USA - Land of Freedom and Democracy

I see that we agree on this, dear Mick! Fredrik

quote:

Originally posted by Don Atkinson:

Wake-up call

Looks like many of you guys need to wake up.

You seem to expect that everybody and every nation-state should be the personification of absolute perfection - forever.

Get real - It ain't like that and it never will be.

Don

Nice one! I guess such advice could be applied to one's view of any government's actions in any era and any place.

Maybe you forget the hanging, drawing and quartering in England's fine history? The Star Chamber "trials"? The list goes on...

We've gotten to where we are (yes, "we" who live in free democracies) and we're keeping what we've got only through vigilance. If you think voting every few years is vigilance, well, perhaps you need the wake-up call...

Deane

yes - there seem to be autonomic forces that will strip freedom from our grip it if is loosely held, in every country and in every era.

quote:

Originally posted by Deane F:


We've gotten to where we are (yes, "we" who live in free democracies) and we're keeping what we've got only through vigilance. If you think voting every few years is vigilance, well, perhaps you need the wake-up call...

Deane

quote:

Originally posted by fidelio:
yes - there seem to be autonomic forces that will strip freedom from our grip it if is loosely held, in every country and in every era.

No one could possibly argue with such a broad statements, but what does freedom have to do with police officers using a modicum of force to control a crowd that was resorting to taunting and had clearly gone beyond the limits of peaceful ?

If I were to go up to a cop and start yelling insults and screaming my head off, could I not be arrested for disturbing the peace ? The demonstrators ( a minority of them granted) used their superiority in numbers to do just that. At some point law enforcement needs to be given some slack in oder to do their job.

When we are talking about democracy, we are talking about a basic form and structure of the government (free elections, Civil rights) it would then just be a question of how those basic principles are applied in daily life.



BB

bb,

i think the initial point of the thread, or one of them, was that the lapd was busting up a bunch of news reporters in a park. according to chief bratton (head of lapd, who stated his own people had gone over the line) and the fbi, there is to be an investigation. do you think that is a legitimate exercise of police power, riot police pushing around the news media, and shooting over 200 rubber bullets at an almost completely mexican and defensleless crowd? if you do, you are even more a police apologist than bratton.

another point, which no one really got into, was that rudy guliani is a scumbag. i guess that is not really worth arguing over. seems to be a minimum qualification for u.s. president.

Well said Fidelio. I agree entirely.

Fidelio, Acad,

I think the thread title is:' America, Land of Freedom and Democracy'. Said in an ironic tone.

My point is that in a democracy we need to strike a balance. If the rule of law and order are not maintained then freedom does not mean anything, it can be taken away by someone with a gun, a small group with baseball bats or an angry mob. What good are freedom and democracy if someone can enter you home, pull a gun to your head, assault your wife and kids ect..

I am not a police apologist. The cheif of LAPD has to say what he has to say for political reasons.

Suppose me and some friends were to enter Mexico illegally, protest in downtown Mexico City and taunt the local police demanding our rights. We would be summarily beaten, thrown in jail and the key thrown away. It could all be captured in Cinema Scope, and not a word of protest from the likes of you or Acad.

I don't suppose Acad remembers the riots at the 68' Chicago Democratic Convention, now there was a clear cut case of police brutality. Were we devoid of our democracy then ? No. Did we survive with our rights intact ? Yes.
A little perspective here, please.



BB

BB

Acad just moans .. simple as that.

Regards

Mick

quote:

Originally posted by Big Brother:
Fidelio, Acad,

I think the thread title is:' America, Land of Freedom and Democracy'. Said in an ironic tone.

My point is that in a democracy we need to strike a balance. If the rule of law and order are not maintained then freedom does not mean anything, it can be taken away by someone with a gun, a small group with baseball bats or an angry mob.

BB,

This was a legal demonstration not a riot - where is the police video of an angry baseball bat wielding mob? To legally demonstrate is a precious right in a democracy and it must be treasured. This was a legal demonstration planned weeks in advance with full permissions from the police and City Hall. It was organised in part as a family day out. I am not pointing out a lack of perfection such as one policeman shoving one demonstrator I am talking about Nazi tactics of an armed and vicious police force. How many more of your civil rights have to be eroded before you wake up?

Police Attack May Day Demonstration.

CNN - Video

More video evidence

quote:

Originally posted by Mick Parry:
BB

Acad just moans .. simple as that.

Regards

Mick

Have another whiskey and go and drool over your Margaret Thatcher photo album. You are out of your depth here as elsewhere.

quote:

Originally posted by acad tsunami:
I am talking about Nazi tactics of an armed and vicious police

....Oh...for gods' sakes...here we go with the Nazi thing again (!!)


I'll have to wait to see the clips, since I don't have high speed at home. No doubt the clips are taken out of context, i.e. we only see the violence, not what preceded and precipitated it.


