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Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
You're thinking of a conspiracy. False flag is false identification, e.g. as a disguise or redirection of blame.
Let me clarify. The belief that the ICE shooting was a false flag operation is a conspiracy theory.
Seems like a predictable consequence of making the criminal justice system an explicitly partisan institution, no?
For like a decade now the standard profile of these shooters has been, basically, terminally online losers committing violence as an extreme form of shitposting. What little I’ve seen of this case seems consistent with that archetype. But didn’t these guys (in charge of the FBI now, fresh off careers as right-wing podcasters) try to tell us the last one had “transgender ideology” inscribed on the bullets? Meanwhile the administration they’re plainly partisan agents for tried to use it as a Reichstag fire-esque excuse to crack down on dissent? Why exactly should we take them at their word?
I would say FBI offices are not partisan places, but then again I lived through Russiagate.
The only sign people were trying to point to was that the shooter hit detainees. Now that we know why, and we have a bunch of other evidence, the already incredibly far-fetched theory that it's a setup is even more rediculous. And during the first hours of the Kirk investigation there were leaks, and now we have way more info into his motive, showing that indeed the most likely explanation was the correct one. In this case now as well, he left a note and the bullets. What's remarkable is this guy is screaming to the world why he did it and that fact will presumably be used as evidence it's fake. People are sacrificing more and more of their rational faculties to try and pin bad things on their opponents. Your penultimate sentence is assuming the conclusion.
By the way this is what is wrong with so many of these violence studies. If you try hard enough, you can take any sort of facts and categorize them as you wish. Kirk murder, ICE attack, not political! Gunman who killed people in MN for seemingly personal reasons=right-wing violence. And it's not about the volume entirely. The difference is that everyone here can condemn when some right-wing freak kills someone, but it's like pulling teeth trying to go the other way.
I suggest people stop tying themselves into intellectual knots attached to an ever descending anchor deeper into the echo chamber. If you are at the point where you think the FBI might have set this up then you made many a mistake in getting to this point.
So the only reason I have any doubt about these things or consider them conspiracies is because the really quick release of really questionable evidence that is just so straightforward and ideologically convenient that it boggles the mind. I think the people trying to say these shooters are right wing is pretty braindead, though. They were probably right wing at one point, and then changed their politics due to the realities they were seeing around them. It's also possible these people are just pushing back against whoever they perceive to be in power at any given time, you know, like libertarians always do.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
When that bridge is "just accept you are inferior or your identity is wrong and lesser" that's not much of a bridge, that's a pirate ship plank.
Why do you think that the people lableing these shooters as rightwing are brain-dead? I admit the leaks recently of the shells being engraved before being shown pictures of a sharpie as well as the previous one of kirks shooter that was also bunk is suspicious.
Yes I agree when right wingers deny that there can be transgender people, that gay people don't deserve rights, that immigrants are human beings, that democrats are vermin, that is a pirate ship plank onto violence. When you say that gun violence is acceptable for the 2nd Amendment and that empathy is bad you can't act surprised that people act on that.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
Yes, you children are wrong
On September 26 2025 08:30 Phyanketto wrote:
When that bridge is "just accept you are inferior or your identity is wrong and lesser" that's not much of a bridge, that's a pirate ship plank.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
You pretend to be a centrist but are a right wing stooge.
What are you asking people to cede on? Womens sports? Your whole ridiculous 2 americas conservative and liberal culture? Conservatives dont even have a fucking belief system anymore other than power and lesser thans. In group out group nonsense.
Comey now indicted on bullshit charges. Unbelievable the lows this administration is willing to stoop to. Its a sad day for our country. It will take decades to undue the damage these people are doing. None of these people believe in Democracy or the United States.
If your identity is a nazi, a facist, or a racist then yes you are lesser and wrong. I'm not going to defend the people who want to justify being them and identify as them.
The idea to compare peoples ability to get healthcare and to be acepted for who they love vs who they hate is pretty silly.
Comey: ""My heart is broken for the Department of Justice, but I have great confidence in the federal judicial system. I'm innocent, so let's have a trial and keep the faith," he added."
