This is why I did not enjoy the "health care flyovers" recently. Normally when we have flyovers, it's meant to say "look at all the might we have to use in protecting you". Even that's not particularly appealing, knowing that that might is going to be turned against most likely undeserving people. But the recent flyovers really felt like "look what we could be using against you". And now here we are.

Except in Egypt the military did it to show that were with the protestors and getting ready to swap the dictator out.

> If you perform low-altitude flyovers while citizens exercise their right to assembly, you are attacking them lethally and must expect lethal reaction also. Please DO NOT do this.

President Trump on severity of response to protests.

This is absurd. Is that not a violation of Geneva conventions?

https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/customary-ihl/eng/docs/v2_rul...

It started with violating the rights of non-citizens by throwing them and their families in cages. Its building on centuries of black oppression and a nationwide corps of officers lead to believe certain class of Americans to be less than human.

Today, the president used American Military-lite in a completely unnecessary display of machismo, to terrorize groups of peaceful Citizen protesters and continues to do so by semi-wartime methods. The CBP has offered its help in brutalizing another class of people; these are the same group of people who have been let loose on border communities with little repercussions for their actions.

Unchecked, the fascism will grow until there is nothing left to contain it.

Its clear to the present occupant of the White House that winning fairly is not possible. Using emergencies as a pretext for grabbing on to power is an entirely predicable playbook, and yet Americans seem utterly powerless to stop what they know in their hearts is going to happen.

Honesty feeling hopeful for the first time in awhile, bullish on protest and I think that tech can be leveraged in a significant way

When people feel that their security is threatened, they welcome fascism with open arms.

Large numbers of Americans are going to cheer this on.

The internet we have punishes educated, honest, kind, good actors. The internet we have rewards ignorant, dishonest, malevolent, connivers.

It's hard for the average person to reason about political issues when trolls and grifters and morons monopolize the public discourse.

The vast majority of people in those cities would've already supported them. And they bite that hand. Often hands just as brown/black as theirs...they don't care, because what they seek is power, not justice.

At least when authoritarianism hit my home country (Venezuela), we could leave.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings#Aftermath...

I don't see it as a crazy idea that shooting some protestors would be popular.

I hope we never get to that.

There are many groups, but the most effective one is a right wing movement that is trying to start a second civil war by touching off race riots. Apparently international anarchists, and foreign governments’ misinformation campaigns are also making strong showings. Trump claims Antifa is too (though he has not provided any evidence to back that up).

Some of the right wingers have been caught with bombs, etc. Some have been firing weapons into crowds in an attempt to get police to shoot innocent people (and at least one person in Louisville was killed this way)

All of the major US news (except fox) networks are covering this continuously and showing pictures of the perpetrators, etc.

If you don’t believe their reporters, they also usually live stream the protests from the ground and the sky, so you can see for yourself. They covered a half dozen cities tonight.

The majority of the protests across the country have been peaceful, with a minority engaging in rioting and looting. If that's what you choose to focus on, then you don't give a damn about justice.

I also see hateful graffiti sprayed all over my city about cops, despite the fact that the vast majority of them are peaceful and lawful and mean well for their communities. That seems to be lost on people as mob mentality has taken over.

right. https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/california/articles/...

Stand this one out. You’re hilariously out of touch with what’s important to societies.

> § 91.119 Minimum safe altitudes: (b) Over congested areas. Over any congested area of a city, town, or settlement, or over any open air assembly of persons, an altitude of 1,000 feet above the highest obstacle within a horizontal radius of 2,000 feet of the aircraft.

> New York Times reporter Thomas Gibbons-Neff said that one of the Black Hawks had flown so low that it broke a large branch off a tree with its rotor wash, which fell, but thankfully didn't injure anyone on the ground below.

The Senate abdicated their responsibility and chance to hold Trump accountable. This is the outcome.

I don't like the looks of either side of this bloody conflict.

