LOCAL and Florida Politics

[spenser1058]

Monique Worrell, candidate for Orange/Osceola state attorney, has been endorsed by Bernie Sanders. 
 

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/politics/os-ne-bernie-sanders-monique-worrell-endorsement-state-attorney-20200605-oveofxpjubfilmtyygbgigtrty-story.html

From the Sentinel 

[spenser1058]

The NFL says “Never Mind” and admits it was wrong about Kaepernick. 

First the players:

Then, the Commissioner:

Meanwhile, The Donald went into a Twitter fit because he’s all about being presidential, you know....

From the New York Times

Edited June 5, 2020 by spenser1058

[aent]

 

On 6/5/2020 at 2:21 PM, JFW657 said:

What I think is relevant, is that the narrative seems to be that the police in general are inherently bad and every department nationwide needs to be reworked from top to bottom. 

I don't believe that's true. Given the difficult job they have to do and the kinds of people they have to deal with, I think overall they do an admirable job.

I don't think thats quite even the narrative. There is an inherit systemic issue where officers refuse to cross the thin blue line. Its a difficult job, yes, no doubt, but if you do it wrong, lives and their liberties are at stake, ya know, the very thing that is supposed to make America, America, the land of the free. But IMHO the problem is this:

I think much of the arguments people make are questionable and divisive, but its hard to deny that police defend each other at nearly all costs. They cover up all the wrongdoing. They operate with a them vs you mindset.

The entire "Blue Lives Matter" movement and this flag to make it represent just police demonstrates exactly what is inherently bad and why almost every. I've never heard of anybody  denying Blue Lives Matter, and it completely misses the messaging of what people are unhappy about, and is a direct assault on the very concept of reforming for literally any problems with the police departments in this country. And thats whether you believe the problems are about race or not, whether you believe the issue is "All Lives Matter" or "Black Lives Matter" or none of the above.

On 6/5/2020 at 2:49 PM, JFW657 said:

But re: the cops you mention in the videos seen pushing people down, etc.... should we judge them on one incident that happened in the middle of a heated situation in which the cops were likely as scared and on edge as the protesters, or even more so given how outnumbered they were? Are these "problem cops" or are they normally valued and respected members of their dept who nobody wants to lose over one over reaction in the heat of an extreme situation? How much would it cost in terms of time, effort and loss of service to train a new rookie to take the place of a veteran cop fired over one out of character incident?

There are just sooooooo many complex, intricate little details and what if's to consider, and hugely complex dynamics at play in all of these issues. They require a lot of people thinking long and hard about a lot of things.

Should we judge the looters and rioters based on that one incident where they were inside of someone else's property? Causing physical harm and property damage? I think so, yeah.

Is it possible some of the looters are otherwise respected and providing some contribution of society? Sure, but they should still be judged and punished for what they did. The same is true for cops. Being a cop is SUPPOSED to be a dangerous job, you're trying to confront the more dangerous people in society and de-escalate and defuse situations without anyone getting hurt or violating anyone's rights. But the police seem to have lost sight of that. I have a few buddys who are cops... #1 concern above all else is made real clear to them by their departments... OFFICER safety. Police are trained to consider the safety of themselves and all colleagues before any member of the general public. From the emails I've seen, this is often reinforced daily, with lots of information being sent to officers daily on every time an officer gets hurt or killed on the job. They're taught everyone is out to get them, and again, its the "us vs you" mentality.

This is clear from various mass shooting cases where the officers sat outside, waiting for backup to make sure they aren't going to get ambushed and they won't lose any "blue lives" while people are actively getting killed, or even ran away even though they were the only ones with a gun and supposed to be protecting the place (Parkland).

Our other rescue workers don't do this. Firefighters don't sit outside buildings trying to squirt it with water when there are people stuck inside, they risk their lives and go try to rescue them. Its recognized that firefighters have an important job to save as many lives as they can, regardless of whether or not they are civilian. Police are taught that the people they're dealing with are less valuable than them, so if they have a choice between saving a fellow officer and a citizen's life, the choice is easy, save the officer. Even if its multiple citizens, the way they're trained is still save one officer vs save multiple citizens.

 

I do agree that its wrong and flat out unjustified for people to riot and loot, and the police need to do something. To me the common answers of "its not important because they can rebuild" and even worse "its fine because insurance companies will cover it" are entirely unacceptable (they often don't, with damage being above or below the minimum or maximum, claims the stores should have done more to protect themselves, and if they do, they necessarily hike the rates, so the people who worked hard in society to create businesses will suffer and be innocent victims no matter what)

[elefants]

Very well put, aent.

[spenser1058]

Mitt Romney marching for BLM today in DC:

Had he brought him the other day, Seamus could have marched with Elizabeth Warren’s retriever, Bailey! 
 

Good to see so much of America taking part.

