistance or threatened resistance by or on behalf of the person against whom such action is directed.

(3) Except as required by paragraphs (1) and (2) of this subsection, a person employing protective force may estimate the necessity thereof under the circumstances as he believes them to be when the force is used, without retreating, surrendering possession, doing any other act which he has no legal duty to do or abstaining from any lawful action.

(c) Use of confinement as protective force. — The justification afforded by this section extends to the use of confinement as protective force only if the actor takes all reasonable measures to terminate the confinement as soon as he knows that he safely can, unless the person confined has been arrested on a charge of crime.

Title 18, §506. Use of Force for the Protection of Other Persons.

(

M52NICKERSON

Friday, August 12, 2011 8:14 PM (P)

I stand corrected.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

KIRKULES

Friday, August 12, 2011 8:30 PM (P)

In Florida if two people steal my car and I shoot one of them, the surviving thief could be charged with their accomplice's murder and I would be within my legal rights.

STORYMARK

Friday, August 12, 2011 8:38 PM (P)

Quote:
Originally posted by Kirkules:
In Florida if two people steal my car and I shoot one of them, the surviving thief could be charged with their accomplice's murder and I would be within my legal rights.

That's pretty cool, really.

For once, Florida gets something right.

"I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him."

NIKI2

Friday, August 12, 2011 8:39 PM (P)

Quote:
The only places where UK-like riots could happen (for longer than a day) are in places like Chicago, NY, California, and Mass.

Typical liberal strongholds that have high unemployment, low morality, and gun control.

Gawd, Wulf, you are so ignorant and say such stupid thing that it's hard NOT to believe you're Raptor's sickpuppy!

We won't have riots in Northern California. What are you going to come up with when we don't? I'm sure you'll have forgotten by then and find something else stupid to say which makes you think you're intelligent and have a grasp on reality. We might well have PROTESTS, especially over in Berserkeley, but not riots.

It would be so lovely if you could see people as people, and not entire states as bastions of one political party or the other. I guess you're just not capable of conceiving of such a possibility, which is part of wht makes you so ridiculous.

Just FYI: As of February of this year, DC, Vermont, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Oregon, Colorado, Washington, New Jersey all rank above California in being liberal according to Gallup ( http://www.gallup.com/poll/146348/Mississippi-Rates-Conservative-Rates
-States.aspx). We're not even in the top ten.

California ranks below Nevada, Arkansas, Wyoming, Idaho, West Virginia, Kentucky, Oklahoma, Alaska, Florida and Maine in divorce rate. Nevada has worse unemployment than we do. In California, there are 5 major restrictions on handguns; Colorado has 7, Connecticut 5, New York 7, Texas and Utah 4. Obviously gun restrictions are much more complex than that, and for a number of states, it's text, not table, but that gives you an idea ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_control_in_the_United_States_(by_stat
e). I'm not going to spend the time reading or finding more than that, given your mentality, but hey, it looks like "morally" we're doing pretty good (as divorce is the only measure I can think of), we're doing better than Nevada on unemployment and we have less gun control than Colorado and New York (and possibly other states, if I bothered to read further).

I realize this won't stop your blathering about California, but those are the FACTS!

Hippie Operative Nikovich Nikita Nicovna Talibani,
Contracted Agent of Veritas Oilspillus, code name “Nike”,
signing off

FREMDFIRMA

Friday, August 12, 2011 10:32 PM (P)

I don't see where the wulfenwhiner gets off complaining about a "police state" that him and his completely enabled, first by not having the guts to stand up and say no, and second by deliberate enablement so long as the right victims were on the wrong end of the bayonet - so forgive me for not being particularly sympathetic to any of his whinin about those bayonets being potentially pointed at him.

That said...

Many large cities in america right now are a goddamn powder keg waiting to happen, and it's got shit to do with left-right politics so much as downright class warfare and corporate exploitation helped along by government in a pretty bi-partisan fashion.

Now, Michigan and Texas, surely are the kinda places where it's prettymuch legal to shoot dead someone on your property who's an imminent threat, which to me makes a whole lot more sense than any other way particularly cause I am usually in a damn wheelchair and my residence has only one entry/exit, so what the hell am I gonna do, run away ? yeeeahhh right.
Sorry, I just don't see "Lay down and die" an appropriate defense strategy - although I am also well aware that even the most clear-cut, fully justifiable shooting will result in a curb stomping, weapon confiscation and about thirty grand in legal bills, which I find every bit as ludicrous as the idea I should just lay down and die rather than shoot some nimrod crashing my door with evil intent.
But that's a side issue, really it is.

Thing here is, there is, and always has been, particularly since 1984, a "plan on the shelf" for using the excuse of civil unrest to perform a coup d'etat, a fascist takeover - you can thank ollie north for that one(1) since he helped write it, or rather, re-write it out of the original plans penned by scoop jackson(2), which were seized and retroactively classified.(3)
Although not after some folk had read them and made copies - what has been seen cannot be unseen.
Anyhow, there's folks in our government just waiting for the excuse, and I can even tell you how that would go.

