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znModeratorLee J. Carter@carterforva
I really don’t think people are grasping the reality that a car running into a crowd was a once-in-a-lifetime event 3 years ago and now it’s happening like 4 times a day, sometimes done by police themselves.znModeratorStill brings a tear to my eye everytime I see this masterpiece of a throw pic.twitter.com/UqKQkIOAQ4
— JB 🐏 (@JB_Peeples) June 7, 2020
==
Goff to Kupp is always a beautiful sight to see pic.twitter.com/eTmFYssQ5e
— JB 🐏 (@JB_Peeples) June 8, 2020
znModeratorznModerator.@RGabriel4HOF to ❄️ #LARams pic.twitter.com/fl8BcX8Y22
— Old Time Football 🏈 (@Ol_TimeFootball) June 8, 2020
znModeratorESPN did a draft, assuming every player was available. Here’s the 1st round…
Thoughts? 😬 pic.twitter.com/6bCghHzpgo
— NFL Stats (@NFL_Stats) June 8, 2020
znModerator“A bunch of leaders on the team decided to speak up and say what was on their mind. And some guys who weren’t leaders decided to speak up too, which was really powerful.”@j_fuller4 on last week’s team meeting + more. pic.twitter.com/0VtgIW2xuX
— Los Angeles Rams (@RamsNFL) June 8, 2020
znModerator5 reasons the Rams can win the Super Bowl next season https://t.co/m5o7Ju21Jb
— Rams Wire (@TheRamsWire) June 8, 2020
znModeratorLMU93
Pro-Football-Reference’s top 30 Rams teams https://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/ram/
Just using their SRS (Simple Ratings System). Showing their top 30. Championship teams in red. Last 3 Rams teams all make the cut:
1. 1967
2. 2001
3. 1973
4. 1999
5. 1945
6. 1976
7. 1970
8. 1949
9. 2017
10. 1975
11. 1951
12. 1968
13. 1952
14. 2018
15. 1977
16. 1950
17. 1953
18. 1969
19. 1971
20. 1988
21. 1980
22. 1948
23. 1966
24. 1958
25. 2003
26. 1947
27. 1954
28.1989
29. 2019
30. 1974znModeratorSam Farmer@LATimesfarmer
Roger Goodell has issued protocols for players to return to NFL facilities. At least 6 feet between lockers. I can’t imagine how that is going to work during the season, let alone training camp with 90 players. Locker rooms the size of airplane hangars.Tom Pelissero@TomPelissero
Among the highlights here:– Locker rooms reconfigured to permit people being 6 feet apart
– Meetings must be conducted virtually when possible
– Helmets, shoulder pads, etc. disinfected after each game
– Masks required except when interfering with “athletic activities”
No dates set yet and no minicamps expected, but the NFL and NFLPA are discussing the possibility of certain players — such as rookies, and veterans who changed teams and need physicals — returning to club facilities on a limited basis before June 26, per sources.
Albert Breer@AlbertBreer
we also have details on where the NFL and NFLPA stand in talks on players coming back.At issue is the camp report date.
Geoff Schwartz@geoffschwartz
Just quickly reading through the new NFL physical distancing protocols. Meeting rooms aren’t big enough to handle all these distance requirements. The cafeteria and indoor facility will need to be usedJudy Battista@judybattista
Meetings of more than 20 people must be conducted virtually, unless physical distancing can be adhered to. In person meetings are prohibited if physical distancing cannot be adhered to. “Meetings must be conducted virtually to the extent possible.”Gary Klein@LATimesklein
The locker room at the Rams’ Thousand Oaks facility is very small.znModeratorNFL and coronavirus: Rams have had strange seasons before, namely 1982 and 1987
GARY KLEIN
The ritual was performed regularly in 1987, when Rams offensive linemen Jackie Slater and Dennis Harrah shared a ride to the team’s Anaheim facility during the NFL players strike.
After emerging from the car, and before they walked the picket line, Slater and Harrah exchanged a nonverbal pleasantry.
“He’d bend over, and I’d kick him right across his butt,” Slater said, laughing. “And then I would bend over, and he’d kick me right across mine.”
