***Official Political Discussion Thread***

[osh kosh bosh]

I want to get away from

talks about the slogan
meta conversations about the media's coverage of the slogan
the politics of the slogan

it's a pointless convo.


but this idea that we should reduce police funding, and move it to other programs is an question that deserves scrutiny.

people in left wing spaces like NT just take it like it's a given that it's a good idea.


when just a curory glance at evidence seems like it pretty clearly isn't assuming your goal is decreasing police violence and stopping crime.

 

[osh kosh bosh]

defund ≠ abolish

im aware.

defunding the police is a bad idea.
abolishing the police is a worse idea.

 

[RustyShackleford]

Yeah I'm not gunna relitigate that.

I'll just say I agree with the point Obama is making.

We don't have to relitigate anything.

I agree with Obama's point too.

Just saying he is making a different point than the one you were ran in here to make.

So if you feel people should listen to him, then maybe you should too.

 

[osh kosh bosh]

Obama’s Curious Cautiousness
He is a great politician, but he is not an activist.

seems to me left wing people actually need more great politicians and less online activists imo right now.

 

[IATT]

Or maybe seeing the vehicles and weaponry the police in the US have at theIr disposal is startling

as a non American, I’ve never fully understood Americans fascination with guns.. went to high school and college in the states, went to school over in England.. and ain’t like I was born and grew up that far away.. grew up on American television

 

[deusavertat]

-People should be treated equally and fairly.

-These identity politics turn moderates away!!!

Lol if something basic like this turns " moderates" away f*** em we don't want them. Treating people equally isn't some type of radical idea, if you think it is, you aren't really a "moderate".

 

[osh kosh bosh]

So if you feel people should listen to him, then maybe you should too.

yah I have and i think my opinion is pretty close to Obama's.

closer it seems than some leftists.

 

[osh kosh bosh]

Lol if something basic like this turns " moderates" away f*** em we don't want them. Treating people equally isn't some type of radical idea, if you think it is, you aren't really a "moderate".

but you actually do need em assuming you want policing policy to change.

 

[aepps20]

I'll say this on the "defund the police" slogan. It is a very easy slogan to attack but let's be very clear on this, those that vote for Republicans because of that slogan were always going to do so. Republicans are not honest brokers and just lie all of the time. Does anyone not believe that they would still run ads about dems wanting to destroy cops of the slogan was police reform? We spend too much time letting Republicans frame the debate and are always on the defense. The message has to be what happens to innocent Black and Brown people at the hands of the cops is not acceptable and must be addressed.

 

[IATT]

 

[IATT]

 

[kdawg]

This chick was hammered

How are you going to answer my crazy theory - with facts you say? Well, I have more crazy to dispute your "facts"... That eyebrow raise was classic!

 

[KHUFU]

seems to me left wing people actually need more great politicians and less online activists imo right now.

There is room for everyone, as all have a purpose. I use the King, Malcolm X example.

Malcolm knew that he empowered King, for if the system didn't deal with King? They'd have to deal with Malcolm.

 

[junglejim]

I want to get away from

talks about the slogan
meta conversations about the media's coverage of the slogan
the politics of the slogan

it's a pointless convo.


but this idea that we should reduce police funding, and move it to other programs is an question that deserves scrutiny.

people in left wing spaces like NT just take it like it's a given that it's a good idea.


when just a curory glance at evidence seems like it pretty clearly isn't assuming your goal is decreasing police violence and stopping crime.

please tell me how spending $1T on defense spending every year is benefiting US citizens outside of other countries being scared ****less of us nuking them?

How are we benefiting from spending more on military than the next 10 largest nations?

 

[osh kosh bosh]

You are right, it only consumes a mere 33% of the total budget. The 51% was the amount of discretionary budget which is spent on the LAPD so that's my fault, but the $3B budget number was correct. The 1.5B above does not include discretionary spending.

But my point is the police and military are the only two departments in the US that we do not ask to do it more efficiently. Education, healthcare, everything else we put on a strict budget then tell them to figure it out. We give the police and military a blank check every year and do not hold their spending accountable. We spend more on military spending than the next 10 largest countries combined. There is zero reason that we should fund MORE to that as opposed to telling them to be more efficient with the funds they currently receive like we do with absolutely everything else.

