8 ms·

U.S. Justice Dept weighs stripping federal funds from cities allowing 'anarchy'

27 points by pera 6y ago

greenduck 6y ago
I wish I could go back in time to when I didn't need to tense up before opening up the news each day. How does this policy help the country? It's just so blatantly designed to hurt people. The whole point seems to be to rile up Trump's base at the cost of people who are just trying to go about their lives during a pandemic.
- dimator 6y ago
  > I wish I could go back in time to when I didn't need to tense up before opening up the news each day. This really hits home. These four years have been such a depressing time for just reading the news. Every day it seems the US is edging closer and closer to.... I don't even know what. With half the country happily marching to the drumbeats. It's amazing just how fragile our systems were. I've been wondering if it's just mentally more healthy to go the ignorance is bliss route. I know so many people who don't even register these kinds of events, and they seem happier.
  - redis_mlc 6y ago
    > These four years have been such a depressing time for just reading the news. I know right. The Democrats have so little regard for our nation that they've nominated two Manchurian candidates in a row.
- DenisM 6y ago
  > I didn't need to tense up before opening up the news If you frighten people enough they will vote for anything that resembles safety. The first part is accomplished, wouldn't you say?
- anonymouswacker 6y ago
  Don't trust the news. Watch documentaries about mainstream news (Manufacturing Consent is my personal fav) and you will see that reality is not what they are peddling--it is influence.
- zalkota 6y ago
  Remember when the media didn’t lie? Yeah, that was nice.
  - colejohnson66 6y ago
    No? Yellow journalism has been a thing since the newspaper became a thing.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > Remember when the media didn’t lie? No, but I'm old enough to remember when all the major media told approximately the same lies so that they were part of the shared, accepted “truth”, which is probably what you are thinking of.
iron0013 6y ago
I would like to hear the arguments of anyone who thinks this is not both illegal and fascistic
- Miner49er 6y ago
  I'm not a lawyer, but I don't see how it is illegal. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/26/nyregion/sanctuary-cities-funding.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/26/nyregion/sanctuary-cities... Another case that may apply: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Dakota_v._Dole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Dakota_v._Dole It may be illegal, but it's not really clear, it seems like it would need to be decided in court.
  - joshuamorton 6y ago
    Note that that sanctuary city cases was the exception. 3 other federal circuit courts ruled the other way, and so far the Supreme Court has refused to vote, so as it stands, the government can withhold funds from NY but not California or Oregon or Washington.
    - charwalker 6y ago
      Go figure why the GOP wishes to add another SCoutUS judge with 1.5 months to the election, unlike precedent set in 2016 by McConnell's senate along with vocal support from Senator Graham.
      - dang 6y ago
        It looks like your account has been using HN primarily for political battle. That's against the site guidelines, and we ban accounts that do this. Commenting occasionally on political threads while generally using the site as intended is fine, but using it primarily for politics is not fine, because those things will take over the site by default if we allow it, and that's not HN's mandate. If you would please review the rules and use the site as intended, we'd appreciate it. (On the other hand, I didn't see your account attacking fellow users, calling names, and so on—that's definitely good.) https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html More explanation about how we moderate this: https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix=false&page=0&query=primarily%20test%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=political%20overlap%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
cwhiz 6y ago
I live in Manhattan. I don't know what anarchy they are talking about. It is calm, peaceful, and beautiful here right now. I have not seen, nor heard, a protest since June or July? I've biked all around Manhattan and the only distressing thing I've seen is the closed storefronts and "for lease" signs plaguing city blocks. Mayor de Blasio seems intent on ruining the local economy with petty rules and restrictions.
- xenospn 6y ago
  They are making up their own reality. The people under their sphere of influence are absolutely positive NYC/PDX etc are burning to the ground.
- aspaceman 6y ago
  My grandmother called me in a panic the other day because she thought rioters burned down my neighborhood in Chicago. An hour long conversation and I still couldn’t grasp why she thought that.
  - cwhiz 6y ago
    That’s the type of question I get most often. “What is the rioting like?” Well I don’t know because there hasn’t been any. Everything is peaceful and calm. People are walking around with masks and socially distancing themselves while they lounge in the park. It’s total anarchy.
- zalkota 6y ago
  Probably because you live in the wealthiest part. Murders are up 140% in NYC. You didn’t read the actual Washington report.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - Grazester 6y ago
    I live in Brooklyn in a neighborhood with a demographics this administration would call rapist and criminals because they originated south of the border. But there is no anarchy here either. I do acknowledge crime is up in New York but it's not like everyone is running around the streets shooting, looting and burning things down.