[spenser1058]

Meanwhile, @JFW657, it looks like protests can make a difference as the Minneapolis City Council has voted to disband its police department and start from scratch. This follows in the footsteps of cities like Camden, NJ.

My links aren’t copying at the moment but it’s safe to say that the city’s PBA has long taken an over aggressive stance on policing in MSP and, as is often the case, local politicians were loathe to buck them. This time, the citizens were heard.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2020/06/07/minneapolis-votes-to-disband-police-department/

From Forbes

 

 

Edited June 7, 2020 by spenser1058

[spenser1058]

“America’s appeal has never been that it is a perfect democracy, but rather that it has the ability to struggle with its own failings and hold itself to a higher standard.”

- Charles Edel - The Canberra Times (Australia)

 

[spenser1058]

At least we know why The Donald is so convinced of voter fraud - it’s the GOP that keeps getting caught. First, the MPD murderer of George Flynn, now Steve Bannon and of course His Orangeness who’s living at Mar-A-Lago illegally. “Law and Order”, indeed...

https://twitter.com/therickwilson/status/1269811932535676930?s=21

No wonder the Repubs keep winning in Florida - they’re letting ringers vote.

[spenser1058]

Meanwhile, the chairman of the Hillsborough County Republican Party has done gone ‘round the bend:

https://twitter.com/billkristol/status/1269788583432462336?s=21

Another good reason not to live in Tampa?

[JFW657]

11 hours ago, aent said:

I don't think thats quite even the narrative. There is an inherit systemic issue where officers refuse to cross the thin blue line. Its a difficult job, yes, no doubt, but if you do it wrong, lives and their liberties are at stake, ya know, the very thing that is supposed to make America, America, the land of the free. But IMHO the problem is this:

I think much of the arguments people make are questionable and divisive, but its hard to deny that police defend each other at nearly all costs. They cover up all the wrongdoing. They operate with a them vs you mindset.

The entire "Blue Lives Matter" movement and this flag to make it represent just police demonstrates exactly what is inherently bad and why almost every. I've never heard of anybody  denying Blue Lives Matter, and it completely misses the messaging of what people are unhappy about, and is a direct assault on the very concept of reforming for literally any problems with the police departments in this country. And thats whether you believe the problems are about race or not, whether you believe the issue is "All Lives Matter" or "Black Lives Matter" or none of the above.

Should we judge the looters and rioters based on that one incident where they were inside of someone else's property? Causing physical harm and property damage? I think so, yeah.

Is it possible some of the looters are otherwise respected and providing some contribution of society? Sure, but they should still be judged and punished for what they did. The same is true for cops. Being a cop is SUPPOSED to be a dangerous job, you're trying to confront the more dangerous people in society and de-escalate and defuse situations without anyone getting hurt or violating anyone's rights. But the police seem to have lost sight of that. I have a few buddys who are cops... #1 concern above all else is made real clear to them by their departments... OFFICER safety. Police are trained to consider the safety of themselves and all colleagues before any member of the general public. From the emails I've seen, this is often reinforced daily, with lots of information being sent to officers daily on every time an officer gets hurt or killed on the job. They're taught everyone is out to get them, and again, its the "us vs you" mentality.

This is clear from various mass shooting cases where the officers sat outside, waiting for backup to make sure they aren't going to get ambushed and they won't lose any "blue lives" while people are actively getting killed, or even ran away even though they were the only ones with a gun and supposed to be protecting the place (Parkland).

Our other rescue workers don't do this. Firefighters don't sit outside buildings trying to squirt it with water when there are people stuck inside, they risk their lives and go try to rescue them. Its recognized that firefighters have an important job to save as many lives as they can, regardless of whether or not they are civilian. Police are taught that the people they're dealing with are less valuable than them, so if they have a choice between saving a fellow officer and a citizen's life, the choice is easy, save the officer. Even if its multiple citizens, the way they're trained is still save one officer vs save multiple citizens.

I do agree that its wrong and flat out unjustified for people to riot and loot, and the police need to do something. To me the common answers of "its not important because they can rebuild" and even worse "its fine because insurance companies will cover it" are entirely unacceptable (they often don't, with damage being above or below the minimum or maximum, claims the stores should have done more to protect themselves, and if they do, they necessarily hike the rates, so the people who worked hard in society to create businesses will suffer and be innocent victims no matter what)

A lot to unpack here as they say.

I'll attempt to address the major points.

Re: police defending each other and covering up for one another, I can only surmise that it's sort of like soldiers in battle. Brothers/sisters-in-arms. They know their lives may depend on any one of their fellow cops someday, so they instinctively close ranks. Maybe they deal with problem officers from within, IDK.

But I think making a comparison between them and looters is way off the mark. You asked "Is it possible that some looters are otherwise respected and providing some contribution of society" and your answer was "Sure, but they should still be judged and punished for what they did." 