It was the second time in five years the longtime teammates were in the midst of a season that began amid uncertainty and ultimately was shortened because of a strike. The kicks to their backsides were reminders to remain committed to the cause.
Now, 33 years later, Slater, Harrah and other Rams players and coaches who endured NFL seasons impacted by unforeseen events are watching to see how teams prepare for and deal with a season already affected by the global COVID-19 pandemic.
Team facilities have been closed. Offseason programs are being conducted virtually through Zoom meetings. Games, if they are played, could possibly be staged in stadiums without fans.
How does that affect players?
“It’s apples and oranges,” former Rams quarterback Jim Everett said of comparing strike-shortened seasons to one affected by a pandemic. “But the same factor is, it’s a distraction.”
In 1982, Rams receiver George Farmer was coming off knee surgery that had sidelined him for what would have been his rookie season. Despite the prospect of a looming strike, he said he was “on a quest to prove myself,” and he prepared accordingly.
“The real pros are doing their thing, grinding and figuring I’m not going to let the competition get ahead of me.”
Farmer said he worked out twice a day, and ran 10 miles on the beach every other day. He and other players also did passing drills at Santa Monica College.
“I wanted to be able to run all day and never be tired, to be in better shape than anyone on the team,” he said.
NFL teams played two games before a 57-day strike. The Rams finished the nine-game season with a 2-7 record. Farmer caught 17 passes, two for touchdowns. The performance helped set the stage for 1983, when he caught a career-best 40 passes.
“Some of these guys,” Farmer said of players today, “if they’re on the bubble in any way shape or form, they better be working out and better be doing what they need to do.”
In 1987, the Rams were optimistic they could build upon the season before, when they finished with a 10-6 record and made the playoffs for the fourth season in a row.
But the threat of another work stoppage loomed. The Rams started the season with two defeats before NFL players went on strike. Coach John Robinson and his staff, including first-year special teams coordinator Artie Gigantino, assembled to plot strategy.
“Coach Robinson said you can’t allow a strike that you have absolutely no control over … to stop you from doing the best you can,” Gigantino said. “You can’t sit around and go drink beer at night and bitch.”
Robinson eventually instructed Gigantino, a former USC assistant, to help assemble the team of replacement players.
“Was it a great team? Absolutely not,” Gigantino said. “But it was a team that was able to get by.”
Everett was in his second pro season. Slater and Harrah were in their 12th and 13th seasons, respectively. None of them crossed the picket line. But several veteran players joined the replacements, causing a fracture, Everett said.
“It really started pitting the older guys against the younger guys,” Everett said. “It really affected our leadership in an adverse way. And it affected us maybe more than other teams because we were an older team.”
The replacement roster went 1-2. When the strike ended, the regular players returned, and the Rams lost to the Cleveland Browns. A few days later, the Rams traded star running back Eric Dickerson to the Indianapolis Colts. They finished with a 6-9 record and missed the playoffs.
“I look back at it as kind of a wasted year,” Everett said, “and it was unfortunate.”
The 1987 season marked Harrah’s final season. The six-time Pro Bowl player said he lost about $100,000 of his $330,000 salary because of the strike.
“I had to support the union and thought, ‘Hopefully, this will one day benefit me or my teammates and the guys coming in behind me,’ ” Harrah said. “It’s pretty obvious they benefited.
“The $330,000 I was going to make? Now the guys are making $13 million a year for my same position. I think something must have worked!”
Farmer, Everett, Slater and Harrah said that in the wake of COVID-19, players must find ways to stay on point despite the absence of on-field organized team activities. They must be ready for whatever happens before and during what will be among the most unusual NFL seasons in history.
“The real pros are doing their thing, grinding and figuring I’m not going to let the competition get ahead of me,” said Slater, a hall of famer.
Regardless of the environment when the season begins, focused preparation will be the key, Harrah said.
