Summations Only

Ars TechnicaThe US was working with Chinese researchers - in China - to investigate coronaviruses. The title of the project: Understanding the risk of bat coronavirus emergence,. With the current epidemic still ongoing this research would seem to be of considerable value.Not to the Trump regime.The research funding was abruptly cancelled in April this year, on orders from the White House. No reason given.Peter Daszak, President of EcoHealth, the company organising the research commented: Which is quite likely true. The Chinese government could pick up the tab for the Chinese researchers. And if they do, can the US count on seeing the results? Doubtless some would be published in the scientific literature but the Chinese government would have access that the US government would not.

What is wrong with opposing fascism?

When Hurricane Dorian neared the US Trump incorrectly claimed that Alabama was likely to be hit. Strangely an unsigned tweet from the Birmingham National Weather Service supported Trump.It’s turned out that the tweet was ordered by the Commerce Department who decided that covering for Trump was more important than accurate weather warnings. And of course Trump later appeared with a map altered with a sharpie to agree with his mistake.The full report on what happened was due to be released on Monday, but the Commerce Department are demanding redactions and digging their heels in to delay the report as much as they can.See this on Ars TechnicaA summary that was released on Monday - with redactions. The conclusions - quoted by Ars Technica are: So, under Trump, the President’s errors are a PR problem that must be handled by pretending that he’s right. At least where the Commerce Department is involved.I wonder how much of that applies to Government messaging regarding the coronavirus pandemic, and how many American lives it’s cost.

And despite the Department of Commerce refusing to cooperate, the report is out. here (pdf)Reading between the lines it seems that Trump thought that the Birmingham office deliberately contradicted him instead of just doing their jobs. They had a lot of people phoning in fearing a hurricane, and it wasn’t coming. So they put it out in a tweet, not realising that Trump was the cause of the false concerns. It seems that Trump was really pissed off about it even though he was wrong - and even his recent briefings hadn’t mentioned any significant risk to Alabama.The criticism of them was justified by the fact that a small part of Alabama had a small chance of high winds - nothing really bad, just the edge of the high winds that accompany the storm. So they were technically wrong but not in a way that actually mattered. Alabama was not going to be hit, and even in the worst case a small part of Alabama would only have had a windy day.But that’s the message. Government employees are required to agree with Trump even when he is wrong. Even when it comes to warning people of disasters that aren’t coming. But that’s what you get when you put someone like Trump in the White House.

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Sitting on the sidelines allowing the Government employees to do their job.

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So much for defending the Constitution.

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Since when is it an abuse of power to protect Federal Buildings from being destroyed by a mob determined to destroy the Federal buildings in Portland?

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Don’t be silly. The justification for their presence is graffiti on Federal buildings - a little short of destruction, don’t you think? And they are snatching peaceful protestors off the streets.Edited by PaulK, : No reason given.

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You really would not want a militia protecting the buildings in Portland would you?

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At least you agree that the militia are lying hypocrites who actually want a tyranny. I don’t want them involved but if they lived up to their rhetoric they should certainly be objecting to the Federal government’s actions.

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Defacing a Federal Building is a felony. injuring a federal official is a felony and several have permanent eye damage due to attacks by the rioters. One officer was hit in the head with a sledge hammer that was being used to try and break down the door.

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Then why is the justification for the deployment a series of graffiti attacks?And the eye injuries I hear about are those inflicted on innocent people by police firing baton rounds at their heads.

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So you paint it any way you want too. To me it is total anarchy and should be brought to an end with every rioter being locked up for a long time. No one has any right to destroy someone else's property in Portland alone over 23 million dollars worth of damage has been done to private property and local government owned taxpayers property.

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Even if that were true - and I very much doubt it, how is it an excuse for picking up innocent people off of the street? In violation of the Constitution?

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The only one's who have been arrested is those who have committed felonies.

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That is certainly untrue. Edited by AdminPhat, : fixed broken quote

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when did christians stop believing we're all sinners?

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When did they change their minds and decide that the President’s character didn’t matter? Oh, right. That would be when they decided to support Trump.

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charity covers a multitude of sins

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Whose charity? Maybe it’s time to point out that the Trump Foundation was poorly administered and the funds misused (for Trump’s convenience).

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trump has done more for prolife than any US President.

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Well great if you’re a single-issue voter who doesn’t care about anything else. But to be honest abortion is not a black-and-white issue. Hence the misleading pro-life label, rather than the accurate anti-abortion. Maybe if Ireland had been less strict Savita Halappanavar would still be alive.

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he has also publicly acknowledged the greatness of JPII.

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Trump will talk people up and tear them down depending on whatever is most useful to him. It’s not really meaningful.

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he may not be a good person, but few rarely are.

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He’s a pretty terrible person.

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in the ways that count, he has come through for the religious right.

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for that he has earned my respect.

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So it’s all about the unprincipled pursuit of political power. How Christian.

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Why would I or any other law abiding citizen have a problem with Federal Employees doing their job? That is what we pay them a salary to do.

