The LA riots

[TIDE-HSV]

Coming to a city near you:

Seeing reports that ICE has Special Response Teams on stand by for New York City, Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia and Northern Virginia.

It is likely to be a long hot summer and we will have much to discuss on Tidefans.

We have a SA (Brownshirts in Nazi party) problem. Trump and his underlings wan to make a huge show on their one strong point, immigration. After promises to concentrate on actual criminals, apparently quotas have been sent. Rather than the time and effort-consuming process of rooting out real criminals, ICE has opted to grab the low-hanging fruit, in order to meet quotas. That means schools, courts, Home Depots, etc. They seem to be determined to prove what economists already know - this country can't run without undocumented labor. It takes the house going unroofed or the nanny not showing before people are confronted with this uncomfortable reality. Back several years ago, Alabama decided to go on its own anti-immigrant drive. First, the poultry processing plants on Sand Mountain ground almost to a halt, then the hosiery mills in NE Alabama. Then the howls started from around Birmingham and agriculture further south. Without formal announcement, the pressure was just eased off. I wouldn't be surprised to see it happen on a national basis. What we need is a rational, sane immigration policy...

 

[CrimsonJazz]

 

[UAH]

We have a SA (Brownshirts in Nazi party) problem. Trump and his underlings wan to make a huge show on their one strong point, immigration. After promises to concentrate on actual criminals, apparently quotas have been sent. Rather than the time and effort-consuming process of rooting out real criminals, ICE has opted to grab the low-hanging fruit, in order to meet quotas. That means schools, courts, Home Depots, etc. They seem to be determined to prove what economists already know - this country can't run without undocumented labor. It takes the house going unroofed or the nanny not showing before people are confronted with this uncomfortable reality. Back several years ago, Alabama decided to go on its own anti-immigrant drive. First, the poultry processing plants on Sand Mountain ground almost to a halt, then the hosiery mills in NE Alabama. Then the howls started from around Birmingham and agriculture further south. Without formal announcement, the pressure was just eased off. I wouldn't be surprised to see it happen on a national basis. What we need is a rational, sane immigration policy...

Much of the food processing industry nation wide provides temporary housing for their migrant work force. My primary concern has been food availability and of course what it may cost. I haven't seen ICE agents out in the fields but that could happen soon enough. I see reports that Stephen Miller is the force pushing to grow the arrest numbers This administration doesn't know much about how the real world works when it comes to immigration and tariffs.

Lutnik is in negotiations with China pleading for them to release rare earth magnets for the automotive and defense industry and the US releasing more advanced chips that were previously restricted. It would have been nice to know what the US needed from China before bloviating about how high the US would raise tariffs on them.

 

[CrimsonJazz]

Wait—Billionaire Christy Walton, as in one of the heirs to the Walmart fortune, is helping fund the June 14th protests?

You mean the same Walmart that pays so little a huge chunk of their full-time employees qualify for food stamps and housing assistance?

The same Walmart that got caught taking out life insurance policies on ill employees so they could cash in when they died? Frequently referred to as “dead peasant insurance.”

Huh. Weird.
I wonder what her motivations could possibly be…

Sources:

Billionaire Walmart Heiress Urges People To ‘Mobilize’ At June 14 Anti-Trump Protests

The 76-year-old Christy Walton has aligned herself with “No Kings,” an organization planning mass protests across the country this Saturday.

forbes.com

Walmart Sued For Collecting Life Insurance on Employees

By James CallOriginally published May 7, 2010http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wfsu/local-wfsu-900732.mp3Tallahassee, FL – The Florida…

news.wfsu.org

Walmart and McDonald's are among top employers of Medicaid and food stamp beneficiaries, report says

Walmart and McDonald's are among the top employers of beneficiaries of Medicaid and food stamps, according to a GAO study commissioned by Sen. Bernie Sanders.

cnbc.com

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1932847506171294027

 

[selmaborntidefan]

Your reminder from five years ago this week that "you see, sometimes RIOTING is GREAT!!"

