An ideal America starts with ideal Americans and let's get real, forty percent morbid obesity with third world crime rates is not the ideal anything. The country has rot from the ground up.

RR says America hasn't come close to living up to its purported values. I am inferring that he says this because he is dissatisfied with the outcomes of MANY. Americans suck, and RR is absolutely right about that. I dont think anyone can possibly disagree that Americans suck. Everyone hates us around the world and then Americans hate each other about twice as much as the rest of the world hates them.

But I dont think that's the government's fault. I dont think its the system's fault. I think this system is fine, by and large. Its actually when we stray from the value of giving people equal opportunity for failure and success that I think we lose our way.

This is going to reach a head pretty soon.

I don't say you but I think the general public is misremembering the Kap timeline. He was a bit incoherent in his protest at the beginning and looked like he was a puppet of of an activist girlfriend, as he had never been a participant in these types of discussions in the past. I think there was some point in there where he praised the police and then wore socks picturing the police as pigs. There was confusion and inconsistency in what exactly he was saying.

Once his actions started to gain prominence, he was advised by people like Harry Edwards, who has been associated with the 49ers and has put serious thought into the matter for decades. They helped him to have a more directed and sophisticated message on the subject.

Nobody wants to break up the union. Many want an authoritarian mandate that those "who disagree" be severely punished instead. People not interested in authoritarian mandates are hated by those who do.

This is why Antarctica is wrong when he says the system is fine. Unlimited terms and gerrymandering should not be allowed, and BOTH parties use these heavily to their advantage.

If you're protesting because you have a Democrat governor or you want a haircut and to sit inside Telegram Sam's restaurant and eat in the middle of a pandemic, you're an American who believes in her. If you're protesting because you're afraid someone is going to take your guns away, you are and American who believes in her. If you're protesting in support of the 14th amendment then you are clearly anti-American/don't like America and want to destroy the country. It's the same tired dog whistling every time.

This is going to reach a head pretty soon.

The system is run by people though. The same system that you claim "works fine" is the same system that is inherently contradictory. It always has been.

Did you see my pick sides? Both sides are guilty of it, needs to stop. The FF messed up they never thought people would get as greedy and power hungry as we are.

So, no kneeling for prayer, no kneeling for protest.

✓

I think for many that's probably a fair point. And I would agree that obviously America hasn't always lived up to her ideals, but I do think we've always made progress.

Anyway, my point wasn't to disparage those who don't like America even if I disagree with them. Like I said, we don't have to have America. And ultimately we won't. The America we have always known is not a permanent state.

Maybe it's time to consider some type of reconfiguration. I think there a lot of people who consider the Bill of Rights to be our highest values and many who think they don't matter at all. Perhaps some kind of amicable separation would be a good thing.

Don't be so sure. When saying that you love the flag and respect veterans becomes controversial, we might have passed into a new moral paradigm.

Nevertheless, people on both sides attempt to score cheap points by defending or belittling the flag (and what it represents).

Nobody was really protesting the right to get a haircut or go to Applebee's, that's not why those people were demonstrating. You know that and I know that.

It's more fun to be a victim

There will never be an effective vaccine. I'll never get one anyway.

They may administer it, but they certainly didn't design it. The only thing really saving the USA from itself is the protections built into the system that prevent it from being hi-jacked by an unruly, entitled mob.

Unfortunately those protections can only hold against so much for so long.

This is going to reach a head pretty soon.

I don't think that's true. It's happening informally right now as people have been segregating themselves based upon political beliefs.

There was an inherent contradiction created by the people that designed it too.

There was an inherent contradiction created by the people that designed it too.

It's just certain aging segments can't conceal their fears or view every change as a personal indictment.

And both cable news, the chattering class and social media are there to amplify it like never before.

Yep. Its the sort of thinking which leads people to cheer someone for telling actual Americans to "go back to where they came from"

That's been happening since the sixties, often with the approval of government at every level.

Exactly! It's just another attempt to completely dismiss what people are saying. "We protest things because we're Americans who love this country, THEY protest because they're democrats or minorities who hate our country." It's complete stupidity, but it is guaranteed to happen every time. Anyone who wants the country to improve doesn't hate her. Few things are more American than demanding progress.

It's just another attempt to completely dismiss what people are saying.

If you're protesting because you have a Democrat governor or you want a haircut and to sit inside Telegram Sam's restaurant and eat in the middle of a pandemic, you're an American who believes in her.

It's more fun to be a victim

There will never be an effective vaccine. I'll never get one anyway.

Yep. Its the sort of thinking which leads people to cheer someone for telling actual Americans to "go back to where they came from"

"We dont hate America! We just think it should be more Marxist-Leninist" nobody buys this shit Nas. At the end of the day the point you make is hollow because the political and economic aspirations of this movement are tied up in a broader ideology that is, well and truly, anti-American from a values perspective.

This is going to reach a head pretty soon.

You know how I can tell this has gone way overboard? I got a #BLM email from both Chewy.com and PetSmart.com

Black Labs Matter.

I am not a legal expert, how many times do I have to say it?

What is wrong is the one sided conversations coming out of it. Take for example the Opra thing coming out this week. Two nights 3 hours each night across all the Discovery channels. All the "guests" have one thing in common. Not one person of the opposite race, how can you have an honest conversation on race and how to fix it if you do not have the opposing view point.

You literally did just that not more than 15 minutes ago.

That's still not breaking up. That's still trying to own the "union." Extremists of all kinds participate, and can be found by watching who insists that they are "right" or "just" and that those who disagree are "evil" "stupid" or "subhuman"

I literally didn't do that. I supported those protests even though I knew they were Trump rallies. I didn't accuse them of being Un-American. We have a long thread of proof.

It's more fun to be a victim

There will never be an effective vaccine. I'll never get one anyway.