“I don’t care if there’s anybody in the stands or nobody in the stands,” he said. “There’s always someone across from you that wants to kick your ass.”
znModerator
June 8, 2020 at 8:29 am in reply to: BT & others–simple things on the “spam” issue–mods please read #116050znModeratorJust curious. Why did the spam-thing start doing this? It didnt used to.
w
vAll I know is, it started doing it when the site software got upgraded.
znModeratorRams hope new defensive boss Brandon Staley is a quick fixer
It’s not a souffle or a roast duck. It’s football. The prep time is overrated.
When Brandon Staley was coaching at John Carroll, there was no spring practice. At Hutchinson Junior College at Kansas, players constantly rushed through the turnstile, none available for more than two years.
“When I got hired by the Bears, Khalil Mack showed up seven days before the first regular-season game,” Staley said. “And that was one of his best games. People wonder about it, but the competition starts when everything goes live.”
Stanley is the 37-year-old defensive coordinator of the Rams. He was Mack’s position coach in Chicago. When he followed Vic Fangio and Ed Donatell to Denver, Von Miller was in his linebackers’ room.
“I told him he could coach 20 years and not have two guys like that,” Donatell said.
Instead, Staley now works with Aaron Donald, who could be roused from a midnight snooze and still sack quarterbacks.
Donald says he wants to see Staley’s defensive alignments “out there on the grass,” not just on teleconferences. But with no live OTAs or mini-camps and maybe a truncated summer session, Staley will be operating under a running clock and a tight lens. They say trust is built slowly. Not here.
“The first thing he does with those guys is establish his knowledge,” said Donatell, who became Denver’s defensive coordinator when Fangio became the head man. “Then he connects with people. The great players are looking for somebody with credibility and it doesn’t matter who it is. That won’t be a problem for Brandon.
“He’s prepared. When he interviewed with us in Chicago, he showed he’d been following Vic not just for a couple of years but for 10. He can frame problems quickly, while everything is going on, and address them. I know (Rams’ coach) Sean McVay is unique, but Brandon will be a good match.”
“Aaron would play well with my wife Amy coaching him,” said Staley, who added that, as a schoolteacher, she often coaches him. When she heard him use the sloppy expression “aiiight” in too many remote conversations, she called him out.
Like McVay, Staley was a high school quarterback, in Perry, Ohio. He also quarterbacked at Dayton, not far from McVay’s Miami of Ohio.
Unlike McVay, Staley took the scenic route to the NFL. He was an assistant at Northern Illinois at 24, went to St. Thomas (MN) at 27, was at Hutchinson at 28, was a Tennessee graduate assistant at 30.
Then Staley ducked out of prime time and spent three of the next four years at John Carroll, with a pit stop at James Madison. He was ready to join his John Carroll coach, Tom Arth, at Tennessee-Chattanooga when the Bears called.
“Other than Jon Gruden, who played quarterback here, Brandon was the best at putting stuff on the greaseboard,” said ex-Dayton coach Mike Kelly, “although it was a chalkboard back then.”
Joe Novak, the Northern Illinois coach, made Staley a defensive backfield coach for the same reason, because Staley could see all the pieces moving.
“When a young kid wants to get into coaching,” Novak said. “I always ask them, ‘Can you live without it?’ Because if he can, he probably should. I don’t think Brandon can live without it, and he shouldn’t.”
“I’ve been able to coach all 22 positions,” Staley said. “But I just grew up fascinated with all of it. I was drinking coffee and reading the paper every morning in the first grade. What I’m going to show the players is that I’m out there competing as much as they are.”
Hidden in that curriculum vitae is a scrimmage against Hodgkin’s lymphoma when Staley was 24. He coached for NIU through it all. His dad Bruce, who was his high school coach, is also a cancer survivor. His mom Linda was not. She died three years before Brandon got sick.
Staley might be the new kid, but the block has changed. Only four of the 11 defensive Rams who started in the Super Bowl in 2019 are still here. You might ask what Wade Phillips did to lose his job, since the Rams were fourth in sacks and seventh in rush defense (per carry). But the bad games were really bad (Tampa Bay, Dallas, Baltimore, San Francisco) and the third down and red zone stats were below the NFL average.
