"Why A Second US Civil War Would Be Far Worse Than The First" Topic

9 were ambushed in Phoenix alone. Invited into the house and shot.

Yes 35th, bad case in Phoenix, especially. Homicide suspect holed up in a house, baby hostage. This guy had criminal history, shot and wounded nine cops, seven are out of the hospital, luckily. Complex case, still under investigation will take a while to unravel how everything went down.

Just crazy – all in one incident. Do you remember the 5 Dallas cops killed by a sniper in 2016? Plus 9 wounded? That was the worst, although there were a couple of incidents a few years before with 4 killed in each case. I think Dallas was at a BLM demonstration after a couple of police shooting incidents in another state. The shooter was a vet, angry, lost it, as I recall. Very sad.

It does feel like it never ends. With such a large population the odds are that things are gonna go seriously wrong sometimes, re sick people and/or criminals.

So, from all accounts the suspect invited a responding officer inside after the girlfriend had dialed 911. The then suspect produced a gun and shot the officer as he approached the house. He was the only one ambushed, not all nine in the house.

This one does not sound like a new street tactic as part of an anti-cop organized movement. This @#$% has be going on in various waves forever. But it is a good time to start up an ambush stat category, if there isn't one already, to see what the data tells us about trends, and therefore tactics. I suspect tactics are under discussion in Phoenix.

No matter what, stats so far this year are awful. 😢

Yes a very bad year for LEOs, but many criminals still walk the street instead of being in jail. 'nuff said …

Yes Legion, way too many still a danger to society. The justice system needs a serious overhaul.

35th, I am only thinking that it's good for people to know that we have had all kinds of bad stuff happen in the past. We never run out of bad guys, sick guys. It's like the war that never ends.

The Next Civil War: Dispatches from the American Future

link

Armand

So we have 5 scenarios. One is a hard right wing, rural group being confronted by the US military. Another a disenfranchised youth shooting the President. The third is a global warming catastrophe.

So can I assume what the other two might be?

Perhaps the leader of a country and his party, overreacting to a peaceful protest. Invoking emergency powers. Close to martial law. Allowing them to stop financial aid, cut off their insurance, confiscate their private funds and private property (Canada).

Or

A populists leader promising a Socialist Utopia for all it's people, gets elected. Then destroys the countries economy. Leaving only those who support him with any wealth and uses the Army to suppress the people. (Venezuela).

Or

A government revokes the rights of individuals in that country, granted to them by their Constitution and Bill of Rights. Doing this by controlling the Presidency, both the House and Senate and by adding like minded justices to the Supreme Court.

I of course am assuming the author is fair minded and considers all sides. 🤔 So are any of those the other 2 not listed? 😉

Anyone unfamiliar with what's going on in Canada. The Prime Minister invoked the Emergency Act. Never used before in Canada. Even Civil Liberty groups in Canada are attacking him for this. Check out The Lounge for the discussion on all this.

Subject: Ezra Levant 🍁🚛 on Twitter: "Finance Minister and WEF governor Chrystia Freeland -- seen here with Trudeau and Soros -- is launching a crackdown on crowdfunding sites, traditional bank accounts and crypto-currency. She says banks may now seize accounts without a warrant. t.co/pRTKxIxllY / Twitter


link

I know they meant it as a protest, but I think it hurt ordinary people, families, the economy. It will be interesting to see if we learn the cost in money, time and grief for the average working stiffs whose livelihood depends on freedom to get to work, freedom to do business, freedom for their employers to stay supplied and in business.
Because of this, I do not think there would be popular support for this to base a civil war on, even while supporting their right to protest.

This does sound like a great book, but more as entertainment in dystopian style.

I am sure we all notice how often we all come together to support our fellow citizens during natural disasters, despite political differences.

Here is my scenario for the book. Big media stirs constant strife by creating it and sustaining it, leaving people who otherwise lead lives of freedom and fulfillment to believe they are under dire threat of losing their rights, despite what their own actual everyday lives tell them.
Then we turn on each other. But a happy ending as we all realize we've been had and vote for new leaders, find better sources of information.