ignoramceisblis 6y ago
Because I didn't see a link to it in the article, a brief explaining why the decision was made: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/department-justice-identifies-new-york-city-portland-and-seattle-jurisdictions-permitting https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/department-justice-identifies... If you govern a people and willfully allow them to become endangered through, eg. defunding the police, permitting lawless zones throughout your jurisdiction, and so on, and the end result is innocent lives under your power are harmed or destroyed, then you should be held accountable.
- ignoramceisblis 6y ago
  Addendum: Minneapolis should also be considered, as their local government took similar actions which resulted in similar - predictable - results: https://hotair.com/archives/ed-morrissey/2020/09/16/minneapolis-city-council-asks-police-chief-police/ https://hotair.com/archives/ed-morrissey/2020/09/16/minneapo... And they ask "where are the police?" after defunding the police.
  - iron0013 6y ago
    The police have not been defunded in either Minneapolis or NYC. They have decided—while fully funded—to stop doing their jobs to punish the cities that tried to hold them accountable for their abuses.
    - ignoramceisblis 6y ago
      Correction: And they ask "where are the police?" after unanimously deciding to defund (rather, abolish) the police. So an entire police force must be abolished because of the alleged abuses of a few?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
lr 6y ago
The cities they are targeting probably send a disproportionate amount of tax money to the federal government. I really wish the mayors of these cities, and the governors of these states would start to talk about this imbalance.
- tastygreenapple 6y ago
  It would be interesting to see the democrats embrace the idea that progressive taxation is unjust and that a person's tax bill should influence the services they're entitled to.
- bzb5 6y ago
  Define disproportionate. Is it not proportionate to the number of citizens?
  - charwalker 6y ago
    No. Some state take in billions more in federal tax dollars then they send in with states like Alabama and Kentucky often at the top of the list. Without California and New York floating most red states they'd be sunk. https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/which-states-are-givers-and-which-are-takers/361668/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/which-s... This is why when a red state chooses to lower taxes or otherwise increase their reliance on federal help I laugh at the hypocrisy of the bootstraps party and wonder why my federal taxes, in a blue state without federal support, should go to such irresponsible people.
  - eatingCake 6y ago
    The suggestion is that these cities are potentially paying more money to the federal government than they get back in federal aid. The population is irrelevant.
  - perl4ever 6y ago
    Urban areas have higher per capita income, and taxes are progressive, so out of proportion to the number of citizens is a possible meaning.
birdyrooster 6y ago
Congress controls the purse, not the President and his increasingly political departments. If they want to change the law, they should vote on a bill first.
- TimesOldRoman 6y ago
  It seems that the rules and common law interpretations that we are used to no longer apply to the degree that we imagined.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > Congress controls the purse, not the President Congress authorizes spending but the executive actually does it and, in practice, can fail to do it selectively. If not statutorily authorized, this can be illegal, but the fact that it's illegal doesn't mean a whole lot until someone uses that fact to force it to be undone, which can take quite a long time. > If they want to change the law, they should vote on a bill first. What if they just want to arbitrarily exercise power and don’t give a flip about the content of the law, what should they do then?
charwalker 6y ago
Remember, a fascist leader won't say it out loud but they will name antifascists enemies of the state. This is that. If this happens, the House needs to strip funding from DHS for inciting said violence as well as set up systems to cope with ongoing problems instead of fomenting unrest to further the current administrations political goals and lie about protests. Depending on what sources you've read, it may be there is way less 'anarchy' at protests than you think, at least wherever the federal government did not get involved. At first protesters kneeled during the anthem at NFL games and were belittled and straw manned as protesting the flag or America when really protesting police violence against black people. Kneeling was suggested by a US veteran in communication with Kaepernick as a way to respect the flag while making the issue known. As an amateur athlete I kneeled for the anthem at baseball and football games but never even had such a nationalistic show of pride for soccer or other sports. The protesting voices were drowned out by misinformation and character attacks to obscure their true cause. Then as people began paying more attention, more police violence was exposed and protested including the ongoing deaths of black Americans. Just or unjust the police are no executioners and the constitution provides the right to a fair trial. As events piled up in the short term memory of society, more began protesting and marching to make their voices heard in accordance with their first amendment rights. And again they were shut out or shut down, violently, by the same police they were protesting. The movement was counter protested by white