Damned straight there should be protest.

[pecunium]

Teresa, at Making Light, has a bangi-up post about What kind of “Election Day unrest” are we talking about?

She has a lot to support the question. The skinny is... McCain has lost. The polling data is very good (and if you have any interest in the numbers, Five Thirty Eight is THE place to go. Nate Silver was a sabremetrician which is to say he played with the records/stats of baseball. He knows how to read them, and they do a bang up job of not just giving you the results, but showing you how they got there. It is the best polling spot on the web). The polling data has been trending Obama for weeks, and it seems pretty tight. McCain is going to lose.

But there's a lot of intimation the people who staged a riot in Florida, whose supporters were firebombing Democratic offices in 2004, who have sent death threats to ACORN (unless you think it was an Obama Supporter who attacked them, after Palin and McCain started telling us what a threat to democracy they are), aren't looking forward to losing the, "Permanent Republican Majority".

This is no time to be complacent Make your vote. If you can, vote early. If it's a touchscreen, do your damndest to verify the vote. Encourage your friends to vote. Encourage your enemies to vote. Why? Because the Republicans have said, for more than 40 years, they do better when fewer people vote.

An honest election will have Obama win, or there will be an obvious shift in the mind of the nation, and we will know McCain won legitimately. But this idea that McCain winning an honest election will lead to riots... with the emphasis on prevention in cities like Detroit, and Oakland (which, co-incidentally have large black populations... race baiting much?) is meant to intimidate people.

Cops on the streets are not conducive to going out in peaceful enterprises. I'm white, and they make me nervous.

It's also a way to get the wishy-washy racists out. The ones who don't like either candidate, and so might stay home. This gives them something to go out for; keep them uppity-types from getting their way; remind 'em who's boss.

If that sudden groundswell of McCain Mania doesn't appear, and the 6 point lead Obama has suddenly melts away, and McCain comes out of nowhere? I will not be typing. I don't know where I will be, but someplace I can be seen, and heard. If it takes fifty, a hundred, "Orange Revolutions", we need to have them. If I have to hitchhike to Washington to stand on the Mall and be counted... well there are times and places to put it all on the line, and that would be one of them.

Comments

[magentamn.livejournal.com]

Please clarify, what do you mean by "Orange Revolutions"?

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

When Yevtushenko stuffed the ballot boxes in Ukraine (in 2004) people took to the streets of Kiev; with orange banners.

They were protesting the election, demanding either an honest count, or a revote.

That was "The Orange Revolution"

[wcg.livejournal.com]

Baltimore has police officers prepared for contingencies too. It's a city with a Democratic, female, black mayor and a Democratic city council. The thing is that every large city has to consider the possibility of civil unrest. If they don't and something does erupt, the city is guilty of gross negligence. I'm sure Mayor Dixon doesn't intend to intimidate anybody. Likewise in Washington DC with Mayor Fenty.

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

Cops on the streets are not conducive to going out in peaceful enterprises. I'm white, and they make me nervous.

You have the benefit of experience that a lot of white folks don't have -- as a photographer, you've been targeted and harassed by cops. My father, for example, would have looked at something like that and felt safe instead.

cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

If Obama wins and gets a filibuster proof congress to work with and gets three supreme court justices on the bench of his liking, then you will be turning in your guns or face a felony. When the only ones out there that have guns are the cops and the crooks, then you will see intimidation. Before you turn over your freedom to Obama, take a look at his voting record at GunBanObama.com

Re: cops in the streets

[shunra.livejournal.com]

Are you implying that Obama will cancel the courts?

Last I saw, the U.S. was still a nation of law, and the Supreme Court allowed gun use far, far beyond what seems wise - because that's what the Constitution says, so that's what the court follows.

Which is as it should be. And no president (not even the blithering idiot we've got at the moment) has changed that. Neither will Obama.

Re: cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

That ruling did not pass by a wide margin and courts do reverse their opinion. Did you go to the website before you replied?

Re: cops in the streets

[shunra.livejournal.com]

It passed and it is the law of the land, which is the point.

I do not suspect Obama of any intent to subvert the courts. McCain follows in the tradition of Bush, who has repeatedly tried.

Re: cops in the streets

[thirstygirl.livejournal.com]

Wow, coming from a country where guns [rifles and shotguns] are *really* only used for hunting, cops don't carry guns as a matter of course, and there is no concept of a link between guns and freedom, your idea seems utterly illogical. We still manage a civil society, without any sort of police state emerging.