McVay surely remembered a back-alley night in Chicago, 2018, when the Bears picked Jared Goff four times and dealt him a 19.1 passer rating in a 15-6 win. Staley’s resume was built by association. This job could go any which way, but forget the prep time. He’s been in training camp all his life.
znModeratorWith Fowler gone, #LARams EDGE Samson Ebukam will look to step up as a potential starter in 2020
Last season, he tied with #Cowboys EDGE Demarcus Lawerence in terms of defensive stops with 28 pic.twitter.com/Z8Tv5nUwLg
— PFF LA Rams (@PFF_Rams) May 28, 2020
znModeratorThis spin by Obo Okoronkwo against D.J. Humphries is one of the best you'll see pic.twitter.com/t0p0tm4B7H
— Cameron DaSilva (@camdasilva) December 2, 2019
znModeratorRams offense and new coordinator Kevin O’Connell are clicking
link https://www.dailynews.com/2020/05/26/rams-offense-and-new-coordinator-kevin-oconnell-are-clicking/
The Rams hired Kevin O’Connell to help the offense meet expectations.
But first things first. Someday soon, O’Connell expects to meet the offense.
Four months after the new offensive coordinator and other new assistant coaches joined the staff, O’Connell still hasn’t been able to introduce himself to most of his players face to face. Coronavirus restrictions have kept NFL teams from gathering at team facilities, let alone on practice fields. The Rams are conducting unit and position-group meetings via video streams.
“Do they even know who I am at this point?” O’Connell wondered in a video chat with reporters on Thursday. “Hopefully they can click through that team meeting and find the little box that says ‘O’Connell,’ so when they catch me walking in the halls, they know who I am.”
In person, O’Connell, who turned 35 on Monday, is a likable former San Diego State quarterback and Patriots third-round draft pick who didn’t catch on as an NFL player but has caught the up escalator as a coach.
After three years as a position coach and offensive coordinator under Jay Gruden with the Redskins, roles that Rams coach Sean McVay used to have in Washington, O’Connell was hired by McVay in January.
His own role with the Rams takes some explaining. An offensive coordinator normally runs the attack, calls the plays. But McVay does that himself, and he didn’t even have anyone with the title of offensive coordinator after Matt LaFleur left following the 2017 season to be OC for the Titans and now head coach of the Packers.
“I look at it as my role is whatever is required to assist coach McVay in preparing the offense,” said O’Connell, who comes in along with new running backs coach Thomas Brown to join an offensive staff that includes pass-game coordinator Shane Waldron and run-game coordinator and offensive-line coach Aaron Kromer.
McVay, who hasn’t had a quarterbacks coach per se since Zac Taylor left to coach the Bengals following the Rams’ 2018 run to the Super Bowl, has said some of that duty will fall to O’Connell.
“I think it’s going to be a great opportunity for Jared (Goff) to work with someone like him, because of some of the things that he’s done, that maybe I haven’t gotten exposed to,” McVay said when he introduced O’Connell, defensive coordinator Brandon Staley and special-teams coordinator John Bonamego at a press conference in February.
Goff’s passer rating sank from eighth in the league in 2018 to 22nd in 2019. It was only part of the 9-7 Rams’ overall offensive disappointment, which saw Todd Gurley lose more than a yard per carry off his rushing average.
Now Gurley (released) and wide receiver Brandin Cooks (traded) are gone. Second-round draft picks Cam Akers and Van Jefferson will compete for major roles in replacing them.
If the offensive line improves, it will be because of better health and the benefit of experience. The only new face is Tremayne Anchrum, a seventh-round draft pick.
O’Connell might be the biggest addition to the offense.
His success could be measured by how much Goff’s numbers improve, something that will depend on the quarterback and everybody around him.
“You’ve got the fundamentals of playing the position,” O’Connell said on Zoom from San Diego, where he was visiting his parents. “It can be as pure as a first step on a drop-back from underneath the center, it can be his base at the top of a drop, it can be where his eyes are going off of a play-action fake, it can be understanding what’s happening on the other side of the ball vs. (the) play (that was) called.”
O’Connell noted that this will be Goff will have more “ownership” of the offense in his fifth NFL season.