Either via provacateurs, or just by the fact that our infrastructure itself in most cities is hanging on by a goddamn thread already (at any one time in detroit, there's a couple thousand folk without power, y'all have heard my rants at DTE about that shit), sufficient damage will be done to "justify" shutting off power, water, sewage - and they'll spin it as either a punitive measure or protective depending on what they think they can get away with.
You've NO IDEA how fast that can go badly, medieval siege conditions in an urban environment against folk totally unequipped or prepared to handle it(4) - which leads to excuse sufficient to send in the Dirty Third, which is as you know on homeland security civil unrest pacification duty(5) complete with new APCs and prefab prisons courtesy of KBR/Haliburton(6).

I mean, these preparations haven't even been particularly secret, as I have pointed out each and every one as it happens - but Detroit won't go down so easily, remeber that we've been working our asses off getting urban agriculture up and running, against severe resistance from the Monsanto cronies of the DNR, and the city government, and in our own ways preparing to lessen the blow of infrastructure failure by weather, natural disaster, or intentional shutoff, for a while now, cause only a fool wouldn't see it coming by now - all it waits is the opportunity, and one good spark to set those powder kegs off... I had begun to worry that certain events in the Wisconsin mess mighta done it, thanks be the WI Natty Guard told Walker to piss up a rope that day, and I was even more so over the recall and obvious fuckery in the eight district, which if it comes out via private investigation, still might happen.

But anyhow, the powers that be WANT riots and disorder, some of them are gleefully rubbing their hands together in anticipation even now, at the fruition of plans laid down over the past thirty years to end this farcical charade of democracy and pull the mask off once and for all.

KWICKO

Friday, August 12, 2011 11:18 PM (P)

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
The only places where UK-like riots could happen (for longer than a day) are in places like Chicago, NY, California, and Mass.

Typical liberal strongholds that have high unemployment, low morality, and gun control.

Just in case, tho...

Clean your gun, make sure you have plenty of ammo, food, water, and a secure location.

You mean a secure location from which to riot, right?

After all, you're the one constantly calling for armed revolution. Are you saying it's impossible now, except for the places where the "liberals" might do it?

How odd a stance for you to take. And odder still that you think your beloved "tea party values" are a sign of "low morality".

You are one strange little dude, Wulfboy.

"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservatives." - John Stuart Mill

KWICKO

Friday, August 12, 2011 11:22 PM (P)

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:

By morality I meant this: "I don't think its wrong to burn and loot so long as I get mine". Morality DOES play a big role in riots. Do I burn and loot a store, hurt or kill someone, so I can get something that I want (not need)?

But again I point out that you have, on numerous occasions, lobbied for hunting and killing people - the President, Nancy Pelosi, ALL "libs/progs", etc. - just so you can get something you want (a more fascist right-wing militaristic nationalist government), not something you NEED.

Your hypocrisy is showing.

Again.

"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservatives." - John Stuart Mill

KWICKO

Friday, August 12, 2011 11:25 PM (P)

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Same sort of things happened during Katrina.

You want to get out? Sure, just come by the friendly gas-station and pay 20 bucks a gallon....

then there was the "mayor", using the cops to disarm people. EXACTLY when they NEEDED to be armed...INSTEAD of helping folks evacuate.

I agree. Its scary.

Yet, whenever liberals get out of control, when the cancer of their beliefs begin to rage.. there are always those who stand against the darkness.

You mean like the five New Orleans cops just convicted of shooting and killing those unarmed "liberals" for being so out of control in wanting to get out of a flooded New Orleans?

Yeah, they really showed those danged "liberals", didn't they?

Quote:
Tho I am hopeful that this may always be true, I know it takes simple people willing to fight.

Well, you are nothing if not simple, Wulfie. Willing to fight? Not so much.

"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservatives." - John Stuart Mill

KWICKO

Friday, August 12, 2011 11:28 PM (P)

Hell, in Texas I can blow someone away just for tagging my property (vandalism IS covered by our Castle Doctrine). Or even my neighbor's property, if they've asked me to keep an eye on the place.

'Course, thanks to the legislature, I can also carry my guns on any college campus now - but they will NOT let me carry them into the legislature or the governor's office.

Wonder what they're scared of...

"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservatives." - John Stuart Mill

RIONAEIRE

Friday, August 12, 2011 11:36 PM (P)

Do I think its possible? Yeah, people are people no matter where you go, no matter what century we're in, no matter their ethnicity or country of origin. So its possible. I hope it doesn't happen here, especially not in my backyard (yeah I know that saying is over used, but you know what I mean here, that's scary stuff). How likely do I think it is? Well in my city I doubt it would come to that but I don't know about other cities. I think most of this discussion is interesting though and that people are talking productively about it which is pretty cool, most of this discussion.

"A completely coherant River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya

KWICKO

Saturday, August 13, 2011 12:46 AM (P)

It's possible. Hell, it's even LIKELY.

Most of America's cities are never much more than one cop beat-down away from these same kinds of riots.