Yes Legion, way too many still a danger to society. The justice system needs a serious overhaul.

Yes, too many on the street who should be in jail, in an asylum or in a grave. The justice system needs to get rid of SJW DAs, mayors, etc., who see the criminals as victims and LEOs as the criminals.

LEOs must be able to do their jobs. And the courts must be able to punish criminals. Not let them out on the streets, when with their record showing them as repeat offenders many times over. This sort of thinking literally has got people killed. One's race, economic status, education, etc., does not justify them getting a pass when they break the law and get arrested.

As the US already has the highest prison population in the World, both in terms of real number and percentage of population.

Just how many do you feel is needed to solve the problems as you see them.

"Don't do the crime, if you can't do the time" is a good enough idea but is there not a point where the US is just a prison where some of its population live outside the walls?

Tort, according to one of the latest polls (yes, do any of us believe polls anymore?), the protesters have 59% support in the US. I am sure some are hurt financially, but then so are those in the freedom convoys. Other than hurting governments financially to achieve change, what avenues does the common working men and women have to achieve it? There are only 2. Voting, and that would require the election be taking place at the time and of course the way we do not want to see, violence.

FYI the Ottawa police chief just resigned, I believe, in protest to what the Canadian government has done. If so, he has my support, for what good that does him.

Trajanus, so what would your solution be. 🤔 I am fully serious, interested to hear.

Also has a nice little link embedded in it , to a CNN article that explains the powers the Prime minister has given himself.

Subject: Our Rulers Fear The Truckers -- Good – OutKick


link

35th, I have no issue with the truckers or peaceful protest, as long as the rights of others are not curtailed as a result. These rights may be losing pay from a job, or really extreme,like having a protester burn down your business, as in the US two years ago.
But if you believe your rights are threatened by a vaccine mandate, you have a right to gather and be heard, protest, petition, vote, organize. Trudeau has to uphold the law and preserve public order so that the rights of all are recognized. He must weigh the impact on public health and the rights of others to stay healthy and well, vs the rights of people to be in charge of their own bodies. No easy answer, but in ending the road barricades, he also needs to talk to the truckers and hear them out.

Trajanus, you are right. Part of justice reform needs to address who needs to be in prison and why. We have made a mess of this.

So far he has refused to meet with them, instead treating them as if they are a cancer that needs to be eradicated. This is unlike he treated BLM, with whom
He met and took photos with. So petitions and anything along those lines would seem to be useless.

The mandates on vaccines would seem to be a moot point, as the vaccine has proven not to prevent either infection or spread of the virus. At best it may only prevent you from getting worse if you contract the virus. Same with the masks, as most people have been wearing cloth masks which have been proven to be almost useless. Basically a panacea for those who want to hang on to the perception of security. A pacifier if you will. So the Prime Ministers hard line seems to be no more than he and his party attempting to hang on to power and control and basically a division between the liberal elite leaders and the every day working class.

As the US already has the highest prison population in the World, both in terms of real number and percentage of population.

From what we see in the media, etc., many people have been killed, etc., by those with a "long rap sheet". Those criminals are my concern.

As for all those in prison now. Yes, their cases may have to be relooked at, etc. But where are the lawyers etc., going to come from, etc.? With an open Southern Border, more criminals and illegal aliens are coming in every day. Where do we put them if we don't deport/send them back to where they came from?

The mess continues to get bigger …

I will also ask the obvious question. Is it possible that we just have more bad people then elsewhere?

Well, I never thought of it that way. For those who work in the system, it does kind of feel like it. Thinking out loud…

We have poverty, a big drug economy, social unrest, and lots of exposure to violence in the culture. We have a lot of freedom here, so maybe that does create more chances to take advantage of others. And, don't get me wrong re our right to bear arms, but we have a crazy amount of guns on the street. Uncountable at this point and no doubt growing all the time. Like it or not, they give some people a lot of power to commit crimes.
It has been said that our prisons are like training grounds for criminals. And we have a lot of people in prison. But not always the right ones it seems. I don't know how to answer your question, I guess

Is it possible that we just have more bad people then elsewhere?