On top of technique and X’s and O’s, O’Connell said, “maybe it’s a leadership thing, maybe it’s making sure we’re great out of the huddle, maybe it’s the little details like that, where if we can just get 1 or 2% better at all of those things, he’s got a chance to have a great season and I’m really excited for him.”
Specific changes in X’s and O’s won’t start until players and coaches see what they have on the practice field, O’Connell said.
There is one advantage to not having physical practices until further notice from the NFL and local officials: It leaves more time to talk with players about the philosophy and “the why” behind the offense.“It’ll be great when we get to training camp, or whenever we’re able to all get together again, and kind of pick up from a person-to-person, in-person standpoint,” O’Connell said. “But I’m really happy with where we are considering what this offseason has been like.”
znModeratorfrom https://theramswire.usatoday.com/2020/06/06/rams-bengals-andrew-whitworth-retirement/
Whitworth originally planned to retire as a member of the Bengals when he left Cincinnati for Los Angeles, but he’s undecided. He talked about the decision he still has to make with former Bengals tackle Willie Anderson.
“Yeah, when I left there, that was really kind of the intention,” Whitworth said. “Obviously, whenever I’m done playing, that’ll be the decision I’ll make at that time. But yeah, at that time when I left there, that was kind of the intention. And that was really the only thing that – Mike [Mike Brown, Bengals owner & de facto GM] was obviously not happy when I left – but that was really something that was important to him ask me about whenever I actually signed with the Rams.”
June 8, 2020 at 3:31 am in reply to: defunding the police … & other legislative responses to the protests #116039znModerator*
link https://www.snopes.com/ap/2020/06/07/when-protesters-cry-defund-the-police-what-does-it-mean/
Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said part of the movement is really about how money is spent. “Now, I don’t believe that you should disband police departments,” she said in an interview with CNN. “But I do think that, in cities, in states, we need to look at how we are spending the resources and invest more in our communities….
Generally, police and union officials have long resisted cuts to police budgets, arguing that it would make cities less safe.The Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union for the city’s rank-and-file officers, said budget cuts would be the “quickest way to make our neighborhoods more dangerous.”.*
https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2020/06/03/black-lives-matter-co-founder
“what we’re asking for is a reinvestment in how we understand what’s needed in our communities. Why is law enforcement the first responders for a mental health crisis? Why are they the first responders for domestic violence issues? Why are they the first responders for homelessness? And so those are the first places we can look into. Let alone, let’s talk about law enforcement’s ability to surveil the community and how much money they’re given in surveillance dollars every single year. We have allowed, the public has allowed, for us to have militarized police forces in our communities and we have to stop it.”
*
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/04/defund-the-police-us-george-floyd-budgets
the striking visuals of enormous, militarized and at times violent police forces responding to peaceful protests have led some politicians to question whether police really need this much money and firepower….Defunding, said activist Jeralynn Blueford, is the logical response from leaders in this moment of unprecedented unrest. “If police had been serious about reform and policy change, then guess what? People would not be this angry.”
*
https://www.newsweek.com/defund-police-movement-growing-heres-what-it-actually-means-1508761
While, ultimately, Montague [Jamani Montague of Critical Resistance] would like to see policing as we know it today abolished, dramatically reducing budgets for law enforcement and redirecting that money into community-based and community-serving initiatives would be a positive development.
Many in the black community and in other communities, including undocumented immigrants and the trans community, Montague said, “have never really been able to rely on the police or call the police…so they already have strong systems of mutual need and ways of dealing with conflict in the community when it happens.”June 8, 2020 at 1:15 am in reply to: Police v. Demonstrators Protesting Killing of George Floyd #116037znModerator
znModeratorThe #BlackLivesMatter protest in Montreal today is…. unbelievable. pic.twitter.com/CSKssA5bcM
— Joshua Potash (@JoshuaPotash) June 7, 2020
znModeratorJune 7, 2020 at 10:05 pm in reply to: defunding the police … & other legislative responses to the protests #116022znModeratorColorado lawmakers introduce bill that would fire officers who fail to stop inappropriate use of force
link https://www.fox21news.com/top-stories/colorado-lawmakers-introduce-bill-that-would-fire-officers-who-fail-to-stop-inappropriate-use-of-force/znModeratorStaggering.