nationalist groups appearing to have support or comradely with the police, often while fully armed (second amendment represent) whereas antifascists and BLM groups were usually not. Bad actors from either ideology incited property damage with many exposed and turned over to police in the moment. And then the US government overreached by sending unmarked storm troopers into several US cities, against governor and mayor outcry, to only increase the chaos and foment more violence. And yet Trump has used the violence as a political stick to push his election chances, how shameful and pathetic. This is Trump's all doing in Trump's America. The imagery his attack ads on Biden show is Trump's America (or sometimes events from the Ukraine and Russian jets, seriously look it up it's silly). This is what happens when a movement's voice is shuttered under misinformation by media and the current administration. When the first amendment is shut down and the rival groups (police and white nationalists) are leveraging the second to counter protest, what other options does a civil society have? Vote in the next election when elections security bills have been held up in the GOP senate for months now, reducing our capacity to counter foreign interference like what was documented in 2016 and has, according to all US intel groups, continued unabated by Russia and others? That system last elected someone with a 2.8 million vote minority and gave a minority party (48% of the vote) more than a 10% majority in the House and control of the Senate? Do we trust the DHS and DOJ to do the right thing when they are led by someone likely legally unqualified for the role or someone who has drafted pardons for traitors, continues to interfere in investigations to benefit Trump, and is the same person who is calling protests anarchy? These avenues have been shuttered to the public. From the womens march to the last 6 months of protests, what has changed? Trump was impeached and the GOP senate didn't call a witness at his trial, moving to acquit. Several investigations continue to show gross abuse of power by the Trump administration like firing inspector generals, pushing for unprecedented actions in ongoing criminal cases, and we know most of the Trump family has used private email while in office (as the Trump supporters say "Lock them Up"). When has this administration been held accountable for its actions and fallout for the American people? Never. Protesting was belittled and attacked by federal agents. Voting is potentially compromised as well as the USPS gutted for political reasons. The checks and balances in place for 200+ years have crumbled due to blatant partisan corruption and inaction by the GOP. Trump hasn't learned any lessons other than appoint harder loyalists and deny, deny, deny or counter-sue, counter-sue, counter-sue to slow down oversight by the Democratic House or remaining IGs. What other ways can a It rings true: racism and violence against minorities is so deeply American protesting it comes off as protesting America. It's high time to overhaul the structurally racist and abusive systems in this country like employer tied or private health insurance/care, the abject racial and income disparities in our justice system, and the social safety net programs designed to help Americans that may be abused by bad actors to pay off loyalists. Not to mention the inequality created by the electoral college and existing election systems left open to foreign interference as bills rot in the GOP Senate without action. Don't worry though, McConnell will surely get a SCouTUS vote in with less than 2 months until the 2020 election to accompany the hundreds of other justices he's confirmed for Trump. America has a reckoning in November and it won't be any prettier than the alleged 'anarchy' of these cities. Side note: The impeachment acquittal to PPP loan timeline in and of itself is incredibly damning: 1. Trump's impeachment trial has no witnesses or new evidence with nearly party line vote to acquit. 2. When PPP loans were announced, Trump fired the IG overseeing their disbursement, appointed a loyalist to the role, and buried the data from review. 3. It took subpoenas to release the recipient data and identify fraud, waste, and abuse from the program including 4. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell (who pushed no witnesses and acquittal) and wife Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao (with her own scandal directing funding to KY to help her husband's re-election chances) received millions in loans from the PPP: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/lawmakers-and-transportation-secretarys-family-owned-business-collectively-received-millions-of-dollars-in-ppp-loans-2020-07-07 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/lawmakers-and-transportati... Technically legal and constitutional but incredibly corrupt and dangerous to what is left of US democracy. Trump abused an aid program to pay off loyalists with millions of taxpayer dollars to reimburse those that protected him. Remember this when you see a Trump attack ad showing his own nation burning because he failed to lead. Also laugh at his use of Russian jets and attempt at supporting the military after attacking heroes his entire sad life.
fallingfrog 6y ago
Isn’t congress supposed to write laws, not the executive branch?
dmode 6y ago
The Trump admin has such a gross third world dictatorial bent
fallingfrog 6y ago
I love how anarchists, who are a tiny sliver of the population which has never had any significant political power, are now scapegoats for all the problems created by the very same powerful right wing plutocrats trying to pin it all on anarchists. And it’s crystal clear that they don’t even know what anarchism is. Lovely.

