Protests

[tower912]

Life is so much simpler and better when you ask yourself a few simple questions.

What kind of stories about will I tell my grandkids?

How well attended will my funeral be?   Will the people be there to celebrate my death or my life?

If I happen to believe in the metaphor of St.  Peter at the pearly gates, what am I going to have to try to justify or explain away?

I protested a horrible injustice.

I rioted and looted and tried to promote chaos and racial/class warfare.

[WarriorDad]

https://www.instagram.com/p/CA6eeZVpcwh/?igshid=dht77ou1mmnd

Why are so many African American leaders pleading to have the destruction of property and the burning of cities to stop?  Is it because they know it damages the community from an economic (tax revenue and lost jobs), removes services in the community,  takes away from the issue at hand (police brutality), all of the above?

[MUfan12]

Two nights of protests through Milwaukee into the north burbs, and they remained remarkably peaceful. Sunday night it sounded like a couple of people had other ideas, but thankfully there was no real conflict, in large part due to the Shorewood/WFB/Brown Deer police showing a ton of restraint. The police tried to carve a path out for police and some followed, some didn't.

[WarriorDad]

Is the threat to use the military against American citizens a trial balloon for actions in November if/when he loses the election?

What if he wins the election and radical people cannot except that either and start to destroy again? 

On the subject of military troops, Ike was already mentioned in 1957.  In 1965, LBJ did the same in Alabama.  In 1968, LBJ sent the 82nd Airborne and 101st Infantry to Detroit to stop the rioting.  Over 2000 buildings destroyed, 7200 arrests, almost 50 people killed.

There are other examples, twelve in all in the nation's history ranging from President Obama, Bush, LBJ, Eisenhower and others.   Presidents of all stripes, ideologies have sent US troops into American cities.  The idea that it is unlawful is wrong.  The Insurrection Act allows for it.

[Warrior2008]

I believe the words of Terrence Floyd reflect the views of the vast majority of protesters. I hope that his speaking out quells the property damage and looting promoted by a few.

His grace in the face of his brother being murdered is beyond commendable. I’m not sure many could do that.

It should be readily apparent to everyone that there are two groups of people, the peaceful protestors who are exercising their first amendment rights and are the overwhelming majority. Then there are the looters and anarchists that are stealing the media’s attention and destroying whatever they see if front of them. There are no easy answers, but the only thing I can think is the curfews have to be enforced by the police. It’s the only way to separate the peaceful protestors from the looters and anarchists. Allowing curfews to be broken is an untenable position.

[WarriorDad]

Nope.  You are the one that needs to study their history.  Ike federalized the Arkansas national guard.  Also the national guard was used to quell the Vietnam riots.  But the national guard is a reserve force.  Not active military.

It is against the Posse Comitatus Act to use *active* military to enforce domestic law.

I know my history on this topic very well.  1968, LBJ sends 82d Airborne and 101st Infantry to Detroit to stop riots.  Ike Federalized the Reserves, making them immediately active military.  That is what that action did.


The Insurrection Act of 1807 is a United States federal law (10 U.S.C. §§ 251–255; prior to 2016, 10 U.S.C. §§ 331–335) that empowers the president of the United States to deploy military troops within the United States in particular circumstances, such as to suppress civil disorder, insurrection and rebellion.

The act provides the "major exception" to the Posse Comitatus Act, which otherwise limits the use of the U.S. military for law enforcement within the United States.[1]

[Frenns Liquor Depot]

Oops

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/500628-priest-among-those-police-cleared-from-st-johns-patio-for-trump-visit

[Skatastrophy]

I know my history on this topic very well.  1968, LBJ sends 82d Airborne and 101st Infantry to Detroit to stop riots.  Ike Federalized the Reserves, making them immediately active military.  That is what that action did.

You don't seem to know your history very well. The Michigan governor requested that LBJ bring troops in. LBJ didn't do it unilaterally.

In the case of Arkansas, the mayor asked Ike directly for help. That is after the governor of Arkansas removed the national guard troops that had been protecting blacks during school integration. Ike federalized the national guard troops at the mayor's request to move the guard back in to protect the citizens.

Trump sent federal troops into a state against the wishes of the state's government.

[Pakuni]

In all prior invocations of the Insurrection Act, it's been done at either the request of the states (i.e. LA riots) or because the states were actively suppressing constitutional rights (i.e. Little Rock).
Neither is occurring here.

