Peaceful protests? They don’t exist in the USA
Let me make one thing clear about my last post.
I do not, in any way, support violent protest, no matter what it is about, no matter who is protesting.
I am not a fan of protests, period. I believe most are pointless and a waste of time. There are far better things for me to do than to march for a cause. I think it would just drive my blood pressure even higher than it is now, which is way too high, and I don’t like crowds unless it’s at a sporting event.
However, the First Amendment of the United States Constitution—the document every lying politician, no matter what end of the spectrum, hides behind—guarnatees the right of assembly.
PEACEFUL assembly.
The First Amendment protected the rights of the 250,000 who descended upon the Washington Monument on 28 August 1963 to hear Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech.
That was a lawful, PEACEFUL, protest.
Same with Woodstock, where over 400,000 descended upon White Lake, New York in August 1969. The residents feared the worst from the hippies. Instead, the hippies only wanted to listen to Joe Cocker, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and many other big-name musicians, and share peace and love.
The Million Man March, organized by noted racist anti-semite Louis Farrakhan in October 1995, had the potential for violence, but stayed peaceful.
Too bad most protests which receive publicity over the last 56 years have been far too violent and far too deadly. This is not an all-inclusive list, but some of the more infamous ones.
Summer 1964–Philadelphia race riots. Fortunately, nobody died, but hundreds of black-owned business were burned to the ground in North Philadelphia, never to return.
August 1965–Watts. The infamous Los Angeles riot began when a black woman was beaten by police, setting off four days and nights of
Jully 1967–Detroit race riots. Forty-three die and hundreds of millions of damages to black neighborhoods of the Motor City, and come perilously close to Tiger Stadium. Tigers left fielder Willie Horton, in full uniform, helps calm the situation.
April 1968–Riots in the wake of MLK assassination, notably in Baltimore, Washington, Louisville, Detroit (again) and Kansas City
August 1968–Anti-war protesters at Democratic National Convention in Chicago, led by the Chicago 7 and the Black Panthers under the direction of Bobby Seale
May 1970–Kent State, where four were killed by National Guard troops. Two (Allison Krause and Jeffrey Miller) were participating in a violent protest, but two others (Sandy Schurer and William Schroeder) were not. Nick Saban and Gary Pinkel, future college football coaching legends, witnessed the riots.
January 7, 1973–Mark James Robert Essex, a dishonorably discharged Navy seaman, kills three police officers and four civilians in a racially-motivated spree at a New Orleans hotel. Essex, a black Kansas native, killed a black police cadet at the New Orleans jail seven days prior, and carjacked a black man outside his residence to get to the hotel. Essex tells black maids “We’re only shooting whites today”. As Essex shoots anything that moves while perched on the roof, black youths gather across Loyola Avenue and scream ‘RIGHT ON’ whenever a shot rings out. Essex is cut down when a Marine helicopter carrying policemen shoot during a nighttime sortie.
November 1979—Ku Klux Klan rally in Greensboro turns violent when five black counter-protesters are murdered by the racists. Less than 36 hours later, the Iran Hostage Crisis began (not that it was a riot, just mentioning it in passing.).
May 1980–The first of several riots in Miami occurs after four white police officers are acquitted in the December 1979 shooting death of black insurance salesman Arthur McDuffie. Over $!00 million in property damage occurs in Liberty City and Overtown. Eighteen die.
December 1982–Violence returns to Overtown after policeman Luis Alvarez shot and killed 20-year old Nevel Johnson Jr. outside an arcade. The violence forces the LSU and Nebraska football teams, in town for the Orange Bowl, to shelter in place at their hotels following morning practice. There are 24,000 empty seats at the game, won by Nebraska 21-20.
January 1989–In the days leading up to Super Bowl XXIII, Overtown decends into chaos yet again after Officer William Lozano shoots and kills Clement Lloyd, who was attempting to flee on a motorcyle. Lloyd’s passenger also dies when the two-wheeler crashes. The riots give the city a black eye as it prepares to host its first Super Bowl in 10 years. Fortunately, the Dolphins’ 1987 move to the Dade-Broward County line in what is now Miami Gardens keeps the rioters far away from more trouble for the NFL. Had the game been scheduled for the Orange Bowl, there would have been HUGE problems.