I know there's the whole culture of American Exceptionalism but I'm pretty sure that if plenty of other countries manage to put bans on semi-automatics and reduce the overall level of weaponry on the street without turning into a police-state, you can too.

Re: cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

I guess you didn't bother to read the web site and Obama's voting record either.

I have checked your link, thank you

[thirstygirl.livejournal.com]

It's more I don't actually care. I'm not America, I don't live there, and I'm in no way inclined to single-issue vote on gun control of all things.

I'm more boggling at this entire society that's so completely alien. Seriously, I have difficulty trying to put myself in that mindset. I think it's the whole hand-gun issue that separates things- because my country has plenty of rifles and shot-guns, there is a lot of hunting done, but there just really isn't the idea of 'a gun that you carry around with you' in the public narrative.

Re: cops in the streets

[fjm.livejournal.com]

Funnily enough, in a country where, "the only ones out there that have guns are the cops and the crooks" is indeed the case, we have very few deaths by guns, either of murder or manslaughter. Even the "epidemic" of knife crime in London at the moment has killed less than 30 people.

I've checked: I don't feel in the least bit intimidated.

Re: cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

I was just commenting on the one issue. Click on my name and read the public comments for many more. By the way, the banks going bunko in England can thank Barney Frank and the Democrats for the financial mess, not President Bush. However, I have to agree with you on one thing, He isn't the brightest candle in box. In the primary, I thought Hillary had it wrapped up and I voted Republican because I wanted to vote against McCain because I didn't think he was the best choice for the Republicans. Had I known what I do now, I would have voted democrat and voted for Hillary. Had she won and was against McCain, I would have voted for her. Bill got my vote the first term.

Re: cops in the streets

[calimac.livejournal.com]

Are you serious?

I looked at this website.

"Obama voted in favor of legislation to prohibit law-abiding individuals from purchasing more than one gun a one gun a month."

Apparently guns have a lifespan of less than a month, and if you don't buy a new one each month, your right to own a gun is being taken away.

Either that, or this isn't evidence of an intent to "turn in your guns or face a felony."

"If Obama Is Pro-Gun, Why Are Leading Anti-Gun and Anti-Hunting Groups Endorsing Him?"

Sure, they should have endorsed Sarah Palin instead.

Good grief.

Re: cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

He also tried to increase the tax on them by 500%. He also wanted to ban assault rifles and define assault rifle by foot pounds of energy. For those who know nothing about guns (you) that would include those rifles and shotguns you mentioned. He also approved of a law in his state (didn't pass) that would prevent sale of a gun in a 5 mile radius of a school. That would put the closest gun store hundreds of miles from downtown Chicago and most areas of the state. Absent a national forest with a small private piece of ground, that would probably eliminate all places to sell them. He supported the idea that you could sue gun manufacturers for personal injury produced by robbers who used the guns in a crime. (back door to eliminate their manufacture by financially breaking the manufacturer) And exactly what is the purpose to keep you from buying more than one firearm in 30 days? It's like a salesman. Get your foot in the door.

Re: cops in the streets

[calimac.livejournal.com]

Not one of those things - not all of them put together - amounts to anything close to "you will be turning in your guns or face a felony." That a person who did have that aim would support these as beginning waystations is no evidence that Obama has that aim. And he could hardly achieve it if he did. We're in paranoid delusion country here.

Re: cops in the streets

[prodigal.livejournal.com]

GunBanObama.com is owned and operated by the NRA, and they are hardly known for presenting information on Democrats without heavily spinning it. Trying to scare people into voting Republican, on the other hand...

Re: cops in the streets

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

And you wonder why the rest of the world just sits and laughs when the US pitches their version of democracy to developing nations.

-- Steve's going long on aluminum foil beanie futures.

PS: Firearms are inanimate objects, not freedom fetishes. They neither cause nor prevent crime, and neither oppress nor liberate peoples, by themselves. Find some other security blanket or voodoo doll, would ya?

Re: cops in the streets

[rawbery79.livejournal.com]

I don't know you AT ALL, but I really like you for this comment. ;-)

Re: cops in the streets

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

You know. "You can't have PAID ATTENTION to what I am telling you or you'd AGREE with me" is not, actually, an argument. It's a tantrum.

It's a distinction too rarely made, I concede.

Re: cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

Of courses the NRA is against all gun restrictions. BUT, the voting record was referenced. Just like all the tax increases OBama voted for.