And again, none of this is actually going to happen. Trump is putting on a show for the mouthbreathing, mentally limited bumpkins who believe the words that spew from out of his mouth. It's another one of his toothless threats (see: forcing states to reopen churches, shutting down social media, etc.).
Apparently our resident "lifelong Democrat from Chicago" is buying it, though.

[MU82]

Oops

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/500628-priest-among-those-police-cleared-from-st-johns-patio-for-trump-visit

“I am shaken, not so much by the taste of tear gas and the bit of a cough I still have, but by the fact that that show of force was for a PHOTO OPPORTUNITY,” she said. “The patio of St. John's, Lafayette square had been HOLY GROUND today. A place of respite and laughter and water and granola bars and fruit snacks. But that man turned it into a BATTLE GROUND first, and a cheap political stunt second.”

Powerful. More powerful than the guns Idi Trump is deploying in a thread to gun down Americans.

[MU82]

In all prior invocations of the Insurrection Act, it's been done at either the request of the states (i.e. LA riots) or because the states were actively suppressing constitutional rights (i.e. Little Rock).
Neither is occurring here.

And again, none of this is actually going to happen. Trump is putting on a show for the mouthbreathing, mentally limited bumpkins who believe the words that spew from out of his mouth. It's another one of his toothless threats (see: forcing states to reopen churches, shutting down social media, etc.).
Apparently our resident "lifelong Democrat from Chicago" is buying it, though.

Leave him alone, Pak. He's just trying to get his emperor's approval.

[JWags85]

Yep. What you say is true. There will be a relatively small number of people who loot and inflame the situation just for the sake of it.

One of the stirring images from the weekend was Michigan Ave. flooded with people. For blocks and blocks and blocks, the street was filled with 10s of thousands of people. It looked like it could be a sports team's victory celebration.

There was some looting going on. Several storefronts had windows smashed and stuff stolen. But if there were 50,000 people there, how many of them were committing crimes? Maybe 250? Maybe 500? Even if it's the latter (which it probably wasn't), that's 1%.

That's still too many, but it does provide some perspective.

How many Chicago cops commit brutality, most of which is never caught on camera? Does 1% sound high or low? I'm gonna give the men in blue the benefit of the doubt and say it's probably high, but I think the point is fair.

People are effen fed up. They were fed up before George Floyd was murdered in cold blood by a cop while three of his cop-mates stood by and watched. They were really, really fed up after Floyd's life was snuffed out as he pleaded that he couldn't breathe. And then when some leaders, including the man at the top, respond with no empathy, no calm, no attempts to unite, and instead threaten to gun down American citizens, that's how you get where we are.

But the problem is what concurrently happened on the West Side. It was chaos, people shooting out of cars, looting leading to store owners on their roofs with guns.  My former favorite block of Milwaukee Ave in Wicker Park was wrecked and trashed.

I commend Chicago for the River North protests for being largely calm. But the spillover through the city is not what it needed. Hell, you had the Latin Kings working with CPD to stop looting and chaos in minority neighborhoods.

You’re gonna have a hell of a time uniting people while that is going on. It’s horrible that bad actors can spoil a message, but it’s the facts. I’m not smart enough or experienced enough on how to stop or prevent it, but the idea that any focus on that is improper perspective is frustrating.  I can be supportive and in favor of the equality message  and protests and still realize how F’ed up and hypocritical it is for the concurrent looting and violence.

[Pakuni]

I can be supportive and in favor of the equality message  and protests and still realize how F’ed up and hypocritical it is for the concurrent looting and violence.

If you let the looting distract you from the fight for justice, and the hard work and tough questions that entails, you never cared about justice in the first place.
People say "What happened to George Floyd was wrong and we need to fix it, BUT blah looting blah violence blah blah."
Here's the thing ... you don't need the but. You can say "What happened to George Floyd was wrong and we need to fix it" and stop there.
Linking that statement with the looting serves no purpose but to distract from the real issues. It provides an easy out from accepting that we're all part of the problem, we're all complicit in the ongoing existence of a system that allows these injustices and some of us benefit from it. But when you stop at  "What happened to George Floyd was wrong and we need to fix it," then you have to ask yourself, "How do we fix it?" And that's hard and uncomfortable and forces us to face some uncomfortable truths. And none us like that, so let's talk about the looting instead.

