How did the votes fall?

This guy doesn’t boing fish.

No. The abolished it. They didn’t reform it. They abolished it.

But the moment you go around saying “abolish the police”, you’re not talking about reforms, or at least that’s not what most people are going to hear.

Stop it.

Don’t both misinterpret what I said and then put words I didn’t put down into my mouth. If your balls shrink into your chest when you hear “abolish the police”, thats a you problem. Likewise, if you are basing your decision making on “what most people want to hear”, you probably are both a) not an effective strategist, and even further b) not a very good person.

Abolish the police. If you can’t do that, de-fund them. Tip-toeing around the sensitivities of a deeply immoral people isn’t a strategy that gets results. It only gets you halfway to no-where.

billionaires submarine imploding but its lofi

The idea that things devolve into a lawless society because a lack of police is absurdist reductionism.

Firstly, we already live in a lawless society; see any of the actions Trump has taken since January. Its just a matter of “for whom does the law apply?”

Second, and I posted this to your other response, the idea that we can’t “abolish a police department and rebuild it into something that serves its intended purpose” is also absurdist, in at least that we have the counter-factual of it actually happening: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/06/12/camden-policing-reforms-313750

These questions aren’t being asked in a vacuum: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/06/12/camden-policing-reforms-313750. Maybe ask a Camdenite? I’m sure we’ve got a few laying about.

Its not a hypothetical to dissolve a department of a government which is dysfunctional and rebuild it.

1.5 million dollars a year.

I mean, I agree entirely with the “abolish the police” movement. I don’t think policing in the US is recoverable. Its rotten to the core. Its a remnant of slavery. In that sense I’m an abolitionist.

But I also think its a thing that “law enforcement” is a thing that will be expected to happen. So if you are going to abolish policing as we currently know it, you need to replace it with something different.

Since we’re engaging in fantasy, sure.

But I think you’ll find no matter what you do, some version of a person whose role in society is to enforce the laws, a kind of “law enforcement”, emerges.

The properties of that role can vary widely from society to society, but pretty much every society independently comes to the same conclusion, that the role is necessary, once the society determines a common and well structured code of conduct is necessary.

100% abolish the police. They are a corrupt institution which finds their roots in re-enforcing a slave culture. 100% let every prisoner free. The roots of the prison system in the US are the same as the police state.

But countries with no history of slavery have police forces and prison systems. They are an emergent property of large social systems. Society will re-invent the role. We might as well fill the niche in a manner we want, instead of a manner we dont want.

Think about a surgeon. We put peoples lives in their hands. We expect them to be preposterously educated, able to perform extreme tasks under significant duress, to maintain ongoing technical and specialized training, to prove that the training is effective, and they are compensated accordingly. If they fuck up, they can be held personally liable for their fuck ups. There are consequences to the career and its not a role to be taken on lightly.

Hear me out.

We raise the amount we pay cops to 1.5 million dollars a year… but.

No qualified immunity. It no longer exists (guess what? it already doesn’t exist for military service members). Any crimes they commit, the consequences are 10x’d and they are no longer allowed to engage in public service, ever. They can be publicly executed for any crimes beyond misdemeanor. They have to pay for their own equipment. They have to carry liability insurance for any violations of civil rights which might occur in the line of performing their duties.

The minimum qualification is a PhD in constitutional law. They need to be able to run a 6 minute mile, do 100 push ups in 2 minutes, 200 sit ups in 2 minutes, and 80 burpees in 2 minutes. They need to be able to carry 120 lbs for 10 minutes up an incline. They need to be able to recite the US Constitution, the state constitution, and the local city and county charters where they are stationed. They are expected to have advanced knowledge of any and all laws they are expected to be enforcing. They have to undergo annual psychological, physical, technical, and legal reassessments to prove their suitability for the job; these reassessments are maintained as a part of public record.

We 10x the pay and we hire 1/10th the number of cops. It becomes a career path somewhere between than a doctor or a lawyer or an astronaut. Its not something a HS drop out should be able to consider as a career path.

Look, obviously, hyperbole. Or is it?

Just gonna have to keep repeating it. If this is how you proceed through the world; if this is the mentality you approach elections in the US with: you will continue to lose.

Bruh you are the least qualified person on the planet to be commenting on what reality is.

Your “reality” cost the country its Democracy.

Supporting Joe Biden when there was -> 0 <- fucking chance he could win, and it was obvious to anyone with two braincells to rub together; if that was you, Trump is your fucking fault.

And not just supporting him, admonishing ANYONE AND EVERYONE who was pointing out that the strategic approach you were insisting on was a fucking disaster. That’s on you fam. At least your crime is on record.

And if you STILL walking around with this lessor evil mentality, a mentality that WILL lose the next election if imposed in support of a shitty candidate, who stands for nothing, who fights for nothing, who represents nothing but genocide and the defense of a corporate power structure: You WILL lose the next election if you can’t fix yourself.

This is the kind of mindset that resulted in running Biden long enough that we didn’t have a real primary, and Trump winning.

oops.

Heritage Foundation Project 2025 officials are the vanguard of the real fascist movement.

Names. We need names.

It’s not just Biden s team. Its the entire media consent apparatus build around the DNC that was responsible for Biden being around as long as he was.

They’re all culpable.

I mean, Biden is quoted as calling it a campaign promise.

Which is is less binding than a pinky promise, but in 2024, he at least saw that he had made the commitment in 2020. Plenty of people in 2024 then were also incorrectly saying that Biden didn’t make that promise.

Maybe if they center a Cheney even harder next time!

They will have no one to blame but themselves.

Oh come on now. They’ve got you! And me! And the voters! And quite literally everybody but themselves!!

Its interesting right.

When it comes to any attempts to get things done that would make the party more progressive, or more to more aggressively fight, there is always some rule, some policy, the fucking “Parlementarian”, whatever, that blocks them. There are rules! We must follow them, even the ones that contradict the other ones!

But when it comes to stopping progressives, they change, bend, or break their own rules to favor a candidate or policy, its fine. Very legal very cool, the court said so. Justified as “they are private institution and can do whatever they want”. The DNC can rig their primary, its fine. The court said so. See. The rules don’t matter.

The term, I believe, is called illiberalism. Its the facade of democracy; the trapings, the method: but none of its substance. The Democratic party would have it both ways. Rules matter, when it comes to stopping you from having influence on the party, and yet, the rules don’t matter, again, if it results in stopping you from having influence in the party.

The Democratic party is an illiberal party, when it comes to their own governance.