This is the #BlackLivesMatter protest in Rome today.
— Joshua Potash (@JoshuaPotash) June 7, 2020
June 7, 2020 at 9:39 pm in reply to: defunding the police … & other legislative responses to the protests #116017znModeratorWhen protesters cry ‘defund the police,’ what does it mean?
One group, which is working toward a ‘police-free Minneapolis’ argues the move is about reallocating resources and funding away from police and putting it toward community-based models of safety.WASHINGTON — Protesters are pushing to “defund the police” over the death of George Floyd and other black Americans killed by law enforcement. Their chant has become rallying cry – and a stick for President Trump to use on Democrats as he portrays them as soft on crime.
But what does “defund the police” mean? It’s not necessarily about gutting police department budgets.
WHAT IS THE ‘DEFUND THE POLICE’ MOVEMENT?
Supporters say it isn’t about eliminating police departments or stripping agencies of all of their money. They say it is time for the country to address systemic problems in policing in America and spend more on what communities across the U.S. need, like housing and education.
State and local governments spent $115 billion on policing in 2017, according to data compiled by the Urban Institute.
“Why can’t we look at how it is that we reorganize our priorities, so people don’t have to be in the streets during a national pandemic?” Black Lives Matter co-founder Alicia Garza asked during an interview on NBC’s Meet the Press.
Activists acknowledge this is a gradual process.
The group MPD150, which says it is “working towards a police-free Minneapolis,” argues that such action would be more about “strategically reallocating resources, funding, and responsibility away from police and toward community-based models of safety, support, and prevention.”
“The people who respond to crises in our community should be the people who are best-equipped to deal with those crises,” the group wrote on its website.
People gather along a street painted with “Defund the police” near the White House on Saturday night. Evelyn Hockstein/For The Washington Post
WHAT ARE LAWMAKERS SAYING?
Sen. Cory Booker said he understands the sentiment behind the slogan, but it’s not a slogan he will use.
The New Jersey Democrat told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he shares a feeling with many protesters that Americans are “over-policed” and that “we are investing in police, which is not solving problems, but making them worse when we should be, in a more compassionate country, in a more loving country.”
Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said part of the movement is really about how money is spent.
“Now, I don’t believe that you should disband police departments,” she said in an interview with CNN. “But I do think that, in cities, in states, we need to look at how we are spending the resources and invest more in our communities.
“Maybe this is an opportunity to re-envision public safety,” she said.
President Trump and his campaign view the emergence of the “Defund the Police” slogan as a spark of opportunity during what has been a trying political moment. Trump’s response to the protests has sparked widespread condemnation. But now his supporters say the new mantra may make voters, who may be otherwise sympathetic to the protesters, recoil from a “radical” idea.
Trump seized on the slogan last week as he spoke at an event in Maine.
“They’re saying defund the police,” he said. “Defund. Think of it. When I saw it, I said, ‘What are you talking about?’ ‘We don’t want to have any police,’ they say. You don’t want police?”
Trump’s 2016 campaign was built on a promise of ensuring law and order – often in contrast to protests against his rhetoric that followed him across the country. As he seeks reelection, Trump is preparing to deploy the same argument again – and seems to believe the “defund the police” call has made the campaign applause line all the more real for his supporters.
IS THERE ANY PUSH TO ACTUALLY DEFUND POLICE DEPARTMENTS?
Yes, or at least to reduce their budgets in some major cities.
In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Sunday that the city would move funding from the NYPD to youth initiatives and social services, while keeping the city safe, but he didn’t give details.
In Los Angeles, Mayor Eric Garcetti vowed to cut as much as $150 million that was part of a planned increase in the police department’s budget.
A Minneapolis city councilmember said in a tweet on Thursday that the city would “dramatically rethink how we approach public safety and emergency response.”