I'm not sure it's quite that cut and dried. I seriously doubt that one out of a thousand plus  looters who smash store windows and run back out with garbage bags full of expensive sneakers or flat screen TV's under their arms would ever objectively be described as "otherwise respected and providing some contribution of society".

Cops OTOH, by the very nature of their job, fit that description.

Plus, there are other not obvious at first glance factors at play. Cops are difficult and expensive to recruit, screen, hire and train. Losing just one creates a void that has to be filled otherwise public safety could suffer. Not a huge number of people are lining up to become cops and the more hazardous their jobs become, the less popular the job becomes. The less popular the job becomes, the fewer potential recruits they have to choose from. The fewer their choices, the less choosy they can be re the quality of each recruit. Eventually it could get to the point where only the less desirable types even apply. Then, what we think is a problem today could look like a Sunday picnic at some point in the future.

I think we need to ask ourselves and take into account WHY some police occasionally overreact. They deal with some real trash out on the street, so it's no surprise they might become a bit jaded after awhile. For that reason, I think we should cut them a bit of slack. I'm not even sure that some of what gets labeled as brutality nowadays, really rises to the level. If an otherwise good  cop with a clean record socks some out of control POS in the mouth because he spit on the cop, maybe a verbal reprimand and half day training session would be more in order than firing or suspension.

I dunno. It's a complex issue for sure, but at some point, maybe we should start taking the behavior of the arrestees into account and holding them partially responsible the same way we do in civil court negligence cases. You spit on a cop, you should expect a punch in the mouth. Maybe you won't spit on a cop again.

As for running inside buildings when an active shooter is inside, I can't speak to that because thank God I've never been in the situation. I'm sure we'd all like to think that if it were us, we'd run inside and be the hero, but there's no way to know until you're there in that spot.

Fire fighters run inside burning structures during their training. They have heavy protective, fire resistant suits on with oxygen tanks. They can look at a building and fairly accurately gauge how close or not close the structure is to collapse, so if they have to run inside, they are taking a risk in which the odds are fairly calculated in advance. With an active shooter, you have no idea what kind of bugs are crawling around inside the guy's brain or what he'll do. So I guess it's a bit less  of a controlled situation than a fire.

Again, I'm not speaking about any of this from any kind of experience, so it's all just my perception.

All I can say in summary, is that

We need the police.

We need the best candidates possible to be applying for the jobs.

There is no way of knowing which ones may at some point during heir careers, be affected by outside stress and take it out on an arrestee.  

If we make the job so fraught with extra peril aside from getting killed or crippled by some criminal, like loss of livelihood, lawsuits, prison, etc., we may someday find ourselves having a very difficult time hiring good candidates, and reach a point where we have to take whatever we can get.

It's a delicate tightrope we're walking and why we should be very careful about how far we go in demanding a superhuman level of perfection out of the people who do our dirty, dangerous work for us.

[spenser1058]

Joe Biden seems to be extending his lead in all of the major polls at the moment:

From Nate Cohn (New York Times)

Edited June 8, 2020 by spenser1058

[spenser1058]

Meanwhile, it turns out political scientists also are interested in what protests do:

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/what-protests-can-do/
 

From 538

[JFW657]

2 hours ago, spenser1058 said:

Meanwhile, it turns out political scientists also are interested in what protests do:

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/what-protests-can-do/
 

From 538

Mixed bag results-wise it looks like.

Meanwhile, here's an interesting article I think everyone should have a look at and consider as it relates to what is and what is not being talked about in the national discussion on current issues.

It was written by this guy.....

Peter Kirsanow, a labor attorney and partner in a Cleveland  law firm, and  a GHW Bush appointed member of The US Commission on Civil Rights. The piece was published recently in the conservative National Review. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Kirsanow

The article is entitled Flames from False Narratives.

Of particular interest, are the included stats which were taken from the 2018 National Crime Victimization Survey, US Census data and the FBI Uniform Crime Reports. While reading them, keep in mind, the fact that black males make up about 6%  of the US population.

Link - https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/flames-from-false-narratives/

I'm don't draw any concrete conclusions from the data in this piece, but it is the fact that we are not allowed to even mention or discuss these particular aspects of the race issue in this country, that is cause for concern. 

[spenser1058]

Without going into the details, let me say a flag went off immediately with the 6% stat (which, let’s remember as we just had a police murder involving a Black woman and if you add them back in that takes you to 12% (the single largest minority group other than Hispanics, who just moved up to #1). The other part of that is that while Wyoming has very few Black people, you’re saying Detroit or Atlanta has, ummm, 6%? Context matters (Minneapolis is 20% Black). Do we think the author sought to minimize the impact of African-Americans for some reason?

[JFW657]

One can argue the details of the stats with regard to distribution of a particular group, but only if one is allowed to even talk about it.

