Protests close to home

[Deke Thornton]

A note based on my many years as an LEO, most of the troublemakers at protests are anarchists looking for a way to stir things up. They typically don’t have a dog in the fight, their just show up looking to create mayhem and violence.

There are also political agitators looking to start trouble to discredit the protests. Around here, a certain right wing group infiltrated the George Floyd protests in 2020 and started smashing the windows of business to provoke the police to shut the protests down.

With that said, many protesters are very much paid to show up. Back in 2020-2021, the protesters showed up to our small town, and a few were throwing frozen water bottles at the locals who were counter-protesting. Arrests were made, and not one arrestee was from our area. A majority were paid to travel and protest in our town. Not speculation, just a fact.

Where do I sign up for that? I keep hearing about people being paid to show up at these things, but no one ever offered me anything!

 

[Jäger1]

Exactly. These words lead to violence, and that violence is targeted at Democrats. Full stop.

Yep... at least two attempts to assassinate Trump (that we know of) in the last year, and his murder prevented by protecting officers engaging the assassin with gunfire. Clearly, Trump was the DNC candidate running for the presidency - full stop.

The stalker arrested while slinking up to Justice Kavanaugh's house with the intent to murder him because of the Dobbs decision? Justice Kavanaugh is clearly seen by Democrats as a fellow Democrat. Full stop (of course).

The assault on Senator Rand Paul that put him in hospital with potentially life threatening injuries? Well...it's obvious: Rand Paul is obviously a DNC senator. Full stop...

And those ICE agents in Los Angeles that the violent street thugs are attempting to murder with Molotov Cocktails and other weapons in their "mostly peaceful protests" (now where did we hear THAT before and from whom)? Well, obviously, they're Democrats obeying a DNC president's order that they begin enforcing existing immigration and other laws again.

Full stop... of course.

This is the first I've heard of this murder - as presented here as apparently a targeted political murder. The first thing that comes to mind is the Bernie Sanders political staffer that attempted the carefully planned and targeted mass murder of several dozen GOP Congressmen gathered for a ball practice.

An unsuccessful attempt thanks to the would-be mass murderer not knowing that those two people in civilian clothing that looked like spectators were actually a protective detail - but Steve Scalise came very close to dying from the gunshot wounds he fired before the murderer was shot dead.

Remember the good ol' days when Democrats rushed to say that particular political mass murder assassination attempt couldn't be associated with political rhetoric, with the murderer screaming as he repeated the rhetoric of Sanders during the election: You're going to kill people cancelling Obamacare!!!

Those were good times, huh!

Nothing To See Here, Please Believe Us, Don't Believe Your Lying Eyes™

 

[Jäger1]

Adding to ignore list.

You have no idea how I am crushed by that... you were the only reason I'm a member here!

Bluesky should be a comfortable and welcoming environment!

 

[ladder13]

Yep... at least two attempts to assassinate Trump (that we know of) in the last year, and his murder prevented by protecting officers engaging the assassin with gunfire. Clearly, Trump was a Democrat running for the presidency - full stop.

The stalker arrested while slinking up to Justice Kavanaugh's house with the intent to murder him because of the Dobbs decision? Justice Kavanaugh is clearly seen by Democrats as a fellow Democrat. Full stop (of course).

The assault on Senator Rand Paul that put him in hospital with potentially life threatening injuries? Well...it's obvious: Rand Paul is obviously a Democrat. Full stop...

And those ICE agents in Los Angeles that the Democrats violent street thugs are attempting to murder with Molotov Cocktails and other weapons? Well, obviously, they're Democrats obeying a Democrat president's order that they begin enforcing existing immigration and other laws again.

Full stop... of course.

This is the first I've heard of this murder - as presented as a targeted political murder. The first thing that comes to mind is the Bernie Sanders political staffer that attempted the carefully targeted mass murder of several dozen Republican Congressmen gathered for a ball practice.