Look, the rioting and looting is not the problem here. It's a symptom of the problem. It's the headache that comes with a brain tumor. And those focused on the rioting instead of the injustice are more interested in giving the patient an Advil than dealing with the tumor.

And that was rambling and likely not very eloquent, but I hope you get the point.

[mu03eng]

Largely, the bad actors in both camps need to be ignored (the rioters to Pakuni's point are a small subset of the protesters and there are definitely a subset of cops who are acting out for whatever reason). The core message of the protesters is righteous and the police organizations need to realize that they are part of the issue. That is the fundamental facts here. Just because I believe the way policing is conducted in this country is broken doesn't mean that I don't support the police or the people who make up the organizations. The majority of the of cops are good people, but as a process, concept , and organization......policing in the United States needs to be revamped.

I don't know what the end of the protests look like (people have a lot of time on their hands) but the sooner we accept there is a foundational flaw in our current approach that result in negative outcomes biased against minorities the sooner we can move forward. Typically, I'm a see both sides kind of person, if for no other reason to spur debate so we can all learn from it. But this isn't one of those things where there is two sides to the coin.....it is broken, we need to accept that and start working on what the fix looks like.

[mu03eng]

If you let the looting distract you from the fight for justice, and the hard work and tough questions that entails, you never cared about justice in the first place.
People say "What happened to George Floyd was wrong and we need to fix it, BUT blah looting blah violence blah blah."
Here's the thing ... you don't need the but. You can say "What happened to George Floyd was wrong and we need to fix it" and stop there.
Linking that statement with the looting serves no purpose but to distract from the real issues. It provides an easy out from accepting that we're all part of the problem, we're all complicit in the ongoing existence of a system that allows these injustices and some of us benefit from it.

Look, the rioting and looting is not the problem here. It's a symptom of the problem. It's the headache that comes with a brain tumor. And those focused on the rioting instead of the injustice are more interested in giving the patient an Advil than dealing with the tumor.

And that was rambling and likely not very eloquent, but I hope you get the point.

I think it was a solid summary. I'd go so far as to say rioting isn't even a symptom of the disease, it's a secondary infection that got in because the body was busy fighting with itself on the primary disease. Rioting and looting is opportunistic and has zero intent to be part of a message....it's something to be done because people are greedy and selfish. There is a reason we see protests with looting/rioting but we never see rioting/looting without protests.

[MU82]

But the problem is what concurrently happened on the West Side. It was chaos, people shooting out of cars, looting leading to store owners on their roofs with guns.  My former favorite block of Milwaukee Ave in Wicker Park was wrecked and trashed.

I commend Chicago for the River North protests for being largely calm. But the spillover through the city is not what it needed. Hell, you had the Latin Kings working with CPD to stop looting and chaos in minority neighborhoods.

You’re gonna have a hell of a time uniting people while that is going on. It’s horrible that bad actors can spoil a message, but it’s the facts. I’m not smart enough or experienced enough on how to stop or prevent it, but the idea that any focus on that is improper perspective is frustrating.  I can be supportive and in favor of the equality message  and protests and still realize how F’ed up and hypocritical it is for the concurrent looting and violence.

You make many points I wouldn't even try to refute. However, overall, I agree with Pakuni, mu03eng and Gregg Popovich on this subject.

[mu03eng]

But the problem is what concurrently happened on the West Side. It was chaos, people shooting out of cars, looting leading to store owners on their roofs with guns.  My former favorite block of Milwaukee Ave in Wicker Park was wrecked and trashed.

I commend Chicago for the River North protests for being largely calm. But the spillover through the city is not what it needed. Hell, you had the Latin Kings working with CPD to stop looting and chaos in minority neighborhoods.

You’re gonna have a hell of a time uniting people while that is going on. It’s horrible that bad actors can spoil a message, but it’s the facts. I’m not smart enough or experienced enough on how to stop or prevent it, but the idea that any focus on that is improper perspective is frustrating.  I can be supportive and in favor of the equality message  and protests and still realize how F’ed up and hypocritical it is for the concurrent looting and violence.

You are right, that's why I'd ask the police to generally stand down and whatever the mechanism looks like admit collective culpability here. Police organizations around the country have to come out and say "look we get it, we have problems we need to correct, help us understand what that looks like" and then we go from there. The looting is a by product....if the energy of the protesting is put into collaboration to correct the wrongs there will be less protesting and by extension less opportunity to loot.