I just want to be clear that there is nothing that makes me more nervous than a President who is shown no sign of being second guessed by the Legislature, especially during a crisis. It wouldn't even matter if roles were reversed and it were Hillary in the White House with Democrats in control of the Senate. I'd still be calling them out.

It is so easy to get carried away by the reins of power. Most people do not realize just how well equipped the Government is to go full authoritarian if it came down to it. The only thing that has kept that from happening has been our value system doing a fairly decent job of keeping that tendency in check. Or at least it seemed to be prior to 2001.

[0]: https://s.sc-cdn.net/1KO38_D-saomzlpaMCGJvY96UMxYdW5Lsb-9MzD...

And this is a fire and police department set ablaze in Minneapolis: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8UO8ppmbjK8

You've lost the plot.

Stand this one out. You have no understanding of the situation on the ground.

Is that a law you can cite or your opinion? I’m really asking, IDK

The choppers were by all accounts being used against groups of peaceful protesters who were nowhere near the church in question. They were not the ones involved in the arson.

The Boston Tea Party was a riot by the colonial residents and it was an instigating event in the Revolutionary War.

The 2A is a threat that the people will (and according to founding fathers should) rebel if the government becomes too tyrannical.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email [email protected] and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future.

It's impossible to answer every email right away. You'll certainly get an answer, but I can't promise when. If you saw the catastrophic mess that is the HN inbox, you'd understand why.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email [email protected] and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future.

When dictators consolidate their power, they purge their administration of anyone who does not pledge their supreme loyalty to them. The principled ones of course quit immediately, but without a doubt there will be significant number of people that remain. They are only human, and they have to deal with exactly the same problem that anyone else quitting their job faces in America today. Their minds will rationalize the actions, the Dictator will provide ample bogeymen as targets of hatred.

And even if they DO disobey an order, an American where the military no longer obeys the Civilian Administration... however terrible that might be, would be a dangerous line to cross. All bets are off at that point: the American military is the largest, best equipped fighting force the world has ever seen. Whoever commands it instantly commands immeasurable amount of power.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings#Aftermath...

And anyway there's still a lot of space between this and the army shooting on the crowd (which happened in many places in the world historically).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings

You have a crazy country. Stay safe.

Violence in Montreal seems well contained for now.

Considering that it was a private administration call they didn’t intend to be public, I’m not sure “you gotta arrest these people” over and over is wrong.

I must have missed it in my first pass, can you help me out with a timestamp?

The problem here is (other than underlying systemic issues) a pretty stupid attitude from the administration which went for confrontation rather than accomodation.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/paris-riots-...

We know that George Floyd was a repeat criminal, with a record of armed violence, who was being arrested for another criminal act.

Having a knee on his neck so long? Police incompetence.

You know what else is police incompetence, by the same police force? The death of Justine Damond: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Justine_Damond

Killed by a Minnesota police officer fast-tracked through cadet training for diversity reasons.

Where were the protests for her? Why is it just regular police error when a white Australian woman dies in the USA, after having done nothing, but a huge injustice and evidence of massive inequality when a man with a history of violence, in the process of resisting arrest, is killed by the same incompetent police force?

Compare that to Floyd, where it took sustained protests to get the main perpetrator arrested.

When something terrible happens once, it is sad. When it happens over and over again, its not "bad apples" but a systemic problem that needs to be fixed. The protests are about similar incidents (cops killing black Americans) happening throughout the country. The people who protest see that reality and are moved enough to get out there and do something, anything in the face of that injustice.

The basic governing principles of the criminal justice system in the US is that the punishment should fit the crime. Regardless of however flawed human being George Floyd was, he did not deserve to die as he did. Many, many Black Americans did not deserve to die.

Please educate yourself if you're genuinely interested in learning about the reason why so much of the country feels the need to come out and protest during a deadly pandemic.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Justine_Damond#Tri...

ReticentVole believes the penalty for a criminal act is death.

> but a huge injustice and evidence of massive inequality when a man with a history of violence, in the process of resisting arrest, is killed by the same incompetent police force

Oh, you're an all-lives matter person! Why didn't you say so? Go fuck yourself.