On September 26 2025 09:39 Sermokala wrote: If your identity is a nazi, a facist, or a racist then yes you are lesser and wrong. I'm not going to defend the people who want to justify being them and identify as them.
The idea to compare peoples ability to get healthcare and to be acepted for who they love vs who they hate is pretty silly.
Seriously. People who want to be treated equally for their opinions (under their control) that people are lesser/wrong (for things not under their control) is an ontological trap. Basically it goes like this: "I'm white and im better than you because you're black, because white is better than black. I don't like being treated as lesser for thinking this, because im right that being white is being better than black, and also I'm white, which is better than black which means that I should in fact be celebrated." And so on.
Speculation I'm seeing runs from a friendly, collaborative meeting that will be remembered fondly by all to Hegseth blowing up the building with everyone still in it. My money is on a dumb power play or a Christian Prayer Session or both.
While the idea of a Saddam Hussein style purge is surreal to imagine, I'm going to guess it's either about Russia or about furloughs during a government shutdown.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
When that bridge is "just accept you are inferior or your identity is wrong and lesser" that's not much of a bridge, that's a pirate ship plank.
You could just have said, that I am right.
On September 26 2025 08:30 Phyanketto wrote:
your identity is wrong and lesser
You mean like Nazi, Fascist, Racist?
Yes
You pretend to be a centrist but are a right wing stooge.
What are you asking people to cede on? Womens sports? Your whole ridiculous 2 americas conservative and liberal culture? Conservatives dont even have a fucking belief system anymore other than power and lesser thans. In group out group nonsense.
Please explain what you want people to cede on.
"You pretend to be a centrist but are a right wing stooge."
The reason you think that is because my position is as alien to you as yours to conservatives.
"What are you asking people to cede on?" Can you even read? I asked what you are willing to cede on not to cede on something.
"Your whole ridiculous 2 americas conservative and liberal culture?" do you know the difference between statement and demand/ask?
On September 26 2025 08:30 Phyanketto wrote:
When that bridge is "just accept you are inferior or your identity is wrong and lesser" that's not much of a bridge, that's a pirate ship plank.
See you are the pirate here matey. Because one has really hard time to find identities more wrong or lesser than, again, Nazi, Fascist, or racist. The only solution you are able to accept is the one where conservatives surrender, or well, disappeared from the plank. Thats what conservatives dont understand, they believe that there is some consensus to be reached.
If you call me a slur for black or gay people I'm not going to be affected I'm just going to be confused beacuse I am neither black nor gay.
I wish conservatives would surrender on nazis, facists, and racists being bad. I would like for them to disappear from the plank defending people who hold to those identities. I would like for them to understand that there is no consensus to be reached with people who hold those identities.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
When that bridge is "just accept you are inferior or your identity is wrong and lesser" that's not much of a bridge, that's a pirate ship plank.
You could just have said, that I am right.
On September 26 2025 08:30 Phyanketto wrote:
your identity is wrong and lesser
You mean like Nazi, Fascist, Racist?
Yes
You pretend to be a centrist but are a right wing stooge.
What are you asking people to cede on? Womens sports? Your whole ridiculous 2 americas conservative and liberal culture? Conservatives dont even have a fucking belief system anymore other than power and lesser thans. In group out group nonsense.
Please explain what you want people to cede on.
"You pretend to be a centrist but are a right wing stooge."
The reason you think that is because my position is as alien to you as yours to conservatives.
"What are you asking people to cede on?" Can you even read? I asked what you are willing to cede on not to cede on something.
"Your whole ridiculous 2 americas conservative and liberal culture?" do you know the difference between statement and demand/ask?
When that bridge is "just accept you are inferior or your identity is wrong and lesser" that's not much of a bridge, that's a pirate ship plank.
See you are the pirate here matey. Because one has really hard time to find identities more wrong or lesser than, again, Nazi, Fascist, or racist. The only solution you are able to accept is the one where conservatives surrender, or well, disappeared from the plank. Thats what conservatives dont understand, they believe that there is some consensus to be reached.