27 points by pera 6y ago

I wish I could go back in time to when I didn't need to tense up before opening up the news each day. How does this policy help the country? It's just so blatantly designed to hurt people. The whole point seems to be to rile up Trump's base at the cost of people who are just trying to go about their lives during a pandemic.

dimator 6y ago
> I wish I could go back in time to when I didn't need to tense up before opening up the news each day. This really hits home. These four years have been such a depressing time for just reading the news. Every day it seems the US is edging closer and closer to.... I don't even know what. With half the country happily marching to the drumbeats. It's amazing just how fragile our systems were. I've been wondering if it's just mentally more healthy to go the ignorance is bliss route. I know so many people who don't even register these kinds of events, and they seem happier.
- redis_mlc 6y ago
  > These four years have been such a depressing time for just reading the news. I know right. The Democrats have so little regard for our nation that they've nominated two Manchurian candidates in a row.
DenisM 6y ago
> I didn't need to tense up before opening up the news If you frighten people enough they will vote for anything that resembles safety. The first part is accomplished, wouldn't you say?
anonymouswacker 6y ago
Don't trust the news. Watch documentaries about mainstream news (Manufacturing Consent is my personal fav) and you will see that reality is not what they are peddling--it is influence.
zalkota 6y ago
Remember when the media didn’t lie? Yeah, that was nice.
- colejohnson66 6y ago
  No? Yellow journalism has been a thing since the newspaper became a thing.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > Remember when the media didn’t lie? No, but I'm old enough to remember when all the major media told approximately the same lies so that they were part of the shared, accepted “truth”, which is probably what you are thinking of.

iron0013 6y ago

I would like to hear the arguments of anyone who thinks this is not both illegal and fascistic

Miner49er 6y ago
I'm not a lawyer, but I don't see how it is illegal. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/26/nyregion/sanctuary-cities-funding.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/26/nyregion/sanctuary-cities... Another case that may apply: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Dakota_v._Dole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Dakota_v._Dole It may be illegal, but it's not really clear, it seems like it would need to be decided in court.
- joshuamorton 6y ago
  Note that that sanctuary city cases was the exception. 3 other federal circuit courts ruled the other way, and so far the Supreme Court has refused to vote, so as it stands, the government can withhold funds from NY but not California or Oregon or Washington.
  - charwalker 6y ago
    Go figure why the GOP wishes to add another SCoutUS judge with 1.5 months to the election, unlike precedent set in 2016 by McConnell's senate along with vocal support from Senator Graham.
    - dang 6y ago
      It looks like your account has been using HN primarily for political battle. That's against the site guidelines, and we ban accounts that do this. Commenting occasionally on political threads while generally using the site as intended is fine, but using it primarily for politics is not fine, because those things will take over the site by default if we allow it, and that's not HN's mandate. If you would please review the rules and use the site as intended, we'd appreciate it. (On the other hand, I didn't see your account attacking fellow users, calling names, and so on—that's definitely good.) https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html More explanation about how we moderate this: https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix=false&page=0&query=primarily%20test%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=political%20overlap%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

cwhiz 6y ago

I live in Manhattan. I don't know what anarchy they are talking about. It is calm, peaceful, and beautiful here right now. I have not seen, nor heard, a protest since June or July? I've biked all around Manhattan and the only distressing thing I've seen is the closed storefronts and "for lease" signs plaguing city blocks. Mayor de Blasio seems intent on ruining the local economy with petty rules and restrictions.

xenospn 6y ago
They are making up their own reality. The people under their sphere of influence are absolutely positive NYC/PDX etc are burning to the ground.
aspaceman 6y ago
My grandmother called me in a panic the other day because she thought rioters burned down my neighborhood in Chicago. An hour long conversation and I still couldn’t grasp why she thought that.
- cwhiz 6y ago
  That’s the type of question I get most often. “What is the rioting like?” Well I don’t know because there hasn’t been any. Everything is peaceful and calm. People are walking around with masks and socially distancing themselves while they lounge in the park. It’s total anarchy.
zalkota 6y ago
Probably because you live in the wealthiest part. Murders are up 140% in NYC. You didn’t read the actual Washington report.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- Grazester 6y ago
  I live in Brooklyn in a neighborhood with a demographics this administration would call rapist and criminals because they originated south of the border. But there is no anarchy here either. I do acknowledge crime is up in New York but it's not like everyone is running around the streets shooting, looting and burning things down.