Re: cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

In other words, you didn't bother to read it. Not a tantrum, just an observation. I opened and listened to all three of your links, before I responded. The problem is most people watch and believe what their favorite tv station puts forth. I watch them all. I dig into the court records. Check out the reverend wright's churches website. Makes interesting reading too. Check out the lawfirm Obama worked for and the lawsuits they file. Probably you will find nothing wrong. I did. I hope if he wins you are right. I don't think you will be.

Re: cops in the streets

[prodigal.livejournal.com]

That "all the tax increases Ob ama voted for" nonsense is yet anotehr example of people substituting spin for reality. And if all the NRA did was object to gun restrictions, that'd be one thing - but since they actively distort the facts, it's another entirely.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

Actually... I have the benefit of having been "non" arrested from my home because a neighbor accused me of shooting at her house. Since I had done no such thing, I found it more than a trifle distressing.

Having the cops (illegally) void the arrest was good, and bad. I was never arrested on a felony charge with a 7-15 year possible sentence. That's good.

I got to watch them bungle an arrest something fierce, violating two other people's civil rights, carelessly pointing weapons of which they didn't know the status at people, and a couple of other things, from which time has removed the details. That too was good; because it taught me several things about cops, and what they can do.

I spent most of the night in jail, lost a hundred bucks to the bondsman (which was after my folks were interviewed, my bond was reduced from a grand; no way I was gonna be able to find that; not at 18), had to go to an arraignment (which is where I found out, officially, that I was never, arrested; on paper... see above about jail, bail, handcuffs for four hours while chained to a bench, etc.) had a bunch of my property removed from my possession for about six months (which I got a sumary notice to claim in seven days for have destroyed) and got to explain to the administrative judge on the quasi-civil complaint which arose from my non-arrest that I had five witnesses who could testify to where I was when the crime took place, and three who could testify to where I wasn't (i.e. at the scene).

The accuser said, "I don't care, I just want someone to pay the $8,000 for my windows."

It was educational.

Cops have never really harrased me for taking pictures. Talked to me, but not given me greif. Security guards, those are a different subject.

Re: cops in the streets

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

Um.... those links aren't hers, they are mine. So I question your ability to observe.

Um... being a gun owner... bullshit. It's a nice line of fear-mongering and completely irrelevant to this thread.

You want to talk guns, feel free to do it at your Lj, or in posts where it's the topic.

I like guns. I enjoy guns. I've been using them for 36 years. Obama isn't going to tell me to turn them in. And, all in all, I'd vote for him even if I thought he was going to try, because if McPalin gets elected I am afraid I will have to leave the country (in which case I'll be giving up some of them, because legalling taking those to any of the countries I might wan't to reside will be not worth the effort, or illegal), or using them as part of an armed revolt.

Because my "Single issse" is the Constitution, the McPalin ticket want's to continue the Bush/Cheny policy of removing the important bits of that, and making my guns a whole lot more needful than I think Obama ever will.

Re: cops in the streets

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

And.... "I have a shibbolith you didn't even talk about (so you must not agree with it) isn't argument either; it a form of threadjack/browbeating/subject changing.

Gun laws have nothing to do with vote fraud.

Re: cops in the streets

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

No, in other words, you have neglected to include "I have read it and a great deal of its sort and think it all great pile of nonsense" in your list of options.

You also appear think you're the smartest, best-informed, best-read, and most sensible guy in the room.

THIS is an observation: try to pull that in this crowd without a whole lot more than you've shown so far and you're gonna get pasted like a sheet of wallpaper.

Re: cops in the streets

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

"You have used a word which reminds me of an opinion of mine".

Or, in its severe form, "you have used a word. This reminds me of an opinion of mine..."

Often, but not always, a form of Male Answer Syndrome. More annoying at dinner parties than on the internets, but thankfully less common.

Re: cops in the streets

[sharon-masters.livejournal.com]

To Commordorified:
OH HELL THAT"S GREAT!!!!
>>You know. "You can't have PAID ATTENTION to what I am telling you or you'd AGREE with me" is not, actually, an argument. It's a tantrum.

It's a distinction too rarely made, I concede. <<

I am making that a whole POST.

Tell chicken little that intelligent people don't jump at propaganda and fear mongering- which has been an escallating tactic since Palin was nominated.
The good news is that now Paris Hilton looks feasible as a candidate by comparison.

I USED to be very anti-hand gun. But this administration's removal of my civil rights, imprisoning people without trial, illegal searches and seizures, demands for more levels of personal scrutiny, removals of court oversights, and concentrations of power so deep that the V.P. ILLEGALLY decided that his office isn't part of the Executive branch scared me so bad I finally saw "the light".
I am more afraid of the GOP than I am of anyone else!