Yeah, full offense, I'm not willing to budge on "all men [sic] are created equal and endowed by their creator [sic] with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
If you are not willing to proceed from this baseline of equality, and instead insist that some are born, by virtue of some factor outside their control, inferior and do not deserve the same rights and freedoms as the rest of us, I do not think you are someone I can reason with. When the antithesis of that baseline of equality is lauded, no, we do not have anything in common, because you are actively espousing the ideas America was founded to avoid ever taking root. And yeah, the framers were hypocrites. But we tried to get better about this, but only one side has had to be dragged kicking and screaming to the baseline of equality, and are now trying to actively tear it down.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
You're thinking of a conspiracy. False flag is false identification, e.g. as a disguise or redirection of blame.
Let me clarify. The belief that the ICE shooting was a false flag operation is a conspiracy theory.
Seems like a predictable consequence of making the criminal justice system an explicitly partisan institution, no?
For like a decade now the standard profile of these shooters has been, basically, terminally online losers committing violence as an extreme form of shitposting. What little I’ve seen of this case seems consistent with that archetype. But didn’t these guys (in charge of the FBI now, fresh off careers as right-wing podcasters) try to tell us the last one had “transgender ideology” inscribed on the bullets? Meanwhile the administration they’re plainly partisan agents for tried to use it as a Reichstag fire-esque excuse to crack down on dissent? Why exactly should we take them at their word?
I would say FBI offices are not partisan places, but then again I lived through Russiagate.
Lol. You saw the news this week that Trump fired somebody for saying they didn’t have evidence to indict Comey? Or that Tom Homan was caught by the FBI taking a $50,000 cash bribe before the new administration shut the investigation down? Are you really gonna say the Russia investigation was equivalent to that?
The only sign people were trying to point to was that the shooter hit detainees. Now that we know why, and we have a bunch of other evidence, the already incredibly far-fetched theory that it's a setup is even more rediculous. And during the first hours of the Kirk investigation there were leaks, and now we have way more info into his motive, showing that indeed the most likely explanation was the correct one. In this case now as well, he left a note and the bullets. What's remarkable is this guy is screaming to the world why he did it and that fact will presumably be used as evidence it's fake. People are sacrificing more and more of their rational faculties to try and pin bad things on their opponents. Your penultimate sentence is assuming the conclusion.
Which conclusion is that? That the ICE attack is a “false flag”? Maybe I don’t know my history, but wasn’t the Reichstag fire probably set by some communist, and then used by the Nazis as an excuse to crack down on unrelated opposition groups?
Kirk’s assassin, to me, fit the incel-adjacent profile of most recent mass shooters, but I’m guessing you’re assigning him as a leftist partisan. Fine, whatever. But after falsely announcing the shooter had inscribed “transgender ideology” on his bullets, the administration tried to say things like “The Democrat Party is not a political party, it is a domestic extremist organization” and that they were going to “dismantle and destroy” left-wing organizations because they’re a “vast domestic terror network.” Sounds like an attempt at a Reichstag fire-esque crackdown to me. Would you consider Horst Wessel a more apt comparison?
By the way this is what is wrong with so many of these violence studies. If you try hard enough, you can take any sort of facts and categorize them as you wish. Kirk murder, ICE attack, not political! Gunman who killed people in MN for seemingly personal reasons=right-wing violence. And it's not about the volume entirely. The difference is that everyone here can condemn when some right-wing freak kills someone, but it's like pulling teeth trying to go the other way.
I suggest people stop tying themselves into intellectual knots attached to an ever descending anchor deeper into the echo chamber. If you are at the point where you think the FBI might have set this up then you made many a mistake in getting to this point.
I don’t really care about how you count violence for the score-keeping exercise. I never said I thought it was a false flag thing, in fact I think I explicitly said otherwise, but at the same time when an authoritarian government is forcing formerly nonpartisan information sources to issue state-friendly propaganda instead, people are going to start to think conspiratorially. I’m not aware of any evidence the Reichstag fire was actually set by Nazi agents, but could you blame people at the time for wondering if it might have been?