ignoramceisblis 6y ago

Because I didn't see a link to it in the article, a brief explaining why the decision was made: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/department-justice-identifies-new-york-city-portland-and-seattle-jurisdictions-permitting https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/department-justice-identifies... If you govern a people and willfully allow them to become endangered through, eg. defunding the police, permitting lawless zones throughout your jurisdiction, and so on, and the end result is innocent lives under your power are harmed or destroyed, then you should be held accountable.

ignoramceisblis 6y ago
Addendum: Minneapolis should also be considered, as their local government took similar actions which resulted in similar - predictable - results: https://hotair.com/archives/ed-morrissey/2020/09/16/minneapolis-city-council-asks-police-chief-police/ https://hotair.com/archives/ed-morrissey/2020/09/16/minneapo... And they ask "where are the police?" after defunding the police.
- iron0013 6y ago
  The police have not been defunded in either Minneapolis or NYC. They have decided—while fully funded—to stop doing their jobs to punish the cities that tried to hold them accountable for their abuses.
  - ignoramceisblis 6y ago
    Correction: And they ask "where are the police?" after unanimously deciding to defund (rather, abolish) the police. So an entire police force must be abolished because of the alleged abuses of a few?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

lr 6y ago

The cities they are targeting probably send a disproportionate amount of tax money to the federal government. I really wish the mayors of these cities, and the governors of these states would start to talk about this imbalance.

tastygreenapple 6y ago
It would be interesting to see the democrats embrace the idea that progressive taxation is unjust and that a person's tax bill should influence the services they're entitled to.
bzb5 6y ago
Define disproportionate. Is it not proportionate to the number of citizens?
- charwalker 6y ago
  No. Some state take in billions more in federal tax dollars then they send in with states like Alabama and Kentucky often at the top of the list. Without California and New York floating most red states they'd be sunk. https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/which-states-are-givers-and-which-are-takers/361668/ https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/which-s... This is why when a red state chooses to lower taxes or otherwise increase their reliance on federal help I laugh at the hypocrisy of the bootstraps party and wonder why my federal taxes, in a blue state without federal support, should go to such irresponsible people.
- eatingCake 6y ago
  The suggestion is that these cities are potentially paying more money to the federal government than they get back in federal aid. The population is irrelevant.
- perl4ever 6y ago
  Urban areas have higher per capita income, and taxes are progressive, so out of proportion to the number of citizens is a possible meaning.

birdyrooster 6y ago

Congress controls the purse, not the President and his increasingly political departments. If they want to change the law, they should vote on a bill first.

TimesOldRoman 6y ago
It seems that the rules and common law interpretations that we are used to no longer apply to the degree that we imagined.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> Congress controls the purse, not the President Congress authorizes spending but the executive actually does it and, in practice, can fail to do it selectively. If not statutorily authorized, this can be illegal, but the fact that it's illegal doesn't mean a whole lot until someone uses that fact to force it to be undone, which can take quite a long time. > If they want to change the law, they should vote on a bill first. What if they just want to arbitrarily exercise power and don’t give a flip about the content of the law, what should they do then?