With freedom comes responsibility. For some in a free open nation like the USA, even with all it's failings, it is easier to be a criminal, that rise above, go to school, go to work, be a productive member of society. I know this is a big generalization. But too many came from poverty, and made something good out of themselves. Why did they rise to the challenge and others didn't ?

For those who work in the system, it does kind of feel like it. Thinking out loud…

And today those that work the system are not only criminals, but in positions of power, e.g. SJW progressive DAs, mayors, etc.

We have poverty, a big drug economy, social unrest, and lots of exposure to violence in the culture. We have a lot of freedom here, so maybe that does create more chances to take advantage of others.

Yes, again with freedoms comes responsibility. But for some it is easier to be a criminal.

And, don't get me wrong re our right to bear arms, but we have a crazy amount of guns on the street. Uncountable at this point and no doubt growing all the time.

Even if they took all the law-abiding citizens' guns away. The bad guys can always get, guns .. or knives* … or etc. "Outlaw guns only outlaws will have guns." …

*E.g. recently a repeat offender, with a "long rap sheet", stabbed and Asian female 40 times with a knife in her apartment, in NYC. He should have been in jail or dead … This was not a hate crime against an Asian, it was just a murder[hate crime] of an innocent female.

Another case a shoplifter with 40 charges was not in jail but on the street. And he just did it again !

And all this has 0 to do with COVID as someone in the Gov't said at a briefing[propaganda] the other day.

Tortorella,

An impressive list and a lot of it would be on mine.

Though strange as it might be to some, in the light of what follows, I don't think the 2nd Amendment has place in this. Certainly not regarding any solution.

Repealing it tomorrow would solve nothing. You have pointed out the shear amount of guns around. For me this means that train has long since left the station.

In reality the Amendment doesn't need defending the draconian measures required to sweep up firearms in private hands, or out in the wild, are never going to happen.

To address the broader TMP congregation:

The factors are wider and more problematic. As everyone of them comes with its own Dog Whistle.

To be objective, the number of people in prison has been in decline for a while, although at a little under 2.1 million its still leads the field. Although that owes quite a lot to the fact the Chinese feel that 1 million Uyghurs don't count. If you discount China however, the gap to third place is staggering.

So lets cut to parts of the chase. For openers the US sentencing polices are pretty heavy. So with 20-40 year terms, people stay in the system a long time and numbers stay high. The "three strikes and your out" policy and the War on Drugs have handed down tariffs that are still running.

Then there's the matter of where people come from. Only 9.7% of those incarcerated are immigrants.

On the other hand, if you are a black Prison inmate, within the entire World's Prison systems and you look out your Prison window. There is a 1:15 chance what you will see out there is somewhere in the United States.

Then there's the Justice system.

Federal Law, State Law, County Law.

Federal Prisons, State Prisons, County Prisons. A judicial system for each of them. A law enforcement arm for each of them, plus the DEA, FBI, AFT etc. Last time I checked there are around 17,900 agencies in the US that have power of arrest.

That's not the number of employees its agencies!

Don't believe that? Look it up.

Think of your Home State. How many local offices are there at Town, City, County and State levels?

So you get a whole raft of contradiction, jurisdiction and very little direction, other than keep on locking them up!

Then if you pile on top of that the political football operating from SCOTUS to the Sheriff's Office of Nowheresville, Alabama and every level of court and law enforcement in between, is there any wonder why I now decline to offer an answer to 35thOVI on solutions.

Bearing in mind, I haven't got to all those social and economic issues that you may, or may not, think have any bearing on the subject, or indeed might not accept the existence of.

there is a military industrial complex in the USA, that s why the US military is the most expensive military in the world
There is a prison-industrial complex in the US. Therefore many prisoners means $$ for some.
The food industry wants to make big $$. That is why the food in the US is full of sucre (gluccose-fructose).
BTW your body canīt tell you that you have enough food if you are consuming gluccose-fructose.
The health industry wanted to sell pain killers…

It s all about money in the USA

Dogtail. What's it about in Germany?