BB

Be fair, BB, they do wear black.

i live in and grew up in l.a. and the general consensus has been, at least as far as i can determine, that the issue w/ the cops here has alway been that they are low in numerical ratio to the citizenry. and their strategy has all along been one of intimidation, especially of minorities, to offset this disparity and control the population. growing up, my friends and i WERE terrified of them, as they had a reputation for taking youth aside and kicking the s**t out of them, the only law being broken being federal ones against police brutality. look at the two riots. look at the corruption cases. the only modern difference is that there is now a bar that specializes in such cases, which the city of l.a. therefore pays out millions every year in settling. the events in the park last week are another symptom of this syndrome. i don't know if i would call it "nazi." more its own thing; but the point is, it is not a symptom of a free and happy society, to have your own police force assaulting the citzenry at large. just my pov as a local.

in response to bb, who states that chief bratton has to state that his people were in the wrong for political reasons: i challenge you to come on down to hollywood, ride around until the cops stop you, and then post here about the experience. just want to be hospitiable.

quote:

Have another whiskey and go and drool over your Margaret Thatcher photo album. You are out of your depth here as elsewhere.

acad

If a cheap little quip like that is the best you can manage, then you may as well do now, what you will probably do soon ....top yourself.
You must be incredibly depressed about the state of the world as you never stop moaning.

You are just a whinging git. If you genuinely feel strongly about these issues, do something about it and join a political party that represents your views.

Parry,

Moaning like your moan about US immigration officials? You are very quick to moan about what affects you and yours and the last to speak up against those that harm others. I am not even remotely depressed and neither do I need whiskey in my porridge in the morning in order to face the world, unlike you. I rarely drink and when I do it is only social, never alone. You have yet to make a positive contribution to this thread.

(Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images)

American dollars spent bringing democracy to Iraq will hit $456 billion dollars in September.

So what does $456 billion dollars buy?

Need more perspective?
According to World Bank estimates, $54 billion a year would eliminate starvation and malnutrition globally by 2015, while $30 billion would provide a year of primary education for every child on Earth.

At the upper range of those estimates, the $456 billion cost of the war could have fed and educated the world's poor for five and a half years.


Beano off topic but where is the USS Nimitz?

quote:

Beano off topic but where is the USS Nimitz?

Try here. Indian Ocean at the moment...

acad

Yes I do moan about American immigration officials because they have less charm than you. Also I do something about it, I boycott the place, if more of us did that, things would improve.

Finally if you honestly think that your incessant whinging is a "contribution" to this forum, then you are up with the faries.

You are a whinger, a miserable whinger and you are depressing.

Go and cheer yourself up.

Regards

Mick

Mmmm...steaming towards the Persian Gulf then, probably to join the two battle carriers that are already in the region.

Can't beat a bit of good old 'gun boat' diplomacy to support all options on the the table, as the administration likes to say.

Beano

Gun boats worked for us and our Empire lasted a lot longer than the yanks ever will...

quote:

Originally posted by Melnobone:
Gun boats worked for us and our Empire lasted a lot longer than the yanks ever will...

Thanks a lot.... PAL-O-MINE !!


Now I want every one on this ere little Naim forum to gather round case' we're gong to sing a little song, and the title of this song is :'Thank You America.'


Thank You America for saving all of Europe from Nazi tyranny

Thank for Lend Lease and the Marshall Plan which helped us rebuild all of Western Europe and made it the envy of ALL the world.

Thank you for keeping our democracy safe so's we don't have to speak Russian and grandma doesn't have to spend her retirement working on a collective farm.


Thank you for keeping me from wearing a khaki uniform with a red star sewn on the pocket and working in a coal mine in the Urals !!


But most of all America we thank you for letting us keep our culture customs and language as we want and not imposing yours on ours.

Oh, and by the way, thank you for inventing rock and roll, without which, life as we know it would be impossible


END SONG


Now ! Was that so hard ???


You know, we could have just done a Roman on your ass and enslaved the lot of you when we had the bomb after WW2.

Right now I could take the three prettiest of your wives. Two of them would be fanning me Persian style and the third feeding Big Bro grapes, if you get my drift.

Oh, and Parry, he'd be out back working on one of my seven Porche's.



BB

Thank you New Mexico for banning cock fighting from June 15 2007.

So you better get one final dash down to Socorro to get the last few fights in <g>

Thanks.

For being late for both World Wars.

Thanks.

For escalating the arms race after WW2 and keeping it going for 50 years.

Thanks.

For funding the IRA terrorist campaign for 40 years.

Thanks.

For convincing Blair to help you out in Iraq and getting more of our citizens killed.

Thanks

For funding Israel and generating unrest and disquiet in the Middle east for the last 50 years.

I enjoy the irony that you have German cars...