In Defense of Destroying Property | The Nation

 

[stlimprov]

As much as it pains me to in any way take up for these people, I'm pretty sure Christy Walton does not, and has never, had anything to do with the actual operation of Wal Mart. I'm not sure her passive money is even particularly tied to Wal Mart.

It's not like we have to take that specious leap to have plenty to criticize about either billionaire heirs or the Wal Marts of the world.

 

[Maudiemae]

Hopefully, they’ll mostly be “peaceful protests.”

I'm hoping nobody tries to push them into something which can be fodder for media trying to frame it as rioting in need of control. I genuinely think that's what trump wants. We aren't going now due to health situations. Unfortunately, this has been more than a month of what I'm calling a cavalcade of catastrophes, some not so serious but some have been. I hope the protests remain as they are intended to be. Peaceful. Everyone has instructions on this. At least everyone who is actually part of the groups.

 

[CrimsonJazz]

As much as it pains me to in any way take up for these people, I'm pretty sure Christy Walton does not, and has never, had anything to do with the actual operation of Wal Mart. I'm not sure her passive money is even particularly tied to Wal Mart.

It's not like we have to take that specious leap to have plenty to criticize about either billionaire heirs or the Wal Marts of the world.

So rather than have an ulterior motive, she's just a progressive idiot with too much money? That's not much of an improvement (in terms of optics.) I prefer my Waltons to be super-villains.

 

[CrimsonJazz]

Gov. @GavinNewsom and Democrats are trying to gaslight the public by saying the violent insurrection in Los Angeles was “incited” by President Trump having the National Guard federalized on the ground. There was THREE days of assaults, arson attacks and looting before the guardsmen mobilized to protect federal property.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1932906655273959476

 

[selmaborntidefan]

Heather Cox Richardson became the go to source for “sensible” critique of the Trump presidency in 2019 but have increasingly became more and more unhinged in their interpretations of events to the point they sound like the unhinged Trumpers that they constantly complain about

She started normal and became an absolute quack.

Hint: anyone who says "historian here" is about to feed you some serious stuff from the barnyard.
What they usually give is their sanitized "good guys/bad guys" narrative. As I said, she used to be halfway decent but became unhinged in the last election. All that crying about "Trump and tariffs" but not one word of criticism for Biden extending those same tariffs.

At which point you cease to be a historian and become a hack. (It should also be noted that most of their dissertations are little more than taking in one another's laundry, which is why rampant plagiarism wasn't discovered until Bill (H)Ackman exposed it with the Ivy Leaguers).

 

[crimsonaudio]

 

[Tidewater]

Two things occurred to me while driving around this afternoon.

The same party now complaining about the federal government sending in the national guard complained about it in 1861 (and, for the record, I think with some basis in the Constitution). And before anyone says, "But in 1861, it was an insurrection," I will point out that in both cases federal authorities were attacked and the same number of federal officers died, which is zero.

The other thing that occurred to me was that for what seemed like a decade, the British Tories were blessed with an absolutely loonie opposition (Jeremy Corbin). I bet the leader of the Tories sent Corbin a birthday card every year because the British public kept saying, "The Tories are knuckleheads but look at the alternative!" The Republicans are in sort of the same situation. They are knuckleheads, blessed with really dumb opponents.

 

[Bazza]

 

[stlimprov]

So rather than have an ulterior motive, she's just a progressive idiot with too much money? That's not much of an improvement (in terms of optics.) I prefer my Waltons to be super-villains.

I've got some Arkansas ties, and as such know some folks who have worked with and around some of the extended heirs. I don't know that "progressive" or "conservative" means the same thing when we're talking about those people. Whatever they do is sort of a mixed bag, with the common element being that they more or less get to do whatever they feel like.

I mean, whether the idiot is "progressive" or "conservative" at a given moment doesn't change that they are usually living in a different world, but tend to think that they understand the other world much better than they do, and that they're doing the universe a favor by impacting it with that understanding. Sometimes we get some nice bike trails or a chess museum out of the deal, but we're mostly just ants and they are the kid poking the hill with a stick.