An unsuccessful attempt thanks to the would-be mass murderer not knowing that those two people in civilian clothing that looked like spectators were actually a protective detail - but Steve Scalise came very close to dying from the gunshot wounds he fired before the murderer was shot dead.

Remember the good ol' days when Democrats rushed to say that particular political mass murder assassination attempt couldn't be associated with political rhetoric, with the murderer screaming as he repeated the rhetoric of Sanders during the election: You're going to kill people cancelling Obamacare!!!

Those were good times, huh!

Nothing To See Here, Please Believe Us, Don't Believe Your Lying Eyes™

Stop with the facts already.

 

[oldcorps76]

We ain’t all MAGAs here, brother. Way I see it, the 2A exists to empower the people of the United States against all enemies of the USA and the Constitution, foreign and domestic, and I don’t think I’m particularly liable to be threatened by soy-boy hippy peace protesters in this day and age. Way, way more concerned about khaki-uniformed goons from right-wing “militias” riding en masse in uhauls, lifted flag-festooned pickup truck convoys trying to crowd-surf Powerstrokes, and those weird masked dudes in the habit of snatching people off the streets into unmarked vehicles in 2025 than I am about someone holding a Mexican flag.

The problem is, your ostensible side of the political fence has hated the Constitution and has wanted to make it into a rubber doormat for decades. A metric ton of opinions advocating trashing or ignoring the Constitution, by leftist academics more wedded to the COMINTERN Trotskyism brought by their Red Zayde's from the Pale and Frankfurt to CCNY and Columbia in 1930, than to anything identifiable as culturally or jusisprudentially American, is quite available to a net search. Knock yourself out.

But now that Trump is in office, it's "oh, our sacred Constitution."

Kinda like thinly-veiled death threats against SCOTUS justices by sitting Senators and actual thwarted attacks against Justice Kennedy. But now, "oh, the Rule of Law!"

The "masked dudes" were snatching other masked dudes - who today are well-organized and funded by NGO's in turn funded by You-Know-Who (Soros, Hansjorg Wyss, cough) - trying to set fire to Federal buildings to which they had barred the doors, with people inside.

Pretty xtreme, that.

You'll be late for your "No Kings!" (just a Central Committee, Comrade) mostly peaceful rally. Run along now. Make sure you pick up your cash and properly navigate to the bricks, before they're gone.

 

[Jäger1]

This can turn into another Bud Light or Target lesson for Walmart.

For myself, I'm not going to conflate Walmart as a business, with the actions of how this wench chooses to spend her personal wealth her father left her or the dividends she is paid on the shares he left her. And I'm of a mindset that feels contempt at what has become "Juneteenth" posted on business walls.

I also do not object to actual peaceful protest, even to advocate for a political party advancing cultural, economic, and political Marxism or demands that previous presidents' none-enforcement of existing immigration law be allowed to continue in order to protect the criminal Illegal Aliens he invited and allowed into this country.

When businesses, big or small, start endorsing positions I do not agree with, whether opposing the enforcement of existing laws or movements saying little kids must have the right to decide whether they want to be surgically or chemically mutilated in hopes of being the other sex...

That's when I decide I will not be spending money there and I may even go so far as my own First Amendment acts of free speech in opposition to name and shame those companies.

Nor will I need a political party, a politician, or an organization to inform me of what I should find offensive or wrong and what my response to that should be.

The primary issue that started this was not legitimate First Amendment assembly and free speech, it was the RIOTING.

There have been legitimate, peaceful, First Amendment protests and speech since Trump took office. With few exceptions that I would consider having some potential legitimacy, most have been either too false, too stupid, or too hypocritical to pay any attention to.

But the peaceful ones were legitimate, non violent, did not threaten or harm other individuals or their property. As such, I believe such activity that is legitimate First Amendment activity should be supported, even when I thing the message is wrong, stupid, or even deceitful.