Ideally the mechanism would be presidential, but that's not going to happen. In lue of that, I'd like to see some Governor + Attorney General + Sheriffs/Police Union organization have a joint press conference to say what I said above. The protests continue because the protesters continue to feel like they aren't heard, in part, because people do the "ya but what about the looting" thing (and they have a lot of time on their hands because 20-30% of this country is unemployed and the vast majority are scared). Some leaders need to stop worrying about the protests/looting and start worrying about the underlying flaw in the system.

[Jockey]

Ideally the mechanism would be presidential, but that's not going to happen. In lue of that, I'd like to see some Governor + Attorney General + Sheriffs/Police Union organization have a joint press conference to say what I said above. The protests continue because the protesters continue to feel like they aren't heard, in part, because people do the "ya but what about the looting" thing (and they have a lot of time on their hands because 20-30% of this country is unemployed and the vast majority are scared). Some leaders need to stop worrying about the protests/looting and start worrying about the underlying flaw in the system.

As long as it isn't this guy - and sadly, he has a big platform in Minneapolis.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/01/bob-kroll-george-floyd-minneapolis-police-union-chief

[Warrior2008]

You are right, that's why I'd ask the police to generally stand down and whatever the mechanism looks like admit collective culpability here. Police organizations around the country have to come out and say "look we get it, we have problems we need to correct, help us understand what that looks like" and then we go from there. The looting is a by product....if the energy of the protesting is put into collaboration to correct the wrongs there will be less protesting and by extension less opportunity to loot.

Ideally the mechanism would be presidential, but that's not going to happen. In lue of that, I'd like to see some Governor + Attorney General + Sheriffs/Police Union organization have a joint press conference to say what I said above. The protests continue because the protesters continue to feel like they aren't heard, in part, because people do the "ya but what about the looting" thing (and they have a lot of time on their hands because 20-30% of this country is unemployed and the vast majority are scared). Some leaders need to stop worrying about the protests/looting and start worrying about the underlying flaw in the system.

In the absence of a real President, it will 100 percent start with law enforcement admitting the problem on their own.  One of the most effective tools of the human condition is empathy.  The simple acts of kneeling with protestors, walking with them during their march, or saying that "black lives matter" are starting points for developing an empathetic response.  Doing some of those things have helped in some areas to keep protests peaceful and limit looting while employing curfews.  Will they fix everything, absolutely not, but its a first step and at the very least is a deescalating response compared to rubber bullets and flash bangs.

[MU82]

In the absence of a real President, it will 100 percent start with law enforcement admitting the problem on their own.  One of the most effective tools of the human condition is empathy.  The simple acts of kneeling with protestors, walking with them during their march, or saying that "black lives matter" are starting points for developing an empathetic response.  Doing some of those things have helped in some areas to keep protests peaceful and limit looting while employing curfews.  Will they fix everything, absolutely not, but its a first step and at the very least is a deescalating response compared to rubber bullets and flash bangs.

Superb post.

As is the case with the coronavirus, there is no one end-all, cure-all way to fix things. It takes hard work, thoughtfulness, empathy, compassion, common sense, patience. Even if the person at the top is incapable of those things, others aren't. And, as you said, we have seen comparatively good results from leaders who have those traits.

[WarriorDad]

It does not matter if the troops were requested by governors or not.  Stephen Vladek of the University of Texas Law school has been writing about this since last year when he said the President could invoke it for immigration enforcement.  Vladek believes presidents have too much power, and his piece in the Atlantic outlined that because the power does exist.  Vladek wrote again today and yesterday that the President can invoke this.

I don't think he will, it is meat for his base and a bluff, but from a legal theory Vladek says he can.  This is a gamble by the president to say to Democratic governors and mayors to clean it up and if you don't, I will.  He of course will not, but then any of the burning wreckage he will blame on local and state leaders for not doing enough even when he threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act. 

It's a bluff, but he can do it.  https://thebulwark.com/trumps-insurrection-act-threat/

[WarriorDad]

In all prior invocations of the Insurrection Act, it's been done at either the request of the states (i.e. LA riots) or because the states were actively suppressing constitutional rights (i.e. Little Rock).
Neither is occurring here.