I also disagree with your second point. It is absolutely enough when you look at the fact that LA spends $3B on police but $80M on housing, $180M on transportation, and only spends 1/8th of what the police spends on their fire department. Police spending is absolutely an issue.

yeah im not a fiscal hawk asking for "efficiency" most of the time is just a prelude to austerity. I think putting things on a strict budget and telling them to figure things out is dumb.
and i don't think we should take dumb conservative fiscal ideas and apply them to policing.

given

the low solve rates of murders in many big cities,
the lack of diversity in many police departments ,
and the relatively low amount of training police actually have to go through
and the robust evidence of police presence reducing crime.

there are tons of things you could spend money on, that would reduce racialized police violence, reduce crime, and improve policing.

 

[RustyShackleford]

yah I have and i think my opinion is pretty close to Obama's.

closer it seems than some leftists.

Obama is talking about political candidates though. Mans also seems to disagree with your argument that activists and people in the street need to mine their words like there are politicians.

If you are claiming people should listen to Obama. Maybe take your own advice.

 

[osh kosh bosh]

I'll say this on the "defund the police" slogan. It is a very easy slogan to attack but let's be very clear on this, those that vote for Republicans because of that slogan were always going to do so. Republicans are not honest brokers and just lie all of the time. Does anyone not believe that they would still run ads about dems wanting to destroy cops of the slogan was police reform? We spend too much time letting Republicans frame the debate and are always on the defense. The message has to be what happens to innocent Black and Brown people at the hands of the cops is not acceptable and must be addressed.

yeah i don't agree. Biden won because republican and suburban moderates swung his way.

swing voters do exist, this idea that they "were always going to do so" just seems wild wrong to me.


i don't want to get caught up with the politics of the idea, because its all just a mtter of opinion.


I will say, republicans run a million ads about how they want to protect pre existing conditions, but you look at the polling, voters don't believe them.

republicans ran a bunch of ads about biden wanting to defund the police and it seems voters did not believe them




seems to me voters can distinguish a between real and fake attacks.

 

[osh kosh bosh]

Obama is talking about political candidates though. Mans also seems to disagree with your argument that activists and people in the street need to mine their words like there are politicians.

If you are claiming people should listen to Obama. Maybe take your own advice.

yah I have and i think my opinion is pretty close to Obama's

 

[IATT]

I'll say this on the "defund the police" slogan. It is a very easy slogan to attack but let's be very clear on this, those that vote for Republicans because of that slogan were always going to do so. Republicans are not honest brokers and just lie all of the time. Does anyone not believe that they would still run ads about dems wanting to destroy cops of the slogan was police reform? We spend too much time letting Republicans frame the debate and are always on the defense. The message has to be what happens to innocent Black and Brown people at the hands of the cops is not acceptable and must be addressed.

I mean, one just has to look at the breonna Taylor situation

the state gave out a $12 million dollar settlement to the family

the AG and the police clearly didn’t do their jobs and it ended up in that young lady’s death and those responsible not properly paying the consequences for their actions

now on top of that $12 million dollar figure you have the salaries and benefits of all involved and seems like a hell of a lot for people who aren’t good at their jobs.. and you have a citizen removed from the community and numerous lives impacted

but defunding police is the problem

 

[osh kosh bosh]

please tell me how spending $1T on defense spending every year is benefiting US citizens outside of other countries being scared ****less of us nuking them?

How are we benefiting from spending more on military than the next 10 largest nations?

uh i didn't say anything about defense spending.

 

[junglejim]

yeah im not a fiscal hawk asking for "efficiency" most of the time is just a prelude to austerity. I think putting things on a strict budget and telling them to figure things out is dumb.
and i don't think we should take dumb conservative fiscal ideas and apply them to policing.

given

the low solve rates of murders in many big cities,
the lack of diversity in many police departments ,
and the relatively low amount of training police actually have to go through
and the robust evidence of police presence reducing crime.

there are tons of things you could spend money on, that would reduce racialized police violence, reduce crime, and improve policing.

There is also vast amounts of evidence that poverty causes crime. Increasing spending on a fixed budget (state and local municipalities cannot deficit spend) to police while doing absolutely nothing to fix the root issue is stupid. All it does is continue to perpetuate the cycle.

You claim not to be a deficit hawk but if you are going to speak on these things then you should at least have a basic understanding of how local funding works. These municipalities can’t just deficit spend into oblivion to the point where they can increase funding for everything. When they do so, they have to issue municipal bonds. If you issue too many municipal bond that you cannot repay to investors then your credit rating goes down. If your credit rating going down then your borrowing costs increase in the form of higher bond rates. If you increase your borrowing costs then you have less money to fund to local programs because more money is spent on financing interest on debt. These state and local governments do not function the same way the US federal government functions. They cannot print money and they work on a finite budget.