charwalker 6y ago

Remember, a fascist leader won't say it out loud but they will name antifascists enemies of the state. This is that. If this happens, the House needs to strip funding from DHS for inciting said violence as well as set up systems to cope with ongoing problems instead of fomenting unrest to further the current administrations political goals and lie about protests. Depending on what sources you've read, it may be there is way less 'anarchy' at protests than you think, at least wherever the federal government did not get involved. At first protesters kneeled during the anthem at NFL games and were belittled and straw manned as protesting the flag or America when really protesting police violence against black people. Kneeling was suggested by a US veteran in communication with Kaepernick as a way to respect the flag while making the issue known. As an amateur athlete I kneeled for the anthem at baseball and football games but never even had such a nationalistic show of pride for soccer or other sports. The protesting voices were drowned out by misinformation and character attacks to obscure their true cause. Then as people began paying more attention, more police violence was exposed and protested including the ongoing deaths of black Americans. Just or unjust the police are no executioners and the constitution provides the right to a fair trial. As events piled up in the short term memory of society, more began protesting and marching to make their voices heard in accordance with their first amendment rights. And again they were shut out or shut down, violently, by the same police they were protesting. The movement was counter protested by white nationalist groups appearing to have support or comradely with the police, often while fully armed (second amendment represent) whereas antifascists and BLM groups were usually not. Bad actors from either ideology incited property damage with many exposed and turned over to police in the moment. And then the US government overreached by sending unmarked storm troopers into several US cities, against governor and mayor outcry, to only increase the chaos and foment more violence. And yet Trump has used the violence as a political stick to push his election chances, how shameful and pathetic. This is Trump's all doing in Trump's America. The imagery his attack ads on Biden show is Trump's America (or sometimes events from the Ukraine and Russian jets, seriously look it up it's silly). This is what happens when a movement's voice is shuttered under misinformation by media and the current administration. When the first amendment is shut down and the rival groups (police and white nationalists) are leveraging the second to counter protest, what other options does a civil society have? Vote in the next election when elections security bills have been held up in the GOP senate for months now, reducing our capacity to counter foreign interference like what was documented in 2016 and has, according to all US intel groups, continued unabated by Russia and others? That system last elected someone with a 2.8 million vote minority and gave a minority party (48% of the vote) more than a 10% majority in the House and control of the Senate? Do we trust the DHS and DOJ to do the right thing when they are led by someone likely legally unqualified for the role or someone who has drafted pardons for traitors, continues to interfere in investigations to benefit Trump, and is the same person who is calling protests anarchy? These avenues have been shuttered to the public. From the womens march to the last 6 months of protests, what has changed? Trump was impeached and the GOP senate didn't call a witness at his trial, moving to acquit. Several investigations continue to show gross abuse of power by the Trump administration like firing inspector generals, pushing for unprecedented actions in ongoing criminal cases, and we know most of the Trump family has used private email while in office (as the Trump supporters say "Lock them Up"). When has this administration been held accountable for its actions and fallout for the American people? Never. Protesting was belittled and attacked by federal agents. Voting is potentially compromised as well as the USPS gutted for political reasons. The checks and balances in place for 200+ years have crumbled due to blatant partisan corruption and inaction by the GOP. Trump hasn't learned any lessons other than appoint harder loyalists and deny, deny, deny or counter-sue, counter-sue, counter-sue to slow down oversight by the Democratic House or remaining IGs. What other ways can a It rings true: racism and violence against minorities is so deeply American protesting it comes off as protesting America. It's high time to overhaul the structurally racist and abusive systems in this country like employer tied or private health insurance/care, the abject racial and income disparities in our justice system, and the social safety net programs designed to help Americans that may be abused by bad actors to pay off loyalists. Not to mention the inequality created by the electoral college and existing election systems left open to foreign interference as bills rot in the GOP Senate without action. Don't worry though, McConnell will surely get a SCouTUS vote in with less than 2 months until the 2020 election to accompany the hundreds of other justices he's confirmed for Trump. America has a reckoning in November and it won't be any prettier than the alleged 'anarchy' of these cities. Side note: The impeachment acquittal to PPP loan timeline in and of itself is incredibly damning: 1. Trump's impeachment trial has no witnesses or new evidence with nearly party line vote to acquit. 2. When PPP loans were announced, Trump fired the IG overseeing their disbursement, appointed a loyalist to the role, and buried the data from review. 3. It took subpoenas to release the recipient data and identify fraud, waste, and abuse from the program including 4. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell (who pushed no witnesses and acquittal) and wife Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao (with her own scandal directing funding to KY to help her husband's re-election chances) received millions in loans from the PPP: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/lawmakers-and-transportation-secretarys-family-owned-business-collectively-received-millions-of-dollars-in-ppp-loans-2020-07-07 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/lawmakers-and-transportati... Technically legal and constitutional but incredibly corrupt and dangerous to what is left of US democracy. Trump abused an aid program to pay off loyalists with millions of taxpayer dollars to reimburse those that protected him. Remember this when you see a Trump attack ad showing his own nation burning because he failed to lead. Also laugh at his use of Russian jets and attempt at supporting the military after attacking heroes his entire sad life.

fallingfrog 6y ago

Isn’t congress supposed to write laws, not the executive branch?

dmode 6y ago

The Trump admin has such a gross third world dictatorial bent

fallingfrog 6y ago

I love how anarchists, who are a tiny sliver of the population which has never had any significant political power, are now scapegoats for all the problems created by the very same powerful right wing plutocrats trying to pin it all on anarchists. And it’s crystal clear that they don’t even know what anarchism is. Lovely.