That's super-villiany enough for me, with an enticing side of potential greek tragedy.

 

[75thru79]

As much as it pains me to in any way take up for these people, I'm pretty sure Christy Walton does not, and has never, had anything to do with the actual operation of Wal Mart. I'm not sure her passive money is even particularly tied to Wal Mart.

It's not like we have to take that specious leap to have plenty to criticize about either billionaire heirs or the Wal Marts of the world.

From Wikipedia:

Forbes listed Christy Walton as the richest woman in the world for several years.[2][4] Her net worth was estimated to $41.7 billion in March 2015,[4] the bulk of which came from her shares in Walmart, but also from First Solar, in which her husband had invested

 

[selmaborntidefan]

I've got some Arkansas ties, and as such know some folks who have worked with and around some of the extended heirs. I don't know that "progressive" or "conservative" means the same thing when we're talking about those people. Whatever they do is sort of a mixed bag, with the common element being that they more or less get to do whatever they feel like.

I mean, whether the idiot is "progressive" or "conservative" at a given moment doesn't change that they are usually living in a different world, but tend to think that they understand the other world much better than they do,

I don't mean this to stereotype but has there ever been an American billionaire who wasn't at least a tad bit nutty? And I don't just mean "views everything through the business prism," I mean absolute flakes to a point.

Look at how many billionaire sports team owners insert themselves into the process thinking "well, I'm a billionaire, so I understand sports", and they (more often than not) wreck the team. But you'll see this in every walk of life, too. Ross Perot, for example, notoriously made up stories that turned him into a standup, brave guy (his employees would call his tendency to tall tales "Rossing," where he'd make up a preposterous story about something he did, which his confidantes knew was going to blow him up once the news media figured him out). Vince McMahon clearly has pathological issues as to Ted Turner, Trump (and I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt since he alone is the source of his claim to be a billionaire; most billionaires on the record consider him "a clown living on credit"), Bill Gates, Mark Cuban, Dan Snyder, etc.

They're all just a bit nuts.

 

[stlimprov]

From Wikipedia:

Forbes listed Christy Walton as the richest woman in the world for several years.[2][4] Her net worth was estimated to $41.7 billion in March 2015,[4] the bulk of which came from her shares in Walmart, but also from First Solar, in which her husband had invested

Emphasis added. Just a guess, but I think a lot of that was structured as options, some of which would have been exercised long ago. It also turns out that some of that 41.7b figure may have been wrong, as a chunk of the husband's wealth passed directly to the son.

I now know more about this person than I ever really wanted to.

Again: I'm just maybe the most anti-billionaire heir person on this board. But here I am, just trying to point out that it's complicated.

 

[stlimprov]

I don't mean this to stereotype but has there ever been an American billionaire who wasn't at least a tad bit nutty? And I don't just mean "views everything through the business prism," I mean absolute flakes to a point.

Look at how many billionaire sports team owners insert themselves into the process thinking "well, I'm a billionaire, so I understand sports", and they (more often than not) wreck the team. But you'll see this in every walk of life, too. Ross Perot, for example, notoriously made up stories that turned him into a standup, brave guy (his employees would call his tendency to tall tales "Rossing," where he'd make up a preposterous story about something he did, which his confidantes knew was going to blow him up once the news media figured him out). Vince McMahon clearly has pathological issues as to Ted Turner, Trump (and I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt since he alone is the source of his claim to be a billionaire; most billionaires on the record consider him "a clown living on credit"), Bill Gates, Mark Cuban, Dan Snyder, etc.

They're all just a bit nuts.

Allow me to borrow this quip from the world of archives:

Poor people are hoarders. Rich people are collectors.

 

[CrimsonJazz]

Not all heroes wear capes…

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1933008172832498039

Pretty good form here. Get this kid an NIL deal.

 

[Bodhisattva]

Not all heroes wear capes…

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1933008172832498039

Pretty good form here. Get this kid an NIL deal.

Needs a Jim Ross voiceover: Good Gawd Almighty!