If disagree strongly enough with their law abiding First Amendment activity, then I will do as they do: take some of my time to protest, but in opposition to the messaging they're attempting to sell.

 

[oldcorps76]

I've been to numerous protests, and I'm going to the one tomorrow. NO ONE gets paid. NO ONE. That's a fact.
I'm a Democrat who comes from the working class. My dad didn't graduate HS, but my mom did. He worked his ass off his entire life. So, that makes me a libard, right? I worked my own ass off to become a lawyer, now retired.
I believe in the 2nd A, the rule of law, accountability, as small of a government as possible, and the lowest amount of taxes. I also recognize that taxes are essential to ensure that people aren't dying in the streets, the poor aren't starving to death, that first responders respond, and our bridges don't collapse.
I was born right after WWII. We had a great economy. The middle class was thriving. My dad could buy a house, and my mom could stay home and raise us. Millionaires were taxed at 91%. They survived just fine, and our nation's wealth was shared much more equitably. There were plenty of jobs at decent salaries. No one had to depend on the so-called rich job creators to provide jobs, proving that trickle down economics has always been a fraud. Everything was hunky dory.
Then came Vietnam. It's been downhill from there. Since Reagan, wealth in this country shifted to the rich and jobs and salaries flatlined. Today, our wealth gap is equal to Russia's. No democracy can survive that disparity. Largely because of Supreme Court decisions, money has corrupted our political system. Today's level of corruption is out of this world, for all to see. The Constitution's emoluments clause has been rendered meaningless as has been the separation of powers designed by our Founders to protect us from tyrants.
If you can't see what's happening, you've been living on another planet. The bottom line is that WE ARE ALL AMERICANS. We're in the SAME BOAT. Name calling and treating each other as enemies is exactly what the people in power want. Divide and conquer is the name of the game. It's been that way for centuries ,and it's still with us today. Without talking to each other and recognizing that all of us love our country, we are lost and our democracy will fall.
Do we want this? Let's argue policies while respecting one another. Let's work out our differences over a beer and a handshake. We used to do that. Let's get back to that.......
Otherwise, I see us using our weapons to kill each other. Liberals know how to use them, too. We just don't talk about them much. Let's stop this crap now before we cross over the rubicon.

" Largely because of Supreme Court decisions, money has corrupted our political system. " I assume you're talking about Citizens United. How convenient that a reverse decision would have cut off conservative political funding while allowing "foundations" (Soros, Wyss, etc) to keep funding the NGOs that pay for the demonstration you are today attending.

Spare me the "oh, since Reagan" nonsense, as well as the cloying "we're all in this together." I hear that only when the left is out of power. When you are in, it's shut up and color, or be swatted and Gulag'ed.

If you really are working class you are in a minority of opinion.

 

[Jäger1]

Veterans, LGBTQIA, Knights of Columbus, made men, field hands…my Republican friend, in America, EVERYONE IS EQUAL.

Yep... and the list of Republicans that were treated equally by the law and courts in the exact same manner as the First Son proves that all are equal before the law.

Their alleged crimes were also hidden from public view by the DoJ and FBI for years, investigations and investigators denied and blocked, special get out of jail free deals attempted - every Republican got the same kind of deal!

The final two Administration Attorney Generals, three FBI Directors and others who repeatedly perjured themselves before Judge Boasberg's FISA courts to get those illigitimate spy warrants through their criminal use of their felonious "Trump-Russia Dossier" that involved serial felonies at the very top of the Administration?

Not only repeatedly committing perjury and uttering false documents to those courts, then committing the felony of violating thousands of Americans civil rights by color of law using those fraudulent warrants... look at what happened to them!

They were equally dealt with by the justice system as those they charged with "lying to the FBI" were? Prison sentences, fines, exactly the same?

The rioters attempting to breach the Secret Service/Capitol Police defending the president from their assault on the White House where Trump and his family were, just months before January 6th?