“We are going to dismantle the Minneapolis Police Department,” Jeremiah Ellison wrote. “And when we’re done, we’re not simply gonna glue it back together.” He did not explain what would replace the police department.
HOW HAVE POLICE OFFICIALS AND UNIONS RESPONDED?
Generally, police and union officials have long resisted cuts to police budgets, arguing that it would make cities less safe.
The Los Angeles Police Protective League, the union for the city’s rank-and-file officers, said budget cuts would be the “quickest way to make our neighborhoods more dangerous.”
“Cutting the LAPD budget means longer responses to 911 emergency calls, officers calling for back-up won’t get it, and rape, murder and assault investigations won’t occur or will take forever to initiate, let alone complete,” the union’s board said in a statement last week.
“At this time, with violent crime increasing, a global pandemic and nearly a week’s worth of violence, arson, and looting, ‘defunding’ the LAPD is the most irresponsible thing anyone can propose.”
June 7, 2020 at 9:17 pm in reply to: defunding the police … & other legislative responses to the protests #116016znModeratorThis was posted by a friend on Facebook, who also lives in Portland Maine.
Defunding the military and police means shifting resources not leaving social problems unaddressed. Here’s a local example: Portland schools have police officers assigned to them. At a forum I went to a couple of months ago on the question of whether to remove ‘public safety officers’ from those schools, the police officer on the panel (who serves in that capacity) said that sometimes kids get violent or are out of control on drugs and having a hand cuff carrying armed responder on site allows for the situation to be safely resolved. A social work grad student in the audience pointed out that, in her work in the homeless shelter she too encountered violence sometimes exacerbated by alcohol, drugs, or mental illness – and she too is trained to deal with it. And does so without handcuffs and a gun. Shifting some police resources to social workers and nurses and after school programs and housing and job creation would reduce the need for police in the first place. That is what ‘defunding’ looks like. We don’t have to go fully to disbanding the force entirely. But let’s make them as unnecessary as possible.
znModeratorPaul Musgrave@profmusgrave
Protesters Say Statue Tripped, Fell Into WaterJune 7, 2020 at 4:14 pm in reply to: Police v. Demonstrators Protesting Killing of George Floyd #116008znModeratorthis white supremacist ran his car over robert forbes, a black protestor, in bakersfield CA on wednesday. forbes died today after 3 days in the hospital.
the killer’s name is timothy kieth moore. he has the nazi 14/88 symbol tattoo & a long history of domestic violence pic.twitter.com/6udmQ7zp1o
— (don’t laugh!) (@dewybleach) June 7, 2020
znModerator‘You wanna f*cking do something? Make sure you’re registered to vote. Don’t start another goddamn fire,’ — This Black woman went off on people trashing her NYC neighborhood pic.twitter.com/7lROYvwjXN
— NowThis (@nowthisnews) June 7, 2020
znModeratori still say that for the most part protesters were peaceful.
Oh absolutely, there can be no question of that. As of yesterday there were protests in 650 different towns and cities (in all 50 states) and the percentage of them that were violent in any way shape or form was small. And in the cases where they were violent, most of that was initiated by the police.
==
Textbook police kettle. Block the exits, then order people to leave and brutalize them for not complying even though they literally can't comply. https://t.co/2yVyMCzbGk
— Lee J. Carter (@carterforva) June 7, 2020
znModeratorI don’t get why they think it can’t be both. Yes Churchill was a great war leader, but he was also an appallingly racist man, and his policies reflected it.
Sometimes some people forget that the minute the war was over, the Brits dumped him.
From the wiki:
The final result of the [1945 post-war] election showed Labour to have won a landslide victory, making a net gain of 239 seats and winning 47.7%, thus allowing Attlee to be appointed Prime Minister. For the Conservatives, the Labour victory was a shock, as they suffered a net loss of 189 seats despite winning 36.2% of the vote, having campaigned on the mistaken belief that Churchill would win on his post-wartime status. The election was the first in which Labour won a majority, and allowed Attlee to begin implementing the party’s postwar reforms for the country. The national swing to their party from the Conservatives of 10.7% is the largest ever seen in a general election within the United Kingdom.
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