I keep seeing the comments about all the guns in the US. Guys, this is not new. I grew up in the late 50's, 60's and early 70's. Almost everyone in my area had guns of all types. They were WW2 and Korean veterans, most had lived on farms and hunted. We kids saw everything from shotguns to military weapons and handled them as well. My dad had 2 shotguns a 03A3 and a 38 police special. No one went to schools and shot up classmates, nor did we go to the local convenience store and rob it, attack people on the street, carjack or attack police officers. Things like that happened even less in the past when almost everyone had a gun. So the guns are not the problem, the PEOPLE are the problem.

We make excuses for these peoples actions. This social issue or that social issue. The ability and proliferation of guns. But they are that, just excuses. It is the individual who is the issue. In the end, YOU make the decisions that lead you to the situation you find yourself in. You make the decision to take drugs. You make the decision to drink alcohol. You make the decision to quit school. You make the decision to have unprotected sex. You decide to join a gang. You decide to use the gun. The responsibility in the end resides with you.

I know many want to believe the best of people and try to find some reason to take that responsibility away from that person and blame society for those ills, but they are just that, excuses.

This made me think of today. I am driving to the store. I pass the Meijers parking lot. An area with loads of restaurants and businesses with "Help Wanted" signs posted. Standing there is a man with a cellphone to his ear, holding a cardboard sign with "need money for food". "decisions and responsibility".

Not all people are the same, not in Germany, not in the USA, but self-realization is important here. Money is a tool, not a value by itself.
Our social security system is quite good (ask those immigrants lol), our school system sucks but I guess (!) it is better than in the US, So you can choose your job with less pressure.

Dogtail the school systems very here, but it is how you use that system that matters. Things very all over the US and you can't judge based on the news systems you see. They all have their own biases. Outside some major cities, I doubt you would find the US that different then elsewhere. It would be like me judging All of Germany, based on Berlin.

+1 Dogtail

@35thOVI a main theme in your answers to me is "you canīt judge" cause the news is biased. But there are international studies. You can gather informations, you donīt have to follow mere opinions.

You will understand if I put as much credence in international studies, as I do in most of the news services. 🙂 If you choose to believe all those in the US are evil, money obsessed, determined on nothing more than world domination. That is your choice. See, that is sort of the theme I get from the posts you make. Texts can be deceiving and you cannot read the intentions of the person writing them as you could if you were face to face.

If I would judge the people of the USA only by my own experience, my impression would be: they play basketball better than me or they make a living by playing in a Rock/ Punk band.
I donīt believe russian, US born, iranian or turkish people are evil. I distrust some ethnics by experiance, but I know that that is prejudgement.
Hanging around with some former GIs was definitely a precious experiance.

35th, I do not disagree with you that people make choices to commit crimes. But we don't look for excuses for them, they are not our friends. We need to know why, reasons, and we need to address it.

It's easy to get a firearm, main weapon for homicides. We make and sell millions of guns every year, more than double what we used to, few are exported. We import as well.

So we have more guns than people and we don't know who has a lot of them. We have a good sized illegal gun trade. And many guns are transferred among friends, family, at gun shows. By now there are so many, it almost doesn't matter. So we had better figure out how to deter crime using a broad approach with modern data and methods, because prison is not enough. We have tried putting millions of people in prison, we have guns for all, and still we have crime. There is some sort of balance between enforcement and deterrence that we don't always maintain.

The spike in mass shooting injuries data 2016-2021 is really as depressing as it gets. People may chose to commit crimes. Mental health is not a choice. Las Vegas in 17? Imagine being a cop on that case.

If you are looking to find gun and crime data, ATF is a place to start.