Re: cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

until you can make one little 10 minute trip to the website and say "I read it" don't respond. PS, I am sure there are a lot of better informed people than me out there. You just don't happen to be one of them. I also don't need to do your research for you. If you are really interested. google ohio acorn. that will get you started.

sheese

[swseat.livejournal.com]

Ok, I take it all back. You folks are all right and I am entirely wrong. And
pecunium, I am really sorry I mucked up your website with all of this.

Re: cops in the streets

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

It's up to pecunium who does what in his journal, actually.

You, Sir, just failed reading comprehension. Twice.

Let me try this one more time. Reread this bit carefully, paying attention to word choice, tone, etc.:

you have neglected to include "I have read it and a great deal of its sort and think it all great pile of nonsense" in your list of options.

Now. What do you think that means? You may use dictionaries and outside texts of any sort. Show your work. Use both sides of the paper if necessary.

I also don't need to do your research for you

I wouldn't let you within a hundred metres of any research I was doing. Not even to dust the stacks. Not on your present showing, anyway; I suppose it's possible that you are normally brighter than this but are actually drunk under the influence of some strong emotion ...

But I see you have flounced, downthread, so this is all fairly pointless. More than it already was, I mean.

I wish you the best of luck in your future endeavours.

Re: cops in the streets

[commodorified.livejournal.com]

I am making that a whole POST.

My house is your house, my coffee maker is your coffee maker, my wisecracks are your wisecracks ...

In other words, I am very flattered, and thank you. :)

I, myself, a simple Canadian Girl, am inclined to think that in the event of Serious Incursions Of NeoCons, private handguns will be about as much use as spitballs and have just now been discussing with pecunium the desireability of sabotage, applied chemistry, advanced programming, Caltrops for Fun And Profit, and sundry means of subverting large portions of Her Majesty's Armed Forces and Constabulary, and having them bring THEIR assorted objets d'insurrection to the party, possibly while the Powers That Wish To Be are busy rounding up all the people who are still sitting at home doing fuck-all about the situation but consoling themselves with the reflection that they have lost all of the rights and perogatives of free citizens but hey, they still have their handguns.

But this is a point on which persons of good will can, and do, disagree, and my sincerest hope is that that particular disagreement will remain theoretical forever. If it does not, however, I shall no doubt see you at the barricades, and we can settle any relevant side-bets then :)

Re: cops in the streets

[sharon-masters.livejournal.com]

Aw.. thank you back!
And yes, i hope that this particular serious and relevant fear does not materialize. Serious incursions would, of course, not be defensible with that tact.
(But the occasional pot shot at such strays as wander by should sides be drawn would make up for some of this mess. At least lower my bloodpressure:) )

i would never take the coffee maker so long as it is full.
i need java like air.

Re: cops in the streets

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

If you had been paying attention, she did read it.

Yes, there are better informed people than you. I don't know that you are the best judge of who they happen to be.

I, for one, don't need to google Acorn. I've been following it, and attendant issues of voter suppression for some time. It's a republican hoax, a farrago of lies meant to make it seem the election is being stolen, so they can claim Obama is illegitimate.

Unless you have some evidence, rather than imperious demands that other people go and to the research needed to support the arguments you are pretending to make (asserting the evidence is available and people need to go find it, is chickenshit, and passive aggressive to boot. Abusing them because you were too lazy to 1: actually back up your assertions and 2: because you didn't bother to read them saying they had read the evidence and still didn't agree), you need not respond

Re: cops in the streets

[swseat.livejournal.com]

like I said, you are right and I am wrong. And I sincerely apologize for Mucking up your website.

Re: sheese

[ginmar.livejournal.com]

Is that a giant Boy Scout uniform you're wearing?

Re: sheese

[swseat.livejournal.com]

naw, just a regular shirt from Walmart. PS. please don't diss me for shopping there. i've already apologized twice and this poor guy is running out of website space.

[sharon-masters.livejournal.com]

Gosh, all that AND 'anti-American worker' to boot!
Nothing like shopping at places that discriminate against Women, African Americans, Hispanics and teens as well as lock in their overnight cleaning crews and maintain a workforce completely focused on having as few full time employees as possible (thereby making sure NO ONE has health care, overtime, sick leave, or vacation!).

Not to mention the predatory pricing, the destruction of small family stores, or the multitude of lost lawsuits both civil and Federal.
wow...
By any chance are there baby seal seat covers involved somewhere here?