Ever hear the subject discussed on political debate shows or mentioned on the nightly news or anywhere else in the media?

No, you never do and that is the point.

It's been a one-sided discussion which reveals nothing and helps solve nothing

BTW, black women, like women of all races, account for a very small percentage of violent crime and encounters with the police. Citing one instance is not justification for including them relative to crime and police encounters. The total population, also includes the elderly and young children as well. Two groups who we know account for virtually zero percent of criminal activity.

Orlando is 25% black. I watch the local news every day both afternoon and evening, and I'm (truly and honestly) sorry to say that my own personal observation has been that the reports of violent crime overwhelmingly involve black males.

Also, cities like Detroit and Atlanta have inordinately high crime rates in which the disparity between black and white crime levels is probably even higher than when viewed nationally. 

But once again, the main point here is "The Narrative". 

 

[spenser1058]

This was unexpected: Sanford’s mayor (he’s on his third term) is resigning to run for Seminole County property appraiser.

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/seminole-county/os-ne-sanford-triplett-resigns-property-appraise-20200608-n5hph7ursfazthknkodmgu7n4q-story.html

I don’t believe Sanford has a strong-mayor form of government, so this would be a step up.

From the Sentinel 

[Uncommon]

3 hours ago, JFW657 said:

One can argue the details of the stats with regard to distribution of a particular group, but only if one is allowed to even talk about it.

Ever hear the subject discussed on political debate shows or mentioned on the nightly news or anywhere else in the media?

No, you never do and that is the point.

It's been a one-sided discussion which reveals nothing and helps solve nothing

BTW, black women, like women of all races, account for a very small percentage of violent crime and encounters with the police. Citing one instance is not justification for including them relative to crime and police encounters. The total population, also includes the elderly and young children as well. Two groups who we know account for virtually zero percent of criminal activity.

Orlando is 25% black. I watch the local news every day both afternoon and evening, and I'm (truly and honestly) sorry to say that my own personal observation has been that the reports of violent crime overwhelmingly involve black males.

Also, cities like Detroit and Atlanta have inordinately high crime rates in which the disparity between black and white crime levels is probably even higher than when viewed nationally. 

But once again, the main point here is "The Narrative". 

 

And what would you say if you were “allowed” to talk about it?

[JFW657]

3 minutes ago, Uncommon said:

And what would you say if you were “allowed” to talk about it?

Just what I've said.

[spenser1058]

So the PBA in Brevard posted on Facebook trying to recruit all the cops being ditched for brutality around the country.

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/florida/os-ne-brevard-police-lodge-cops-accused-of-brutality-should-apply-20200608-sgaroykjgzexrhwvi6zgyr6ere-story.html
 

From the Sentinel

I would say I’m shocked but Brevard is reliably just slightly to the right of Attila the Hun so I’m sadly not even surprised. 

Edited June 8, 2020 by spenser1058

[spenser1058]

F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote, “There are no second acts in American lives”.

He might wish to rethink that if he were still with us. Today, Dan Rather hit one million followers on Twitter.

He might even give Tebow a run for his money!

[JFW657]

25 minutes ago, spenser1058 said:

So the PBA in Brevard posted on Facebook trying to recruit all the cops being ditched for brutality around the country.

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/florida/os-ne-brevard-police-lodge-cops-accused-of-brutality-should-apply-20200608-sgaroykjgzexrhwvi6zgyr6ere-story.html
 

From the Sentinel

I would say I’m shocked but Brevard is reliably slightly to the right of Atilla the Hun so I’m sadly not even surprised. 

I guess all those NASA rocket scientists, aeronautical engineers and defense contractor types who live and work over there take a less Pollyanna view of the world than do Orlando's theme park ride attendants, coffee baristas and restaurant servers. 

j/k   

[elefants]

18 minutes ago, JFW657 said:

I guess all those NASA rocket scientists, aeronautical engineers and defense contractor types who live and work over there take a less Pollyanna view of the world than do Orlando's theme park ride attendants, coffee baristas and restaurant servers. 

j/k   

I guess I missed the part where all those NASA rocket scientists, aeronautical engineers, and defense contractors used the Brevard FOP Facebook page to ask bad cops to join the local force.

[JFW657]

19 minutes ago, elefants said:

I guess I missed the part where all those NASA rocket scientists, aeronautical engineers, and defense contractors used the Brevard FOP Facebook page to ask bad cops to join the local force.

I don't know about anything like that either.

I was just offering a good natured response to the statement "...Brevard is reliably slightly to the right of Atilla the Hun ... 

[spenser1058]

In Brevard they elect people who want to close down UCF and merge universities without facts to justify it and without telling the schools. Then there are the homophobic ones who get caught in a Titusville park bathroom being naughty. At least our theme park workers seem to do a better job of choosing their reps.

[JFW657]

Damned Brevardians.