Yes, I see what's happening with Comey. That's not the FBI indicting him though, in fact I'm not sure what the FBI has to do with it at all. But I am going to say that the Russia investigation turned out much, much worse than all those things you mentioned. The damage it did to our political process dwarfs those other things and is a precursor that needs to be understood for what's happening now. Along with things like the BS Alvin Bragg case, etc. When Russiagate seems like it might have had legs I was saying things like "bring on President Pence!" but it turned out to be...overhyped. Anyways.
I'm not assigning the Kirk shooter as a left-wing partisan, but I am saying he did it for obviously left-wing reasons. You are placing a lot of weight on initial (anonymous, I believe) reports that turned out to be pointing in the right direction (the weird cope that "a right-winger shot another right-winger" was more wrong than what those reports said). But even so, I think it's a jump to try and justify skepticism of that degree, as you seemed to do at the start by saying
Seems like a predictable consequence of making the criminal justice system an explicitly partisan institution, no?
Using "real" violence as an excuse for a crackdown is a tale as old as time, although hopefully we can say the initial violence is also bad on its own (de)merits.
I’m not aware of any evidence the Reichstag fire was actually set by Nazi agents, but could you blame people at the time for wondering if it might have been?
No, but I have an apparently quite unpopular view that we are not, and are not going to be, Nazi Germany. And given the way that people leak to the press in Republican administrations I suspect such a plot would be exposed rather quickly were it attempted. Another very old story.
I guess the main point is, saying this could be a fake is going too far down the rabbit hole, although it appears maybe there is some backing off now.
On September 26 2025 12:21 Introvert wrote: No, but I have an apparently quite unpopular view that we are not, and are not going to be, Nazi Germany. And given the way that people leak to the press in Republican administrations I suspect such a plot would be exposed rather quickly were it attempted. Another very old story.
People do, often, go right to the Nazis, because they're the only fascists shitty enough that everyone knows who they are and what they did. Does the average american (or even european) know about things under Franco? Pinochet? Batista?
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
You're thinking of a conspiracy. False flag is false identification, e.g. as a disguise or redirection of blame.
Let me clarify. The belief that the ICE shooting was a false flag operation is a conspiracy theory.
Seems like a predictable consequence of making the criminal justice system an explicitly partisan institution, no?
For like a decade now the standard profile of these shooters has been, basically, terminally online losers committing violence as an extreme form of shitposting. What little I’ve seen of this case seems consistent with that archetype. But didn’t these guys (in charge of the FBI now, fresh off careers as right-wing podcasters) try to tell us the last one had “transgender ideology” inscribed on the bullets? Meanwhile the administration they’re plainly partisan agents for tried to use it as a Reichstag fire-esque excuse to crack down on dissent? Why exactly should we take them at their word?
I would say FBI offices are not partisan places, but then again I lived through Russiagate.
Lol. You saw the news this week that Trump fired somebody for saying they didn’t have evidence to indict Comey? Or that Tom Homan was caught by the FBI taking a $50,000 cash bribe before the new administration shut the investigation down? Are you really gonna say the Russia investigation was equivalent to that?
The only sign people were trying to point to was that the shooter hit detainees. Now that we know why, and we have a bunch of other evidence, the already incredibly far-fetched theory that it's a setup is even more rediculous. And during the first hours of the Kirk investigation there were leaks, and now we have way more info into his motive, showing that indeed the most likely explanation was the correct one. In this case now as well, he left a note and the bullets. What's remarkable is this guy is screaming to the world why he did it and that fact will presumably be used as evidence it's fake. People are sacrificing more and more of their rational faculties to try and pin bad things on their opponents. Your penultimate sentence is assuming the conclusion.
Which conclusion is that? That the ICE attack is a “false flag”? Maybe I don’t know my history, but wasn’t the Reichstag fire probably set by some communist, and then used by the Nazis as an excuse to crack down on unrelated opposition groups?