August 1991–Blacks attack Orthodox Jews in the Crown Heights neighborhood of New York after two immigrants from Guyana are struck by a motorcade led by a prominent rabbi.
April 1992—Los Angeles riots protesting acquittal of four LAPD officers who beat Rodney King in 1991. Trucker Reginald Denny beaten nearly to death. The area near the Los Angeles Coliseum and the University of Southern California is mostly burned to the ground, resulting in over $1 billion in damages.
The last 10 years has seen a proliferation of violent riots, from the Occupy Movement to those after police-related deaths (Eric Garner in NYC, Michael Brown in Ferguson, Freddie Gray in Baltimore), the Charlottesville riot involving white supremacists, Antifa, this summer’s riots following the deaths of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd (among others), and now this.
I shudder to think what will happen on Inauguration Day. Joe Biden should demand the ceremony take place inside the Capitol, either in the rotunda, or better yet, in the House chamber. The only people who should be present are the families of Biden and Kamala Harris, the House, the Senate and former presidents Carter, Bush and Obama (Trump should be banned). The rest of us can watch on TV.
Or maybe he should go to a secure location, take the oath, then go straight to the White House and deliver his inaugural address from the Oval Office.
The public must be banned from this ceremony. Sadly, a few psychotic assholes have ruined it for the rest of us.
Besides, this is a good year to ban the public. Something called COVID-19 still rampaging.
The United States of America is SICK. Both sides of the spectrum have a serious problem.
Compromise is the new “C” curse word, replacing the four-letter one which I will not repeat. There is no middle ground; it’s 100 percent good or 100 percent evil.
Biden was long considered a moderate when he represented Delaware in the Senate. Many left-wing groups hated him, never more so than when women’s groups felt he did not do enough to support Anita Hill during the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings in 1991. They were outraged Biden basically twiddled his thumbs while Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, then a Republican, tore into Hill.
Speaking of Specter, he was the last of the Rockefeller Republicans who often had the guts to vote against his party when it didn’t suit the interests of the citizens of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. He was also a tough-on-crime prosecutor in Philadelphia who teamed with Mayor Frank Rizzo to make the city safe during the 1970s.
Specter, who grew up in my current town of Russell, is sorely missed in the Senate.
I left my 2020 presidential ballot blank. I voted for nobody. I also did not vote for Trump in 2016. Before that, I voted for Republican candidates in every major election in Louisiana and Kansas.
I regret many of those votes. Woody Jenkins (US Senate from Louisiana, 1996) is one of those Bible thumpers I can’t stand. Bobby Jindal (Louisiana Governor, 2003–although he lost) proved to be an incompetent boob who cut government services to the bone and decimated the state’s tax base. Jim Barnett (Kansas Governor, 2006) was grossly incompetent and had no business running for the state’s highest office. Kris Kobach (Kansas Secretary of State, 2010 and 2014) is a xenophobic piece of shit whose narcissism rivals Trump’s. Tim Huelskamp (US House from KS-01, 2010-16) was so far right John Boehner and Paul Ryan could not work with him. Roger Marshall (US House from KS-01, 2018; US Senate from Kansas, 2020) proved what a fraud he is by refusing to certify Biden’s election.
Jindal was such a fucking embarrassment that I was glad not to be living in my native state when he was governor. His three immediate predecessors—Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, Mike Foster and Edwin Edwards—all won support from all ends of the spectrum by being pragmatic. Sure, Edwards went to federal prison for racketeering, but he didn’t screw the state the way Jindal did.
Marshall ensured I won’t be voting for him in 2026. Fucking turd.
I’ve had it with talking about this shit. Excuse me while I run to the toilet to vomit.
Posted on 2021-01-07, in Elections, History, Politics and tagged 2020 United States presidential election, civil unrest, Donald Trump, Joe Biden. Bookmark the permalink. Leave a comment.
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