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It is? I thought Federal employers were meant to follow the Constitution.

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Painting graffiti on Federal buildings and beating on them with a sledge hammer is defacing the property and is a felony.

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Graffiti is hardly a major offence that calls for a heavy deployment of additional men, let alone kidnapping people off the streets or tear-gassing peaceful protestors.

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Why would police be involved when we are talking about Federal Building being attacked by mobs of people. Who were throwing bottles of urine and other liquids that were hitting Federal employees and causing the damage I mentioned.

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Because that’s what they’re paid for?

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Why would you doubt it? You can see the damage on TV.

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I don’t watch much TV. Besides it gets less coverage over here.

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Lets just look at the law that controls the actions of the Federal Employees guarding the Federal Courthouse in Portland.

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Homeland Security Act of 2002.40 U>SD> code 1315 Law enforcement authority of homeland security for protection of Public Property.
(c) make arrests without a warrant for any offense against the United States commited in the presence of the officer or agent or for any felony under the laws of the United States if the officer or agent has grounds to reasonaglely believe that the person to be arrested has committed or is committing a felony.

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And they’ve been breaking that by arresting people without any such grounds.Like Mark Pettibone

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Please explain what you are talking about.

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Picking people off the streets without reason to think they’ve committed a crime is illegal under the Fourth Amendment.

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It would not take much graffiti to cause a repair bill to exceed $100 dollars. If you were to cause $100 damage to a Federal building you could be fined up to $250,000 and sentenced to 10 years in Federal prison. I don't call that minor and I did not pass the law that carries those types of penalty.

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So, the law is ridiculously harsh which justifies going even further. That’s absurd.

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But the Portland Police Force is not employees of the Federal Government neither are they the ones who are protecting the Federal Courthouse in Portland.

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But the police would normally do that job, wouldn’t they?

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There is a lot of wiggle room in reasonably belief.

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But not enough. Wanting to question somebody - who was not breaking the law - doesn’t justify bundling them into an unmarked van and taking them away without explanation. And that is exactly what happened to Mark Pettibone.

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i keep forgetting that the FSM idiots around here are the arbiters of what is christian

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Then perhaps you’d like to explain why the unprincipled pursuit of political power is Christian.

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you want to be us yet you can't even see us

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I’d rather be a Christian than be you.

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blind deaf dumb

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You wish,

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i'm telling the FSM you said you want to be a Christian, idiot. i guess you don't understand american politics.

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Well, you seem determined to drag down the level of discourse here. But it’s hardly the first example of that.

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trump is the only us president in recent times besides maybe w bush who was a coward so it doesn't matter, whose main motivation isn't power.

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I guess that greed and egotism might come before power, but I don’t think either are good. Trump is also more power-hungry than most.

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his brain is a little twitter-addled, but god doesn't choose perfect people to lead.

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Boasting about passing a cognitive test designed to detect dementia - and claiming that it was difficult suggests that there is something wrong with his brain.But all the lying he does is something else.Come on, do you worship Trump as the anti-Christ or do you just think he’s paving the way ?

Why do you people think you can get away with pretending to be Christian?Your sheer nastiness undermines the pretence every time.

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They do in most of the Cities except where they are not supported by the city officials to uphold law and order.

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I think that’s just an excuse.

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You do notice that there are just a few cities that are having the problems of rioting. Which are controlled by liberals and have been for the past 30+ years.

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Which means that the inhabitants should be denied their civil rights?

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It depends on what state you are in as to what is required of authorities as to detaining a person

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And in every state you can’t arrest someone just because you think they might know something.

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In most states a person can be detained for 48hrs, 72hrs, and up to 33 days in some states, without being charged with a crime.

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If they are suspected of a crime. People who aren’t suspects can’t be held.

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So it might be good to find out where you are and what laws apply to what you are doing or contemplating on doing before participating in any event that could get you detained.

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Indeed, so you can contest illegal detention.

Oh, and look. Right-wing agitators are behind at least some of the violence
BBCOn May 27, not long after the death of George Floyd: And now:

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For fucks sake, the Federal Protective Service's only real job is to protect is to protect federal assets.

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I think you’ll find that it is the DHS that is sending agents in.But protecting federal assets does not extend to picking people - people who are not suspected of any crime - off the streets and bundling them into vans without telling them where they are going. But they did that to Mark Pettibone.

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You mean the "peaceful protesters" barricade federal police officers in a building after intentionally setting it on fire to kill them? Or are you referring to the man who ambushed federal police with a hammer?

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I mean peaceful protestors of course.

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You, along with other lefty cohorts, are obfuscating and conflating to muddy the waters -- to blur the lines of distinction between a legitimate protest from a riot

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Seems that’s exactly what you are trying to do. There are rioters and there are peaceful protestors. And both sorts can get tear gassed, just like people standing peacefully, away from any violence can be intentionally shot with baton rounds.Really, I am reminded of the homeless man arrested for assaulting a cop’s fist with his face.