Kirk’s assassin, to me, fit the incel-adjacent profile of most recent mass shooters, but I’m guessing you’re assigning him as a leftist partisan. Fine, whatever. But after falsely announcing the shooter had inscribed “transgender ideology” on his bullets, the administration tried to say things like “The Democrat Party is not a political party, it is a domestic extremist organization” and that they were going to “dismantle and destroy” left-wing organizations because they’re a “vast domestic terror network.” Sounds like an attempt at a Reichstag fire-esque crackdown to me. Would you consider Horst Wessel a more apt comparison?
By the way this is what is wrong with so many of these violence studies. If you try hard enough, you can take any sort of facts and categorize them as you wish. Kirk murder, ICE attack, not political! Gunman who killed people in MN for seemingly personal reasons=right-wing violence. And it's not about the volume entirely. The difference is that everyone here can condemn when some right-wing freak kills someone, but it's like pulling teeth trying to go the other way.
I suggest people stop tying themselves into intellectual knots attached to an ever descending anchor deeper into the echo chamber. If you are at the point where you think the FBI might have set this up then you made many a mistake in getting to this point.
I don’t really care about how you count violence for the score-keeping exercise. I never said I thought it was a false flag thing, in fact I think I explicitly said otherwise, but at the same time when an authoritarian government is forcing formerly nonpartisan information sources to issue state-friendly propaganda instead, people are going to start to think conspiratorially. I’m not aware of any evidence the Reichstag fire was actually set by Nazi agents, but could you blame people at the time for wondering if it might have been?
Yes, I see what's happening with Comey. That's not the FBI indicting him though, in fact I'm not sure what the FBI has to do with it at all. But I am going to say that the Russia investigation turned out much, much worse than all those things you mentioned. The damage it did to our political process dwarfs those other things and is a precursor that needs to be understood for what's happening now. Along with things like the BS Alvin Bragg case, etc. When Russiagate seems like it might have had legs I was saying things like "bring on President Pence!" but it turned out to be...overhyped. Anyways.
I'm not assigning the Kirk shooter as a left-wing partisan, but I am saying he did it for obviously left-wing reasons. You are placing a lot of weight on initial (anonymous, I believe) reports that turned out to be pointing in the right direction (the weird cope that "a right-winger shot another right-winger" was more wrong than what those reports said). But even so, I think it's a jump to try and justify skepticism of that degree, as you seemed to do at the start by saying
Seems like a predictable consequence of making the criminal justice system an explicitly partisan institution, no?
Using "real" violence as an excuse for a crackdown is a tale as old as time, although hopefully we can say the initial violence is also bad on its own (de)merits.
I’m not aware of any evidence the Reichstag fire was actually set by Nazi agents, but could you blame people at the time for wondering if it might have been?
No, but I have an apparently quite unpopular view that we are not, and are not going to be, Nazi Germany. And given the way that people leak to the press in Republican administrations I suspect such a plot would be exposed rather quickly were it attempted. Another very old story.
I guess the main point is, saying this could be a fake is going too far down the rabbit hole, although it appears maybe there is some backing off now.
Come on, this is silly. You’re gonna act this dense about the concept of an analogy? And firing prosecutors until you get someone willing to indict your political enemies is fine because, what, they were unfair to Carter Page a decade ago? Normally when you’re on a wild one I can just go check the National Review front page to figure out what you’re on about, but this seems to be all you.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
I dont think you do. Thats the problem conservatives have, they dont realise who they dealing with. Some of you say that Liberals are in the cult, but you cant quite grasp implications of that. Most of conservatives seems to still believe that there is some gap to bridge/common ground. There isnt. There is not a single social issue they are willing to cede ground on, more so, even if you grant them all they ask for, they will come back with new demands.
I would say it's more a hope born of necessity. For reasons both ideological and cultural it can be harder for people on the left to countenance people who disagree with them very strongly but that's part of why I think it will take some great national struggle or disaster to return our government to better functioning. Things will have to be placed aside, on both left and right.
Is it a realistic possibility that the US Government is going to go into shut down, or will the Democrats fold?
This seems like the kind of tactic that the Republicans have been perfectly happy to use to get their way when a Democrat has been in the White House, but that Democrats are unwilling to use when a Republican is in the White House.