Earlier in this thread I brought up how one of the biggest issue of this division is caused by the one sided reporting of the mainstream media. How they portray or do not portray events. Kyle Rittenhouse, etc. guilty, white supremists, right wing gun nuts. Well it happened again. Quintez Brown attempted to assassinate a Jewish Democratic Mayoral candidate. Immediately on Twitter and even in the news, without any evidence, they tried to blame this on right wing, pro Trump gun nuts. Of course we know now he was a black, civil rights activist, intern on a newspaper, BLM supporting, anti gun activists who appeared on Joy Reid's show once, and has been associated with Democratic politicians including Barrack Obama. Also. Today BLM came up with $100,000 USD bail to get him out of jail.

Subject: Editors at the Las Vegas Sun appear to have missed a few details in Quintez Brown's background – twitchy.com


link

I do not believe we are headed for civil war. But I have wondered how police across the country might react to an actual war among civilians breaking out. They have their personal views like everyone else, generally conservative IMO.

How would they address citizens attacking each other with firearms and their duty to uphold the law and preserve public safety? Policing was generally a lot less formal in the last civil war, no real data for comparisons there. My guess is that they would try to maintain order unless or until it became impossible.

Tort, my point is there were always loads of guns. Those guns passed between friends and family, they were also sold. They were easily available. So there was no difference between today and the past as far as guns availability.

The difference…. People themselves. Look for the difference in society starting in the very late 60's to now. Obvious things are the heavy usage of drugs, the breakdown of families, the breakdown of neighborhoods, breakdown of morals, the decline in religion, the rise of TV …… but it still boils down to the individual and individual responsibility. They can make any excuses as to why they do it, but are just that, excuses.

Tort it occurred to me, that maybe guns were not as prolific in Massachusetts in the 60's and 70's as they were in Ohio. So your experiences may have been different then mine.

Well there are some in Congress who want to close all prisons down & release all the criminal. Do these people live of a different planet ?

Tort & 35th +1

Also … Joy Ried should be on the Comedy Channel.

I grew up in PA, had a .22 Ranger when I was 8. Then moved to MA. Hunting and going to the range have always been things to do for a lot of folks in the western part of the state based on my experience.

There is a lot of truth in what you say. I believe a lot of the same things. My values are old school, not too happy these days.

I am trying to make sense of the numbers. We have always had the right to own guns and had more than other countries. But we have never made so many guns for civilians as we do now. Does it correlate with crime or not?

Crime goes in waves. Per capita homicides in America were worst around 1975-95. Maybe 80% by firearms. By 2014 they had dropped to around 1950 levels. So your point is a good one. More guns fewer murders. Why?

But…more mass murders started happening as the decade went on. Then a big spike in 2016, also a major year for police being shot, then dropped for a couple of years, then went way up in 2020.
It's time to figure out for real how these things happen. No simple answer,IMO.

By the way, I got a lot of training from my dad, and aged a couple of years or so before I got any ammo for that gun. I still have it.

Responsibility operates on a number of levels, individuals acting on their own and individuals acting in society, in both cases people do things that we might not.

A few years back I saw a documentary on a small rural community and their local Law Enforcement.

The first half was all about recruitment and training. The later featuring basic legal stuff, how not to be a jerk, some community relations and a whole lot about how not to get shot. Which raised some pointed issues around the desirability of this line of work.

They were all regular guys, no one likely to be Police Chief but no one you wondered about how they got a uniform.

The second half took a turn.

The force had budget problems. So, the Mayor and the Sheriff decided to raise some cash via introduction of a few needed misdemeanours. As elections were due these money makers just happened to be ones that appealed to voters who would be very unlikely to trip over them.

They were for all manner of things but generally about "cleaning the up the place" in a time honoured "You, long haired, hippy weirdo!" manner.

So those busted were the most likely transgressors and the people least able to afford the fine.

Then the fun started.

Notice to Pay came in the mail, on or after, the due date. Appeal or Payment was done at the Court House.

A lot of people couldn't or wouldn't pay the flat rate $100 USD, so were even more upset when the notice arrived a couple of days later saying that they now owed $300 USD for non-payment, which then doubled every so many days.

The cherry on top was a program to bring Justice proceedings into the wider community. So instead of due process taking place in the Court House, it went on the road.