Well, at least the specific ones responsible for sending 50+ Secret Service to hospital with the wounds they suffered were warming the cells a few months before the FBI sent the J6 indicted to join them, right?

And that's our proof that "EVERYONE IS EQUAL!"?

Please Believe Us, Don't Believe Your Lying Eyes™

 

[Mister Heavyhand]

Y'all talk too much. My hogs like fresh meat.

 

[GypsmJim]

We all remember George Floyd, and the massive destruction that ensued after his death.

Not long after, a "kid" assassinated 10 black people at a supermarket in Buffalo, NY. It was the only supermarket in a prominently poor neighborhood.

After seeing it on TV news, my first thought was that we need to be prepared for the aftermath. Then it came, and it was heartwarming.

Many people gathered at the site......and prayed. Local businesses donated a lot of money to the survivors. Local taxi drivers offered to ferry people without cars to distant Supermarkets.....for free. The surrounding communities all came together. There was no black or white, just Americans. And of course Buffalonians.

The moral of the story is that it doesn't have to be like LA or Minnesota. If we want to go back to some sort of civility we need to put God and Family back in our priorities.

 

[Comanchero]

I've been to numerous protests, and I'm going to the one tomorrow. NO ONE gets paid. NO ONE. That's a fact.
I'm a Democrat who comes from the working class. My dad didn't graduate HS, but my mom did. He worked his ass off his entire life. So, that makes me a libard, right? I worked my own ass off to become a lawyer, now retired.
I believe in the 2nd A, the rule of law, accountability, as small of a government as possible, and the lowest amount of taxes. I also recognize that taxes are essential to ensure that people aren't dying in the streets, the poor aren't starving to death, that first responders respond, and our bridges don't collapse.
I was born right after WWII. We had a great economy. The middle class was thriving. My dad could buy a house, and my mom could stay home and raise us. Millionaires were taxed at 91%. They survived just fine, and our nation's wealth was shared much more equitably. There were plenty of jobs at decent salaries. No one had to depend on the so-called rich job creators to provide jobs, proving that trickle down economics has always been a fraud. Everything was hunky dory.
Then came Vietnam. It's been downhill from there. Since Reagan, wealth in this country shifted to the rich and jobs and salaries flatlined. Today, our wealth gap is equal to Russia's. No democracy can survive that disparity. Largely because of Supreme Court decisions, money has corrupted our political system. Today's level of corruption is out of this world, for all to see. The Constitution's emoluments clause has been rendered meaningless as has been the separation of powers designed by our Founders to protect us from tyrants.
If you can't see what's happening, you've been living on another planet. The bottom line is that WE ARE ALL AMERICANS. We're in the SAME BOAT. Name calling and treating each other as enemies is exactly what the people in power want. Divide and conquer is the name of the game. It's been that way for centuries ,and it's still with us today. Without talking to each other and recognizing that all of us love our country, we are lost and our democracy will fall.
Do we want this? Let's argue policies while respecting one another. Let's work out our differences over a beer and a handshake. We used to do that. Let's get back to that.......
Otherwise, I see us using our weapons to kill each other. Liberals know how to use them, too. We just don't talk about them much. Let's stop this crap now before we cross over the rubicon.

I've got to ask. What, exactly, would you be protesting?

 

[Rocketmedic40]

not excusing any of the leftist violence against individuals or people either…but if there’s a conspiracy, it should be investigated, exposed, and tried in a court of law.

 

[Major 2]

T.R.O.L.L.S. ignoring them and the protest.
no interest in their agenda, their opinion or the no kings BS

 

[pawngal]

Interesting, many of the posts on this thread are from members with very few previous posts.
Are you just here to agitate? I know, Free Speech.

 

[Jäger1]

Rights for me, but not for thee…this is the end expression of conservative thought as applied in America, brother. Not caution or values, but a voluntary blinding to reality.

Voluntarily blinding to reality... like this? The President is sharp as a tack and is working his young staffers to death while they try keeping up with him!

