grego

huh?

What do you make of Hamas?

can you elaborate?

Nats games was the only thing that I would really be missing when I had cheap Comcast internet plus sling a couple of years ago. I got a cheap lineup plus the free xfinity beta app close to two years ago for less than $100. They were supposed to be charging for it at some point, but I still have the apps free through roku on 3 tvs plus one dvr box. Im sure you can get the games through vpn with MLB but I haven't tried it.

Exactly. Which is why nobody wants to talk about it. And that only guarantees that things continue as they have.

This is a topic that should be discussed (or at least attempted) in another thread because a large portion of the country believes as you do that the these numbers indicate something they don't, necessarily, and that is not good.

Not quite, but this is going to get off topic. The thing that should be taken away is, despite the much larger number, how many can you name? The reason is what I said above--we eat up rage bait.

I think we know, consciously or subconsciously, that a lot of the crap we read on social media is designed to provoke a reaction. But when it's a story that confirms our biases, we turn that instinct off. The rush of having our biases confirmed ('I told you so') and being outraged at the same time is too addictive. Guy executed by cops trying to leave his kids school. Guy shot at cops twice at point blank range. Girl kills pimp escaping sex slavery. Or shoots a John in the back of the head while he's sleeping then robs him. Girl at party murdered. Or she got drunk and fell off a deck. We only see what we want to see. We are being manipulated and we will be as long as we allow it.

Yep. This is where we are today. Click bait / rage bait. It's poisoning and dividing us. But we eat it up.

Eric Reid just got done calling Malcom Jenkins a sellout and a coward for getting the NFL to put 90 mill towards racial equality social programs. The same guy who just accepted an apparenty large amount of money specifically to keep quiet about alleged NFL collusion to keep players from playing as a result of protesting racial inequality (even though he's actually employed by an NFL team). Alrighty then.

I think they tracked them down from the subpoenaed phone records after comparing them to the redacted ones smollett turned over.

Could be. Fake hate crimes (or any fake events painting someone as an innocent sympathetic victim) exist because some people like the attention or the feeling it gives them. Munchausen is this to the extreme. People have chopped off their own limbs for this type of sympathy. Political motivation could be another reason. If you want to bring attention to a cause you think isn't getting attention (or you just hate trump), this is one way to do it. This story was big from day one. Could be a combination of things, including mental instability. Emma Sulkowitz, aka mattress girl, got a ton of attention, including that of a senator, even though her story appears incredible upon any amount of scrutiny. Some of her actions indicate she may have some issues.

Could be a conspiracy. Or it could be he's not good at passing the football. Or running an actual NFL style, non rpo offense. And he would be an incredible distraction while losing games and playing poorly while fosused on non football issues while alienating teammates, which is what he was doing before he got benched. Coaches and owners would probably not like or want to get anywhere near a player like that. But it's probably a conspiracy.

He has claimed to be a 'Vietnam vet', 'in theater' (he's also said 'Vietnam times vet', Vietnam vet times' and 'Vietnam Era vet') , but he was never in Vietnam. That's not good.

i agree with that. for me, like i said before, my perspective changed when you saw phillips as the 'aggressor'- i dont really want to use that word, but phillips was the one who went into the groups if kids and approached the kid. my initial impression was that it was the other way around, probably because of the hat, the fact that its a kid vs an older gentleman, a white kid vs a native american, a taller kid vs a smaller man, and probably the kids expression, which i'm willing to say i may have misinterpreted. had the kid walked up to phillips that closely while philips was beating his drum, i'd feel completely different and probably wouldnt have cared if phillips smacked him on his head.

I think the maga hat (and his expression) is clearly offputting and immediately triggers a reaction- it does in me, and I try to do my best to look at it without prejudice and not have my interpretation tainted by emotion. The hat and facial expression clearly affects how we see the interaction and is unquestionably why most people had the initial reaction to the first, short video. So I’m trying to check myself and I’m thinking of it like this- If a Trump supporter with a maga hat was beating a drum, wandered into the middle of a large group of Native Americans and right up into the space and face of a native American, beating the drum inches from his face, would we say that the Native American was being a smartass and should have gotten out of his way?

i think some of the kids, for sure, acted inappropriately. i always cringe when i see the tomohawk chop and chant, but, as long as it's allowed at braves and chiefs games, i'm sure it'll continue. i'm not sure the kid, sandmann, did anything wrong, per se, but i can see how his expression was interpreted as a douchey smirk. i'll give him credit for giving his friend the 'cut it out' hand gesture when one of the protesters was telling his friend to go back to europe- that actually looked like a smart, mature move. where i reassessed my original position was seeing who approached who. phillips got in the dudes face, literally inches from it, beating a drum. honestly, if the worst the kid did at that moment was smirk, he did far better than any of the adults i saw in the video.

youre exactly right- social media plays a huge role. race stories are currently hot topics, so every story that might be race related will get pushed, because clicks. no, it hasnt always been like this. this chart below tracks political polarization over the last 20 plus years. instead of interacting like a regular conversation online, people form groups and tribes. social media plays a role in that, even causing us to think twice before we like a post or tweet, lest anyone get the wrong idea about us- you dont want to be in the wrong, bad group, you want to be in the good virtuous group. social media is believed to be a huge factor in the rise in teen suicide among young women. getting news from social media (sometimes its just stories that confirm what we want or believe to be true) is not good, as opposed to looking at a variety of different sources from different political angles. i think the future is bleak unless we figure it out. http://www.people-press.org/interactives/political-polarization-1994-2017/

Blue/black vs gold/white dress Yanni/laurel Ben Affleck/Sam Harris on real time Google memo It's fascinating to me how two people see the same thing, but interpret things not just slightly differently, but, virtually, the polar opposite of each other. And how you see the latter two, along with this fiasco, is reliably predicted, with few exceptions, by where you stand politically.

Harvey Weinstein, Roman Polanski.

Do you feel the same way today as you did when you posted this?

not wrong, but how much money are drug companies giving politicians? 2.5 billion, if the guardian is correct. that dwarfs any numbers i've seen from the NRA (not that they arent above criticism). "But experts have caution that the relationship between contributions from pro-gun groups and Congress’ reticence to change the nation’s gun laws is complicated at best. The NRA accounts for just a fraction of the contributions lawmakers receive, and the group doesn’t crack the top 50 in terms of spending to the lobby the federal government." i would really like to see that angle pursued (despite the fact that there are kooky people also pursuing that angle).

lol. i was just thinking of this. great minds...? "youre sitting in a chair in the sky!" but it doesnt go back very far....

I'm with you on Taylor. He's one who won't say he's a nazi or racist but advocates separatism. I'll check out mcinness' interview with him.

i think youre right- the label of 'racist' is so strong that its avoided by people who are obviously separatists. you don't need to look any further than the 'journolist' to see that, and how that label can be effectively used. calling someone a racist is very powerful. its also true that some on the left equate ordinary conservatives (and even some people on the left) with the term 'racist'. its practically become a moral panic- everyone is secretly a racist, which is that the OK sign mocks. still, i'm no expert on those two groups but they are doing a poor job keeping minorities our of their club if they are white supremacists. i suspect they are more likely conservatives who like to troll the left.