And again, none of this is actually going to happen. Trump is putting on a show for the mouthbreathing, mentally limited bumpkins who believe the words that spew from out of his mouth. It's another one of his toothless threats (see: forcing states to reopen churches, shutting down social media, etc.).
Apparently our resident "lifelong Democrat from Chicago" is buying it, though.

Apparently legal scholars are as well "buying it", most of them also Democrats.  Not hard core leftists like some in this thread, but there are many of us that are moderate Democrats which irks the hard liners.  Moderates will save this country, not the hard right or the hard left.  Some day people will come to their senses.

[JWags85]

If you let the looting distract you from the fight for justice, and the hard work and tough questions that entails, you never cared about justice in the first place.
People say "What happened to George Floyd was wrong and we need to fix it, BUT blah looting blah violence blah blah."
Here's the thing ... you don't need the but. You can say "What happened to George Floyd was wrong and we need to fix it" and stop there.
Linking that statement with the looting serves no purpose but to distract from the real issues. It provides an easy out from accepting that we're all part of the problem, we're all complicit in the ongoing existence of a system that allows these injustices and some of us benefit from it. But when you stop at  "What happened to George Floyd was wrong and we need to fix it," then you have to ask yourself, "How do we fix it?" And that's hard and uncomfortable and forces us to face some uncomfortable truths. And none us like that, so let's talk about the looting instead.

Look, the rioting and looting is not the problem here. It's a symptom of the problem. It's the headache that comes with a brain tumor. And those focused on the rioting instead of the injustice are more interested in giving the patient an Advil than dealing with the tumor.

And that was rambling and likely not very eloquent, but I hope you get the point.

I think you’re misrepresenting my point. I never said anything about distracting. But you have segment of people saying along the lines of “if you’re upset about the looting and riots, you’re part of the problem”. That’s BS. Hell the protest organizers were eager to share with every reporter they could that it’s not what they are about.  You can be pissed about that AND pissed about the blatant systemic inequality and inability for people in power to act with compassion and humanity.

But further, there is a community aspect to all of this. Having tough discussions and sometimes difficult fights against the status quo is what needs to be done. How difficult will it be to tease apart the “protest message” and rioting/looter fallout from someone whose store got ransacked? Some great people will turn the other cheek. But no progress is made, no tide turned, no election won by solely winning over those solidly in your camp. The fringe/middle ground is what needs to be won and I worry about how this disrupts that progress. It doesn’t even have to be slanted news coverage, human nature can be visceral reactions and feelings from people who step out into a ravaged street or neighborhood

[GooooMarquette]

In the absence of a real President, it will 100 percent start with law enforcement admitting the problem on their own.  One of the most effective tools of the human condition is empathy.  The simple acts of kneeling with protestors, walking with them during their march, or saying that "black lives matter" are starting points for developing an empathetic response.  Doing some of those things have helped in some areas to keep protests peaceful and limit looting while employing curfews.  Will they fix everything, absolutely not, but its a first step and at the very least is a deescalating response compared to rubber bullets and flash bangs.

Very well said. Empathy can calm the protests, and it can also unite and heal. Tear gas and flash bombs might control the immediate protest, but will only make the deeper problem worse.

[mu03eng]

It does not matter if the troops were requested by governors or not.  Stephen Vladek of the University of Texas Law school has been writing about this since last year when he said the President could invoke it for immigration enforcement.  Vladek believes presidents have too much power, and his piece in the Atlantic outlined that because the power does exist.  Vladek wrote again today and yesterday that the President can invoke this.

I don't think he will, it is meat for his base and a bluff, but from a legal theory Vladek says he can.  This is a gamble by the president to say to Democratic governors and mayors to clean it up and if you don't, I will.  He of course will not, but then any of the burning wreckage he will blame on local and state leaders for not doing enough even when he threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act. 

It's a bluff, but he can do it.  https://thebulwark.com/trumps-insurrection-act-threat/

Do you know what precedent is? Legal scholars can claim whatever they want is possible but the current precedent is that the only time the Insurrection Act has been invoked without local authority approval(state, county, or city) is during the Civil War which was.....wait for it....an Insurrection. So Trump could certainly invoke the Insurrection Act and order the army in but without precedent the army could refuse to obey the order as unlawful (maybe it is, maybe it isn't....again precedent hasn't been set in this scenario) and/or the local authorities could seek an immediate injunction with the SCOTUS which they would would expedite a hearing on. But no matter what the evaluation of your experts is proof of nothing. He can try but he does not necessarily have the power.