In Meeting Houses, School Gyms, places out of town that were hard to reach, some of which were away from Public Transportation, so you need to find a ride if you didn't have one. Take time off work and maybe get someone else to do that as well.

These locations were changed at short notice and soon even the Public Defenders Office didn't know what was where.

Naturally, even less people could pay as dates were missed and the outstanding sums went North of $1,000. USD

Then what happened was those local Officers ended up knocking on people's doors and giving them a trip to the County Jail for failure to pay. Which I have no doubt raised their standing, in the section of the community who received this service, no end.

Responsibility operates on a number of levels, individuals acting on their own and individuals acting in society, in both cases people do things that we might not.

That is the bottom line and it goes up the chain to elected and appointed officials.

The force had budget problems.

That was a standard before, "the defund the police" idiocy was started by elected activists e.g. "the Squad". Even calling for ending ICE. Lunacy, IMO ! However, these types are few but very vocal and not just "the squad". Who IMO duties should only be getting coffee & donuts. We need credible leadership, not progressive activists.

All that being said, yes, I'm sure our entire legal system should be looked at. For how to do things better, not waste time, etc. But not defunding LEOs outright. As we see those cities that "defunded" and didn't support their LEOs. The crime rate has skyrocketed. Add progressive DAs, mayors, etc. You have "Mad Max Thunderdome".

But like the Gun Control "conundrum" … Reimagining the police, etc. may be a massive undertaking, etc. With the possibility of little usable solutions, etc. IMO the word "reimagined" should only be used by Disney, Hollywood, etc.

As we see those cities that "defunded" and didn't support their LEOs. The crime rate has skyrocketed.

Who would have thought! Interesting little info-graphic sloshing around Facebook and the like a few months back comparing average police training times across the world – the US appeared well below a large number of other countries – including the UK which doesn't as a matter of course issue its police firearms so arguably would need less training. As with everything in life you get the law enforcement your willing to pay for – 'efficiencies' aside. A wild guess but I'd bet if you polled the US electorate you'd get a majority in favour of more police funding. But I'd bet a considerable sum that when it comes to elections they mostly still vote for those that promise not to raise taxes! In the UK that's precisely what happens over the funding of the health service.

A wild guess but I'd bet if you polled the US electorate you'd get a majority in favour of more police funding

Very much so … especially those in the inner city. Those in DC pushing defunding can afford private security. And some say they do.

No moderates, including POTUS want to defund the police, but the help is stalled in Congress.

I keep saying look at the numbers, not your favorite media station. We do not really get the cause and effect of multiple factors in "skyrocketing"crime for 2016, a many other years. We need more support of police to help figure this out.

As long as the very vocal, well-funded minority in Congress, etc., for some reason holds the one side in it's hands. That narrative & agenda will continue …

I think it comes down to all of them, Legion. Politics.

The impact of Climate Change is going to hit sooner and far harder than any Civil War will, unfortunately.

It has a good chance of causing one to get worse (the Drought in Syria did not cause the civil war there, but it meant a lot of your men had a lot of time on their hands, no jobs, food or future).

And there's only one political party that will be directly responsible for it.

And that party starts with an R.

Those R parties in China? Russia? India? Pakistan? I must assume those are the R's you speak of. 🙂

Again please enlighten me on how you plan on stopping the truly big polluters in those countries? Xi and Putin would shake their heads yes and laugh and build 5 more coal burning plants, while dropping toxins into the rivers and oceans.

I will help you here. You won't stop them. They just don't care. So no matter what you do here, it is like peeing on a forest fire. You might feel like you are accomplishing something, until your clothes go up in flames.

I think it comes down to all of them, Legion. Politics.

End game – $ & power …

And that party starts with an R.

Romulans, Romanians, Rotarians ?

If Russia, China & India don't go all in to Go Green nothing anyone else does really matters. And that has Nothing to do with any party that starts with an R.

It is easy to confuse narrative & agenda with reality … Reality & politics today are generally mutually exclusive. Blaming "R" for global warming is like blaming BK & KFC because you got fat … No logic just emotion, narrative, agenda and who gives & gets the $ …