Democrats caused the longest shutdown ever in Trump's first term.
You probably don't remember because it's the government, so nobody noticed they stopped doing nothing.
On September 25 2025 13:52 Phyanketto wrote: So how we feeling on the ice shooter? The fact that "anti-ice" was written on the casings is pretty braindead. He attacked a facility and only killed detainees, but all the news and government talking heads are speaking like ice agents themselves were the ones injured and killed. Prima facie idiocy, even. Luigi really did a number on these people that every staged event now has bullets with writing on them, and they keep getting dumber and dumber.
Kash can't even stage a false flag right. I'm not the only one who thinks that's what this is right? Eventually they're going to find the shooter was trans or something, mark my words, because they can't stop themselves from double dipping every time.
ICE was obviously the target.
There is no contingent of people who are mad at ICE for detaining and deporting people instead of executing them, who would write "FUCK ICE" on bullets, snipe carefully at an ICE facility avoiding killing the hero ICE agents that the shooter is mad aren't doing what they're supposed to which is kill, and then commit suicide, rather than just shooting all the brown people he sees, like the guy in El Paso did. It doesn't make a lick of sense.
The government can write on a shell casing with a marker, sure, anyone could do that. But they can't find someone to do a mission like that and shoot themselves, they can't find someone they would trust not to expose the conspiracy, and they can't find someone who they could promise wouldn't get caught or shot and believe it, after every single other person has been caught or shot.
I like the thread dichotomy between "the fascists deserve it and whst did they expect?" with "these recent shootings are actually right-wing." I understand why they don't like the bullets though, it makes it harder to pin an event on their preferred target in the immediate aftermath. Meanwhile we are to assume that since he shot into a van he couldn't see into and hit people he didnt intend, it's a false flag. A very devoted one, since the shooter killed himself after, as you said. But maybe Luigi was a false flag, after all the person he killed was head of a company that didnt do anything to him. And no one pushed back on this as of yet. Really losing it in here recently.
You're thinking of a conspiracy. False flag is false identification, e.g. as a disguise or redirection of blame.
Let me clarify. The belief that the ICE shooting was a false flag operation is a conspiracy theory.
Seems like a predictable consequence of making the criminal justice system an explicitly partisan institution, no?
For like a decade now the standard profile of these shooters has been, basically, terminally online losers committing violence as an extreme form of shitposting. What little I’ve seen of this case seems consistent with that archetype. But didn’t these guys (in charge of the FBI now, fresh off careers as right-wing podcasters) try to tell us the last one had “transgender ideology” inscribed on the bullets? Meanwhile the administration they’re plainly partisan agents for tried to use it as a Reichstag fire-esque excuse to crack down on dissent? Why exactly should we take them at their word?
I would say FBI offices are not partisan places, but then again I lived through Russiagate.
Lol. You saw the news this week that Trump fired somebody for saying they didn’t have evidence to indict Comey? Or that Tom Homan was caught by the FBI taking a $50,000 cash bribe before the new administration shut the investigation down? Are you really gonna say the Russia investigation was equivalent to that?
The only sign people were trying to point to was that the shooter hit detainees. Now that we know why, and we have a bunch of other evidence, the already incredibly far-fetched theory that it's a setup is even more rediculous. And during the first hours of the Kirk investigation there were leaks, and now we have way more info into his motive, showing that indeed the most likely explanation was the correct one. In this case now as well, he left a note and the bullets. What's remarkable is this guy is screaming to the world why he did it and that fact will presumably be used as evidence it's fake. People are sacrificing more and more of their rational faculties to try and pin bad things on their opponents. Your penultimate sentence is assuming the conclusion.
Which conclusion is that? That the ICE attack is a “false flag”? Maybe I don’t know my history, but wasn’t the Reichstag fire probably set by some communist, and then used by the Nazis as an excuse to crack down on unrelated opposition groups?
