Comments on: The natural disaster will be televised http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/14/the-natural-disaster-will-be-televised/ Thu, 28 Aug 2008 19:30:45 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 By: b-psycho http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/14/the-natural-disaster-will-be-televised/#comment-2993 b-psycho Thu, 15 May 2008 05:38:03 +0000 http://www.theartofthepossible.net/?p=209#comment-2993 I was being serious. Even in non disaster areas rushing someone's vehicle isn't smart. I was being serious. Even in non disaster areas rushing someone’s vehicle isn’t smart.

]]> By: Angelica http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/14/the-natural-disaster-will-be-televised/#comment-2986 Angelica Thu, 15 May 2008 03:02:26 +0000 http://www.theartofthepossible.net/?p=209#comment-2986 Keith, To me, getting the book thrown at me as a drunk driver endangering the life of others is much more acceptable and less repressive than being thrown in jail for criticizing the government or having all the information available to me censored, taking out whatever the government does not want me to see. The point of my post is not that the Chinese regime is not repressive. They are. And I would loath to live under such a system. However, it must also be acknowledged that they are evolving to be less heavy-handed in their tactics. Jackson, That's awful. The fact t that the US treatment of Katrina might compare unfavorably with how the CCP is dealing with Sichuan really flabbergasts me. b-psycho, Nice fantasy. Keith,
To me, getting the book thrown at me as a drunk driver endangering the life of others is much more acceptable and less repressive than being thrown in jail for criticizing the government or having all the information available to me censored, taking out whatever the government does not want me to see.

The point of my post is not that the Chinese regime is not repressive. They are. And I would loath to live under such a system. However, it must also be acknowledged that they are evolving to be less heavy-handed in their tactics.

Jackson,
That’s awful. The fact t that the US treatment of Katrina might compare unfavorably with how the CCP is dealing with Sichuan really flabbergasts me.

b-psycho,
Nice fantasy.

]]> By: b-psycho http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/14/the-natural-disaster-will-be-televised/#comment-2953 b-psycho Wed, 14 May 2008 23:45:16 +0000 http://www.theartofthepossible.net/?p=209#comment-2953 That Blackwater idiot is lucky he stuck his head in a window that didn't have the barrel of a 12-gauge waiting for him. That Blackwater idiot is lucky he stuck his head in a window that didn’t have the barrel of a 12-gauge waiting for him.

]]> By: Keith Preston http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/14/the-natural-disaster-will-be-televised/#comment-2942 Keith Preston Wed, 14 May 2008 22:16:39 +0000 http://www.theartofthepossible.net/?p=209#comment-2942 I suspected the repressiveness of the Chinese regime is blown out of proportion by Westerners seeking to score some ideological or political points. I know a number of Americans who've lived or worked in China. They don't have any more horror stories about life there than an attentive American would have. I know someone who was riding in a car in Beijing when the driver was pulled over for drunk driving. All the police did was give the driver a ticket ordering him to go to a class on the evils of drunk driving. That's more lenient than American police and courts typically are. I suspected the repressiveness of the Chinese regime is blown out of proportion by Westerners seeking to score some ideological or political points. I know a number of Americans who’ve lived or worked in China. They don’t have any more horror stories about life there than an attentive American would have.

I know someone who was riding in a car in Beijing when the driver was pulled over for drunk driving. All the police did was give the driver a ticket ordering him to go to a class on the evils of drunk driving. That’s more lenient than American police and courts typically are.

]]> By: jackson http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/14/the-natural-disaster-will-be-televised/#comment-2935 jackson Wed, 14 May 2008 21:39:45 +0000 http://www.theartofthepossible.net/?p=209#comment-2935 Kevin, that is a good point about New Orleans after Katrina: the government hired a bunch of Blackwater thugs and sent them in to "defend" the city. Consider what <a href="http://majikthise.typepad.com/majikthise_/2007/09/blackwater.html" rel="nofollow">Lindsay Beyerstein wrote here</a>: <blockquote>The scariest people I've ever met were the Blackwater guys I found clustered around a van behind a New Orleans hotel shortly after Hurricane Katrina. I saw a lot of disconcerting things during those two weeks, but the one experience that haunts me two years later was a five-minute conversation that crew. We'd already encountered a few other Blackwater guys during our trip. One juiced up freak in mirrored sunglasses and a Blackwater bearclaw t-shirt actually lunged at our car when my colleague tried to take a picture of the hotel he was guarding. He didn't point his weapon or yell, or do anything a rational person in a defensive posture might have done. He just grunted really loudly and tried to stick his head in our window. Mind you, he wasn't holding a position in an emergency. We were driving in broad daylight through downtown New Orleans with a bunch of other traffic (military and civilian). The Blackwater dude was acting as a glorified rent-a-cop on the sidewalk, about two blocks from the main media staging area for New Orleans, which was already amply secured by US military and law enforcement. What I didn't realize at the time was that these Blackwater guys thought of themselves as frontline soldiers in a literal war zone, ready to use deadly force at the slightest provocation. That was an unfounded estimate, in the middle of the day in downtown New Orleans several days after the city had been secured by the legitimate authorities. </blockquote> Kevin, that is a good point about New Orleans after Katrina: the government hired a bunch of Blackwater thugs and sent them in to “defend” the city. Consider what Lindsay Beyerstein wrote here:

The scariest people I’ve ever met were the Blackwater guys I found clustered around a van behind a New Orleans hotel shortly after Hurricane Katrina.

I saw a lot of disconcerting things during those two weeks, but the one experience that haunts me two years later was a five-minute conversation that crew.

We’d already encountered a few other Blackwater guys during our trip. One juiced up freak in mirrored sunglasses and a Blackwater bearclaw t-shirt actually lunged at our car when my colleague tried to take a picture of the hotel he was guarding. He didn’t point his weapon or yell, or do anything a rational person in a defensive posture might have done. He just grunted really loudly and tried to stick his head in our window.

Mind you, he wasn’t holding a position in an emergency. We were driving in broad daylight through downtown New Orleans with a bunch of other traffic (military and civilian).

The Blackwater dude was acting as a glorified rent-a-cop on the sidewalk, about two blocks from the main media staging area for New Orleans, which was already amply secured by US military and law enforcement.

What I didn’t realize at the time was that these Blackwater guys thought of themselves as frontline soldiers in a literal war zone, ready to use deadly force at the slightest provocation. That was an unfounded estimate, in the middle of the day in downtown New Orleans several days after the city had been secured by the legitimate authorities.

]]> By: Kevin Carson http://www.theartofthepossible.net/2008/05/14/the-natural-disaster-will-be-televised/#comment-2931 Kevin Carson Wed, 14 May 2008 19:32:15 +0000 http://www.theartofthepossible.net/?p=209#comment-2931 In fairness to the Chinese govt, the federal authorities in NOLA took a pretty negative and authoritarian attitude toward aid workers after Katrina. My email groups were filled, in Sept. '05, with first-hand accounts of armed thugs in uniform manning bridges and freeway exists, turning away unapproved aid workers at gunpoint. And the population inside the city were treated as an occupied enemy population. It's pretty clear where Jericho got the ideas for Ravenswood. In fairness to the Chinese govt, the federal authorities in NOLA took a pretty negative and authoritarian attitude toward aid workers after Katrina. My email groups were filled, in Sept. ‘05, with first-hand accounts of armed thugs in uniform manning bridges and freeway exists, turning away unapproved aid workers at gunpoint. And the population inside the city were treated as an occupied enemy population. It’s pretty clear where Jericho got the ideas for Ravenswood.

]]>