Half a nation either willingly turning a blind eye to what they were seeing in news media (despite media attempting to cover it up), or deluded into believing that was true by the media and senators who met with him telling them he was fine.

There's a book out on that now by two of those news journalists - you can read all about it!
Original Sin: President Biden's Decline, Its Cover-Up

Conservative reality like The Trump Russia Dossier is verified intelligence agency proof that Trump conspired with Putin to steal the election.

That reality got CNN two Pulitizer Prizes for investigative reporting - neither of which has been revoked or returned in shame.

The conservative reality, cautions and values of those who illegally commissioned, illegally paid for, and then illegally used that felonious document in FISA courts, in order to violate the civil rights of thousands of Americans by color of law. Those conservatives in which party?

(And what percentage of that party STILL believes that felonious "dossier" was legitimate rather than a criminal political creation composed of serial felonies in order to rig the 2016 election?)

How about the conservative reality, caution and values of a White House staffer enlisting 50+ intelligence agency officials to lie and assure Americans prior to a presidential election that wasn't Biden's laptop, but just some disgusting Putin election campaign disinformation with an election just two months away?

Was that planned and carried out by the just-departed Secretary of State because he was showing how conservative thought is applied in America ?

While the conservative FBI demonstrated American values by remaining quiet while knowing for YEARS that the laptop was in fact Bidens, and overflowing with evidence of serial felonies that they were concealing and refusing to investigate?

Oh yes... rights for me but not for thee...

Please Believe Us, Don't Believe Your Lying Eyes™

 

[oldcorps76]

The Democratic Speaker of the House and her husband (both killed) and another Democratic state legislative member and his wife in Minnesota have been shot in a 'targeted shooting' (the shooter had a list of more lawmakers) this morning by a man credibly impersonating a police officer and a fake police car. This is where hateful rhetoric inevitably leads.

Now I'll be attending a protest near me, maybe two, today. No one gets to do this to scare me off or make me stop speaking my mind even if it doesn't please some people. This is enough.

I haven't been part of any political party for 20-odd years, last registered as a Republican.

You maybe heard the murdered female rep - a Dem - had recently voted for a budget that excluded healthcare for illegals, and publicly had expressed concern that would not sit well with her base.

On the seat of the shooter's faked-up police vehicle, was a not-yet-released manifesto and "No Kings" signage." The facts so far....

 

[madmikeb]

Have the rules changed? Are we discussing politics now? It seems that this thread has touched on every banned topic except religion.

 

[Imissedagain]

No kings, started long ago.

"REBELS", declared the British Parliament and King George Ill, of the American Colonists, in 1775.

 

[phm14]

I appreciate the factual comments here, that expose the complete hypocrisy of todays manufactured outrage. So, Trumps a self appointed "king", for enforcing our laws and protecting US citizens...cleaning up the litany disasters created by the left? It's a sad comedy to watch people parrot the lies from the propaganda mills that have obviously been lying to everyone dumb enough to listen, for decades. I commend the mods here, for not silencing the discourse. As for the latest wave of riots? It's clear who pushing them: https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/asra-nomani-familiar-hidden-hand-behind-todays-nokings-protests

 

[Jäger1]

Alternatively, people across the country are outraged and LA is just another flash point.

Yes, their outrage was made obvious in how they voted in the election a few short months ago.

And much of that outrage was at how the previous administration invited and then treated at least 10 MILLION Illegal Aliens as though they had more rights than both American citizens and legal American Immigrants.

Now, if you believe people across the country support violent rioters they watch on news media throwing Molotov Cocktails in attempts to murder police while burning and pillaging while some call it "mostly peaceful protest" - doing so because they object to criminal Illegal Aliens being arrested and immigration law enforced - I would call that an alternative reality to the one I live in.

In my reality, this staged political violence where they attempt to murder police and destroy both public and private property has exactly NOTHING to do with First Amendment rights.