MAGONSDAUGHTER

Saturday, August 13, 2011 2:36 AM (P)

I love how the more moronic elements of the right are blaming this on liberal policy.... any excuse to push an agenda I suppose.

OLDENGLANDDRY

Monday, August 15, 2011 12:28 PM (P)

Charly Brooker in the Guardian, brilliant.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/14/charlie-brooker-pr
event-more-riots

DREAMTROVE

Monday, August 15, 2011 1:08 PM (P)

Frem,

You cam see their "readiness" all over the satelite picture. The one everyone misses is the most obvious: the real point of the autobahn is to be able to deliber panzers pronto to any trouble spot.

Niki

No, it didn't occur, because it already happened here.

Economic disparity? Please, spare us. What you're looking at is organized crime, with some overtones of racism, but I already spelled his out in the other thread.

Wulf,

Ya missed new orleans, but I see mike already made that point. And detroit.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

NIKI2

Monday, August 15, 2011 11:46 PM (P)

DT, you make communication virtually impossible when you spout idiocy like " the real point of the autobahn is to be able to deliber panzers pronto to any trouble spot". Must TRULY be awful, being you and seeing shadows in every corner, I don't know how you get through the day, honestly I don't!

Hippie Operative Nikovich Nikita Nicovna Talibani,
Contracted Agent of Veritas Oilspillus, code name “Nike”,
signing off

FREMDFIRMA

Tuesday, August 16, 2011 2:58 AM (P)

He's actually not that far off the mark, strangely enough, Niki - not conventionally, but historically most highway infrastructure, dating back to the days of rome, was initially intended to move large bodies of troops, both our railroad system (Civil War) and our interstate highway system (Eisenhower) were at certain times upgraded for exactly that purpose as well.

Although I kinda doubt moving tanks on it is the current purpose, sure - you still COULD, if you wanted to, and didn't care what it did to the road, either by chewing it up (Tank treads are murder on roads, and when they do parades they use special rubber track blocks which only last a few miles) or by the weight damaging the integrity of the surface material.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

DREAMTROVE

Tuesday, August 16, 2011 4:12 AM (P)

Frem

Thanks. I was just stating history. The interstate is a pretty clear copy, not surprisingly coming after our inheritance of german engineers.

We don't have panzers, and prefer to dloy personnel carriers, but the deployment of Panzers is not hell on the highway: you don't *drive* the Panzers *on* the highway, you put them on the back of trucks which you then drive trucks on the highway. The fact that military equipment was to be carried on the back of flatbed trucks is given away by the vertical clearance regulations for overpasses.

There's little call for deploykng tanks to the continental US, but there was a lot in nazi germany. Still, there are many types of military deployment which could serve domestic purpose.

For human civilian transportation, the interstate highway system is a terrible one. They only save time when you are travelling across the exact same line, and for the same price you could have gotten a far more efficient railroad system.

Another curious spec for the system is that curves be optimized as banked for 90 mph traffic.

Niki

Paranoia is seeing threats which are not there. The condition of not seeing threats which actually are there falls under polyanna syndrome.

That's what a ship is, you know - it's not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that's what a ship needs.

FREMDFIRMA

Tuesday, August 16, 2011 5:11 AM (P)

They call those "hemmits" or something DT, and they still screw up the road cause they're too goddamn heavy and damage its integrity that way.

As for APCs, while it's not been so public, them bastards up there at Grayling been playin with the new ones DESIGNED for domestic use, damn things even have turn signals on em, for cryin out loud.

-F

FREMDFIRMA

Tuesday, August 16, 2011 3:43 PM (P)

Damn I hate being right, while not utility infrastructure, this particular bit of bullshit was brought to my attention recently.

SF transit blocks cellphones to disrupt protest
http://news.yahoo.com/sf-transit-blocks-cellphones-disrupt-protest-180
916272.html

Certainly a first amendment issue, and IMHO also fraud/theft by depriving people of service they paid for, beyond which that might have impinged upon 911 access so it's also a safety issue.

Little known fact, ANY cellphone, even one with no service connected to it, no minutes on it, so long as it has power, *will* connect to 911 if dialed, making even otherwise useless cellphones a handy emergency device, just so you know.

Anyhows, looks like SF Transit took a page from foreign dictators, and that'll work even less well here cause for damn sure GeekFarm *already* had available cell-frequency repeaters in anticipation of just this sort of eventuality.

They do need a civil engineer for certain other preparation-projects, but the only one I know is an old russian guy who lives in some podunk town - he's pretty cool, although I thought him a bit loony for travelling 200 miles to Moscow just to get the crap beat out of him by their police...
He's openly homosexual, which is something still kinda frowned upon over there, but in his home village nobody will mess with him over it cause he's the guy who keeps the power and water up and running - but he felt the need to stand up for it even if it meant getting his ass kicked, meh.

-Frem

I do not serve the Blind God.

RIONAEIRE

Wednesday, August 17, 2011 3:18 AM (P)

That San Fransisco thing about the phones is rutted up, such an Alliance thing to do. Yuck.

"A completely coherant River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya