Oh c’mon, I’m reasonably sure the windmills were standing in place, minding their own business. The wide arm movements were just because, hey, they’re Spanish! They can’t talk without moving their arms!
Sorry, couldn’t get back to this sooner.
Let’s start with my conviction that having the President actively lie to the public about seven times a day is in itself a bad thing. Shocking, I know. I am seriously bothered by this and can’t understand why half the country is not. The loss of trust in the government is easily the deepest problem in modern American politics. It’s not even a right/left issue. Look at all the people on the Dope who keep posting that “they’re all the same” and therefore none of them are worth voting for. The loss of trust has deep roots and I think it goes all the way back to WWII, when the atomic bomb shocked everyone. People knew the government had wartime secrets but this shook people. What else could it be hiding? (The next answer was flying saucers. Silliness, but extremely revealing in hindsight.) As I said earlier, the knowledge that Johnson and Nixon lied repeatedly to our faces about Vietnam created fissures in what used to be called the social fabric. All the cumulative lies by Presidents (Reagan and the contras - anybody remember that?) disengage the public from what used to be called civic responsibilities. The phrase itself now quaint or naive. And the legacy of telling minorities they have responsibilities but no rights makes that hill even steeper to climb. A non-engaged, possibly antithetical, and completely individualistic and selfish polity has potential for harms, not just big ones but small, daily abuses. Problems do not get solved by the non-involved. They get pushed down the road or taken advantage of by those with power.
And we have huge problems facing us. The war on the media is not merely a war against reporting he doesn’t want to hear. It’s a war on facts, a war on expertise, a war on science, a war on objectivity. The President’s matter-of-fact lying puts him in the position of owning the only truth on all subjects. No president has ever done that. It makes bipartisanism a laughable relic of the past.
Those huge problems, like global climate change, are not confined to America. I am a globalist - in the way I am a gravityist. Have you looked at the past couple of decades? The world is one large interconnected economic and sociopolitical system. That creates winners and losers - because everything does. Trump lies about the world, making it a place too dangerous and anti-American for us to engage with it. That’s hypocritical for someone whose companies are expanding all over the world and who advocates huge increases in the military budget, but that anti-world attitude also makes the world more dangerous for Americans, not less.
And far worse if you’re a Muslim in America. The revelation that natural-born American citizens are being targeted because their names seem Muslim (picking on Muhammad Ali Jr. seems to be the tip of that iceberg) should give everyone pause. The court-banned Muslim ban was built out of lies about the basic nature of Islam and its adherents. Giving power and approbation to anti-Muslims will increase the already considerable outrages.
Everybody who looks or sounds different needs to take heed. The “get out of my country” shooter is hopefully an aberration but is merely expressing what he’s hearing from the top.
Bringing the alt-right into the administration gives all groups who see America as “their” country the freedom to act out those impulses. Can it possibly be coincidence that the huge assault of bomb threats to Jewish organizations started near simultaneously with Trump’s inauguration? What will happen now that Trump has revoked federal protections on transgendered people? Which non Straight White Christian group is next?
I can go on. Really. I can. Nobody wants that. But notice that I’ve avoided direct mention of policies. Trump is dangerous because of his personality. Everything else stems from that. The policies will of course be abysmal and destructive. But they may actually be lesser evils to the destruction of the social fabric that seems inevitable.
My only point in mentioning Box is that rumors of muslim enclaves being dangerous to westerners is not something that Trump pulled out of his ass. It may be something that other right-wingers have pulled out of their ass, and Trump likes the taste of shit. As I said, given Box’s attitudes that I glean from his books, I would not be surprised if his sources of information include the alt-right loonies and sovereign citizens.
I heard the incidents were in the NO-GO zone in Sweden, were police will not enter. How does a country openly say they wont go patrol for safety. I know its bad because Sweden is really open as a country both geographically and as a nation. I really wanted to travel to Sweden to see Chieron Studios… or maybe Ill just stay here.
That No-Go Zone bullshit has been debunked countless times.
How The Myth Of Lawless “No-Go Zones” In Sweden Took Hold Among Right-Wing Media
Maybe that would be best. Especially since AFAICT Cheiron Studios in Stockholm has been closed for sixteen years.
Sounds like Cheiron Studios is a no-go zone. Sad.
Lots of that in Europe and Latin America, as well. It’s one of the main triggers behind all those populists.
I refuse to allow cool and subtle Oriental board games in my house! That’s right, its a no-Go zone!
Sweden has now reinstituted compulsory military service for young people. Apparently this is to improve Sweden’s ability to deal with unwanted and illegal immigrants crossing their border…like, say, Russian troops.