Posted on 08/26/2004 1:55:47 AM PDT by weegee
NOTE: I did not write this diatribe, I will voice out in the "afterward".
This weekend lots of folks are gonna be tearin' it up in NYC at the Republican National Convention, showing not only the country, but the rest of the world that not all of us are "united" behind the Bush administration and their "War on Terror." "Bring the war home," went a slogan for the Weather Underground. Similarly, Fugazi said, "There will be two wars." As long as the power elite wages war abroad, we will inevitably feel the effects at home: immigration restriction, and hightened racism, as well as infringment on civil rights. But also, as long as war wages abroad, we will wage our own struggle here at home, promising that things will not be "business as usual," that, frankly, we will not sit idle as fkd up shit goes down.
Attack the belly of the beast while its attention is diverted.
Critical Mass could be just one facet of this effort. It is a celebration of the bicycle as a sustainable alternative to the destructive car culture. On the last Friday of every month, Critical Mass converges at City Hall, and any and everyone into bikes is invited. Then we take to the streets and, spontaneously, ride where-ever and however we want. And sure, cars get pissed off when a huge group of bikes block lanes and run reds...but how do you think we feel when were surrounded by cars, exhaust, and the threat of getting run off the road?!?
But maybe Critical Mass can be not just resistance against car culture but against the whole system from which that culture has sprung forth.
And FOR a more sustainable, free, and just world.
I guess its really up to us.
So, this Friday especially, to show solidartiy with our friends and family up in NYC, come out and reclaim the streets!
CRITICAL MASS! Last Friday of every month @ City Hall
And sure, cars get pissed off when a huge group of bikes block lanes and run reds
It is not "cars" and "bikes" coming to confrontation, it is drivers (who are people with LEGAL RIGHTS) and agitators (on bikes).
I welcome all of the bike loving FReepers who assail me when I discuss the a$$hole nature of some eco-bicyclists to defend these fools.
Look, if I hit one of these people when they break the law, I may KILL them. I WILL have to defend MYSELF even though it is not my fault. Additionally I will have it burdening my conscience.
I almost hit someone that night last year when I was trying to make a right on red and someone ran the light passing my on the right (most bicyclists were in the center/left lanes when they ran the light).
I took it as just being the rude actions of the bicycle messengers who held a party that night.
ALSO BEWARE, I have seen small children riding with their hippie parents at these same midnight runs.
HOUSTON Ping.
Some day, I'm going to write a documentary called "Bowling for Schwinns".
I think a ten year old might be more able to correctly spell "hightened".
May be, but these people are on the roads (this isn't an empty boast).
The NYPD yesterday announced a crackdown on a group that promotes monthly mass bike rides and has promised traffic-disrupting events during the GOP convention. The group, Time's Up, founded the so-called "critical mass" rides on the last Friday of each month. The crackdown was spurred by Time's Up's planned Bike National Convention, timed to coincide with the Republican gala.
http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/18977.htm
...I guess its really up to us.
...but how do you think we feel when were surrounded by cars
...to show solidartiy
That's "heightened racism," "it's up to us," "we're surrounded" and "solidarity."
These morons should spend less time trying to change the world and more time learning about the world they are trying to change.
So now we have the people who ride bikes versus those who don't. Who has an agenda here?
I'm sick of it. PETA is ready, willing,and somewhat able to defend the martian lifeforms.
Nobody agrees on anything anymore. We need a damn good depression where you're lucky if you have a few potatoes and an onion to feed you tonight.
Then, perhaps, rapes, and murders, and jobs, and political corruption will be seen as they are.
These are the same dumb*sses I had to put up with 35 years ago as a UCB student.
A depression?
We need a civil war.
What an idiot.
They should be reminded of the old maxim:
"Yield to that
which can smash you flat."
Great. Then we'll have people killing other people over a can of English Peas.
I think if there was a civil war, it would be only a matter of days, perhaps even hours, before the Russians or the Chinese launched.
From their perspective, it would be the only prudent thing to do.
No.
The prudent thing for them to do would be to gather intel from their agents here in the US, monitor the situation and then offer to intervene on the side of whichever faction they found to be most amenable to their interests.
Neither Putin nor Hu have demonstrated themselves to be rash morons.
I'm inclined to think they would see it as a window of opportunity. A window that might never come again.
I just don't see them sitting back and waiting for the situation to sort out. It might not be a full scale attack, but they could inflict some serious damage.
They wouldn't. They would actively seek to intervene and to direct the outcome.
They wouldn't nuke - they might conventionally bomb areas of the US held by the faction they aren't supporting.
More than likely, if there was civil war II, it would be along the lines of the red states versus the blue states, as shown in the last election.
The red states are far more rural and conservative, you might say hard liner, than the blue states, the major metro areas.
Seems to me they would strike at communications, command, and control, and if successful, hit the metro areas.
To try to take out the mid-American region would not make sense, even though those people are the ones who are most opposed to them, because the payback for them to say, for instance, bomb Kansas, is not very large.
Yes, it would break down red/blue. And it would be similar to the last civil war: the red states would have better soldiers and better generals - just like last time, the warfighting army personnel disproportionately come from red states.
The blue states would be far less likely this time around to raise substantial volunteer forces. Conscription wouldn't work very well, so the blue states would use their wealth to hire mercenaries.
Also, the war would have to be a fight to a definite finish - No one would want to live in a country where one half (CA, WA, OR) is 2000+ miles away from the other half (New England, NY, PA, NJ).
There would be many more "border states" as well.
Plus there are new advantages for the red states - the red states have manufacturing capacity this time around and will be able to build substantial materiel.
The road system makes incursions much easier - a well-trained regiment and a few helicopters could probably take a substantial area in the enemy's rear: how many rifle companies combined with sympathetic gun owners would it take to seize control of Vermont and the St. Lawrence seaway? Five?
The most likely scenario would be for the blue states to invite China or Russia to "help" them.
And there is enough hardware stockpiled in the red states to answer that threat before it reaches our shores.
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