OT- Riots, who is responsible?

[gil]

Here is what Attorney General William Barr said at a press conference yesterday:

"As I told the governors on Monday, we understand the distinction among three different sets of actors. The large preponderance of those who are protesting are peaceful demonstrators who are exercising their First Amendment rights.

"At some demonstrations, there are groups that exploit the opportunity to engage in looting. And finally, at some demonstration, there are extremist agitators who are hijacking the protests to pursue their own separate and violent agenda.

"We have evidence that Antifa and other similar extremist groups, as well as actors of a variety of different political persuasions, have been involved in instigating and participating in the violent activity. We are also seeing foreign actors playing all sides to exacerbate the violence."

This is from the Department of Justice web site: https://www.justice.gov/opa/speech/atto ... vil-unrest

Just to emphasize, the attorney General of the United States is placing blame not only on Antifa, but also "actors of a variety of different political persuasions." And he cites "foreign actors playing all sides to exacerbate the violence."

You know, the last part reminds me or probably my biggest takeaway from the Senate's report on Russian interference in the 2016 election: They (Russian psychological operations) were effectively amplifying extreme views from various positions via social media. Just stir up the Left to believe horrible things about the Right, and stir up the Right to believe horrible things about the Left. Black people: White people are out to get you. White people: Black people are out to get you. Do you think it is working? Getting Americans to turn on each other? I suspect that Putin is cautiously optimistic.

[D-train]

I think the vast majority of Americans judge people based on the content of their character as opposed to the color of their skin so I have no worries. I doubt Putin cares about race relations in the US. If he did he would have pounced last week. lol

[gil]

Definitely agree with you about the vast majority of Americans. But ... someone has already pounced. Thousands of tweets and Facebook posts that George Floyd's death was faked. Thousands of tweets blaming white nationalists for the violence. Some of these accounts post hundreds of times an hour ... or so I hear. Seriously, I fear the existence of psychological operations using social media that are designed to bring out the worst in us. To polar us more. That is what the Senate report concluded.

[D-train]

Definitely agree with you about the vast majority of Americans. But ... someone has already pounced. Thousands of tweets and Facebook posts that George Floyd's death was faked. Thousands of tweets blaming white nationalists for the violence. Some of these accounts post hundreds of times an hour ... or so I hear. Seriously, I fear the existence of psychological operations using social media that are designed to bring out the worst in us. To polar us more. That is what the Senate report concluded.

I am more worried about bias of the MSM which reached hundreds of millions of people vs. a few hundred thousand people that are naive enough to fall for troll postings an social media. I think we will come out of this in flying colors. btw Amazing the markets have almost fully recovered from the March lows just single digits % points from their all time highs. Amazing resilience.

[gil]

Definitely agree with you about the vast majority of Americans. But ... someone has already pounced. Thousands of tweets and Facebook posts that George Floyd's death was faked. Thousands of tweets blaming white nationalists for the violence. Some of these accounts post hundreds of times an hour ... or so I hear. Seriously, I fear the existence of psychological operations using social media that are designed to bring out the worst in us. To polar us more. That is what the Senate report concluded.

I am more worried about bias of the MSM which reached hundreds of millions of people vs. a few hundred thousand people that are naive enough to fall for troll postings an social media. I think we will come out of this in flying colors. btw Amazing the markets have almost fully recovered from the March lows just single digits % points from their all time highs. Amazing resilience.

What bias regarding the cause of the riots do you see on the MSM? That was where I found (AG) Barr's comments. Of course I went to the source (DOJ site) to make sure the MSM hadn't misrepresented them.

[D-train]

Not specific to the riots. The MSM in general. But yeah they basically were saying the riots we're a very small minority relative to the protesters

[Grandma Lynn]

"Don't fund the police"?
Okay, then don't protect that
city either! No gov't handouts,
etc.

[ddraig]

The response will be seen this weekend. More people showing up to support BLM (which doesn't give a rip about black lives. Do they scream when 25 blacks are murdered in one weekend in Chicago? They only hear the MSM because they are too stupid to get their news from multiple sources. Personally, I look at Vox, Breitbart, and Realclearpolitics. Left, right, and center.

Funny how Breitbart was the first news organization that I know of to report the takeover of Capitol Hill by "peaceful" protesters. Apparently Inslee doesn't read that website. He was about 10 hours behind even KOMO, KING, KIRO, and KCPQ. And those "media" organizations had people onsite. I guess if they don't report it, there is no news!

[gil]

Personally, I look at Vox, Breitbart, and Realclearpolitics. Left, right, and center.

I try to distinguish between opinion and facts in all news consumption. Call me naive, but I'd like to think that a left-leaning operation (e.g., CNN) and a right-leaning operation (e.g., FoxNews) would agree on basic facts. Obviously there is also editorial decision-making about what to focus on, for example FoxNews has devoted much more coverage to the origins of the Russia probe in the FBI, and CNN has devoted more coverage to recently increasing COVID-19 cases in some states. I try to stay away from sites like Breitbart that seem intent to inflame as much as inform. Articles that might as well be headlined "Here is another reason that Democrats/liberals are horrible people" is not news, and it really isn't constructive opinion (in my opinion). There must be something on the left that has articles that might as well be headlined "Here is another reason that supporters of Donald Trump are horrible people." But I'm not going to go looking for it because I don't think it's useful or constructive, much less accurate.

I'd argue that Vox is left-leaning in its choice of material (it's a news aggregator), but not its facts. Breitbart seems a bit more hard right to me than Vox is left. I'd argue that Realclearpolitics is right of center. Of course, I really don't know what is center any more. (I used to think Dan Evans and Scoop Jackson.)

[HawkBowler 2.0]

Why trust the media when you can go directly to the source material?

For example, the Steele dossier was published online years ago. We've had relentless media coverage that revolves around that document and yet I bet that most people haven't read it. The dossier is only 30 some pages and reads like the National Enquirer. Anyone who reads it, especially now, can tell that it's junk. And yet followers of the Russian conspiracy theory probably read many more pages from articles about the dossier.

People listened to Dr. Rachel Maddow and Dr. Wolf Blitzer that Hydroxychloriquin was dangerous... and they ignored world renowned epidemiologist Didier Raoult in France who actually treated 4,000 covid patients and proved beyond a doubt that his treatment was effective if given to patients early on when they first develop symptoms.

People want to be told what to think, especially Progressives. They know subconsciously that their ideology is as flawed as any religion, but at the same time, they don't want to give up their world view.