There are limitations inherent in what they can do so they are limited in options for increasing social programs. You either increase publicly held debt which will likely make matters worse, increase property taxes or local sales tax/permit costs, or reallocate funding from other programs. The first two options are measures that typically get voted on by citizens and are largely unpopular measures that do not pass. The last option is the only real option that most local politicians have at their disposal. Your lack of understanding on how local governments are funded is showing

 

[osh kosh bosh]

I mean, one just has to look at the breonna Taylor situation

the state gave out a $12 million dollar settlement to the family

the AG and the police clearly didn’t do their jobs and it ended up in that young lady’s death and those responsible not properly paying the consequences for their actions

now on top of that $12 million dollar figure you have the salaries and benefits of all involved and seems like a hell of a lot for people who aren’t good at their jobs.. and you have a citizen removed from the community and numerous lives impacted

but defunding police is the problem

police a

I mean, one just has to look at the breonna Taylor situation

the state gave out a $12 million dollar settlement to the family

the AG and the police clearly didn’t do their jobs and it ended up in that young lady’s death and those responsible not properly paying the consequences for their actions

now on top of that $12 million dollar figure you have the salaries and benefits of all involved and seems like a hell of a lot for people who aren’t good at their jobs.. and you have a citizen removed from the community and numerous lives impacted

but defunding police is the problem

So you think spending less money will get you...more competent people?

Yah that just doesn't make sense to me.

 

[wr]

I've posted this before but. A good read on the topic at hand.
"As the costs of police misconduct rise, cities and counties across the United States are
going into debt to pay for it. Often this debt is in the form of bond borrowing. When
cities or counties issue bonds to pay these costs, banks and other firms collect fees
for the services they provide, and investors collect interest. The use of bonds to pay
for settlements and judgments greatly increases the burden of policing costs on taxpayers, while
producing a profit for banks and investors. Using bonds to pay for settlements or judgments can
nearly double the costs of the original settlement. All of this is paid for by taxpayers.
We call the bonds used to cover police related settlement and judgment costs “police brutality
bonds”, because they quite literally allow banks and wealthy investors to profit from police
violence. This is a transfer of wealth from communities—especially over-policed communities of
color—to Wall Street and wealthy investors. The companies profiting from police brutality bonds
include well known institutions like Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs, and Bank of America, as well as
smaller regional banks and other firms.
In our research into the use of police brutality bonds, we found that cities and counties across
the United States issue bonds to pay for police brutality settlements and judgments. The
cities range from giant metropolises such as Los Angeles to smaller cities like Bethlehem,
Pennsylvania. Our report includes details on police brutality bonds in twelve cities and counties,
including five in-depth case studies: Chicago, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Cleveland, and Lake
County, Indiana."

Police Brutality Bonds - Action Center on Race and the Economy

How Wall Street Profits from Police Violence June 2018 | Report by Alyxandra Goodwin, Whitney Shepard, and Carrie Sloan Local Case Studies: Chicago Cleveland Lake County, Indiana Los Angeles Milwaukee

acrecampaigns.org

 

[cedric ceballos]

Lol if something basic like this turns " moderates" away f*** em we don't want them. Treating people equally isn't some type of radical idea, if you think it is, you aren't really a "moderate".

In all honesty. You need them to potentially win elections and get people in power capable of making needed change on the state and senate level. After you get said candidates in power to make that change, yeah you’re right, **** them.

But if wording a message in a way that’s more comfortable to potential voters, on the fence voters, moderates etc will have a positive impact at the polls, it should done. If the ultimate end game and intent if elected is police reform, if there’s a way to word it to gain the highest amount of support for it, you do it.

You’re not doing it to look reasonable to an unreasonable obstructionist GOP and their racist base. They’re a trashy lost cause. But you’re doing it to potentially increase your numbers and voters to where you can fight back against them through the political system.

 

[dwalk31]

I want to get away from

talks about the slogan
meta conversations about the media's coverage of the slogan
the politics of the slogan

it's a pointless convo.


but this idea that we should reduce police funding, and move it to other programs is an question that deserves scrutiny.

people in left wing spaces like NT just take it like it's a given that it's a good idea.


when just a curory glance at evidence seems like it pretty clearly isn't assuming your goal is decreasing police violence and stopping crime.

I’ve heard the argument that police funding should be reduced, along with their responsibilities.

And I don’t think that’s a bad idea.