Kirk’s assassin, to me, fit the incel-adjacent profile of most recent mass shooters, but I’m guessing you’re assigning him as a leftist partisan. Fine, whatever. But after falsely announcing the shooter had inscribed “transgender ideology” on his bullets, the administration tried to say things like “The Democrat Party is not a political party, it is a domestic extremist organization” and that they were going to “dismantle and destroy” left-wing organizations because they’re a “vast domestic terror network.” Sounds like an attempt at a Reichstag fire-esque crackdown to me. Would you consider Horst Wessel a more apt comparison?
By the way this is what is wrong with so many of these violence studies. If you try hard enough, you can take any sort of facts and categorize them as you wish. Kirk murder, ICE attack, not political! Gunman who killed people in MN for seemingly personal reasons=right-wing violence. And it's not about the volume entirely. The difference is that everyone here can condemn when some right-wing freak kills someone, but it's like pulling teeth trying to go the other way.
I suggest people stop tying themselves into intellectual knots attached to an ever descending anchor deeper into the echo chamber. If you are at the point where you think the FBI might have set this up then you made many a mistake in getting to this point.
I don’t really care about how you count violence for the score-keeping exercise. I never said I thought it was a false flag thing, in fact I think I explicitly said otherwise, but at the same time when an authoritarian government is forcing formerly nonpartisan information sources to issue state-friendly propaganda instead, people are going to start to think conspiratorially. I’m not aware of any evidence the Reichstag fire was actually set by Nazi agents, but could you blame people at the time for wondering if it might have been?
Yes, I see what's happening with Comey. That's not the FBI indicting him though, in fact I'm not sure what the FBI has to do with it at all. But I am going to say that the Russia investigation turned out much, much worse than all those things you mentioned. The damage it did to our political process dwarfs those other things and is a precursor that needs to be understood for what's happening now. Along with things like the BS Alvin Bragg case, etc. When Russiagate seems like it might have had legs I was saying things like "bring on President Pence!" but it turned out to be...overhyped. Anyways.
I'm not assigning the Kirk shooter as a left-wing partisan, but I am saying he did it for obviously left-wing reasons. You are placing a lot of weight on initial (anonymous, I believe) reports that turned out to be pointing in the right direction (the weird cope that "a right-winger shot another right-winger" was more wrong than what those reports said). But even so, I think it's a jump to try and justify skepticism of that degree, as you seemed to do at the start by saying
Seems like a predictable consequence of making the criminal justice system an explicitly partisan institution, no?
Using "real" violence as an excuse for a crackdown is a tale as old as time, although hopefully we can say the initial violence is also bad on its own (de)merits.
I’m not aware of any evidence the Reichstag fire was actually set by Nazi agents, but could you blame people at the time for wondering if it might have been?
No, but I have an apparently quite unpopular view that we are not, and are not going to be, Nazi Germany. And given the way that people leak to the press in Republican administrations I suspect such a plot would be exposed rather quickly were it attempted. Another very old story.
I guess the main point is, saying this could be a fake is going too far down the rabbit hole, although it appears maybe there is some backing off now.
Come on, this is silly. You’re gonna act this dense about the concept of an analogy? And firing prosecutors until you get someone willing to indict your political enemies is fine because, what, they were unfair to Carter Page a decade ago? Normally when you’re on a wild one I can just go check the National Review front page to figure out what you’re on about, but this seems to be all you.
Not sure which analogy you think I don't get, but in case you haven't been reading the thread lately fascist and Nazi comparisons abound.
I'm spoilering this because I see you have decided to change the emphasis of this convo. It wasn't just Carter Page. It was also Flynn. It was Trump himself by gumming up the works with investigations all over the place, putting his people through expensive legal procedures, sucking all the Oxygen out of the room of the start of his term, dissuading good people from working for him, even leading to the firing of his first AG, and other things besides. And of course it contributed to the distrust of state apperatus that is now being expressed in its own way r.e. this shooting. You can draw a direct line from there to here. I don't know the details of the case against Comey. I did read the reporting that Bondi was reluctant, but as one person put it "Comey is the most deserving person for unfair prosecution ever". Not sure why people thought that indicting Trump on mostly BS wasnt going to backfire, but Democrats are nothing if not short-sighted.
EPT
