Monzanator

8 minutes ago, Olympian1010 said:

It’s a real conundrum because police have proven they can’t be trusted with those weapons (methods of neutralization), but we also can’t just leave our police unarmed. You ask a great question that I honestly don’t know the answer to. 
 

If you pass strong gun control, you risk a civil war. If you let the police continue as is, you risk a civil war. The U.S. is a failing country because we refused to address these problems for too long, and I don’t have confidence that either of the major presidential candidates will solve any of them. Biden might keep the status quo, but I’m not really enjoying that at the moment.

Nobody's willing to touch the NRA lobbyists but that's the whole point of American politics. Private funding rallies for big shot politicians and NRA can endorse a lot them while having insane finds due to guns being sold everywhere since the Second Amendment is king.

It's not a case of civil war but anarchy. You disarm the police and let the thugs rule the streets with their unrestricted access to guns and you've got a recipe for anarchy. Thank God nobody's advocating for disarming the US Army or National Guard yet

PS. Strong gun control in USA? Like when? In 2453 or something? NRA will never allow this to happen since it will cost them money. And politicians both Democrats and GOP are scared to piss NRA off.

Btw, I believe police in Poland, Canada and USA uses the same standard X26 series tasers. Average of 1,200 volts with a peak of 50,000 volts. So American police tasers aren't any different from being used elsewhere. So the whole "non-lethal" theory doesn't hold much ground. The death of Igor Stachowiak has been the most high-profile death in police custody in Poland in the last decade so I suggest you don't tell his family "tasers are not lethal".

Just now, Olympian1010 said:

From what I know, tasers in the U.S. are designed to be non-lethal. They have a limited charge and limited ammo. Of course, it is still a weapon, which is why I said this case is more defendable, albeit still an example of how our police system is broken.

So, police can't use guns, sticks, chokeholds and tasers? In a country with such an easy access to semi-automatic weapons for civilians? So what should police carry then? Water pistols?

8 minutes ago, Olympian1010 said:

*A non-lethal weapon.
 

This is a little more defendable then many of the other cases of police brutality that we’ve seen, but it still represents something inherently wrong with our police culture. Our police place too much emphasis on confrontational, violent methods ending conflict, and too little emphasis on positive problem solving techniques that would have much better outcomes for all parties. 

Really? Robert Dziekanski's death was ruled a homicide.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Dziekański_Taser_incident

Four ex-police officers have been sentenced to prison in Poland as well.

https://tvn24.pl/tvn24-news-in-english/poland-four-police-officers-sentenced-for-igor-stachowiaks-death-ra946568-2283334

So much for taser being non-lethal

13 minutes ago, Olympian1010 said:

@heywoodu Is the IBSF commentator (forgot his name at the time of posting) commentating this race?

Martin Haven has been commentating on EuroSport since the 90s and featured in motor sports as primary subject. Back when DTM was still broadcasted there (this from 1994):

4 minutes ago, heywoodu said:

This is about the guy who resisted arrest and then even thought it'd be a good idea to grab the officers' taser weapon, I guess? I wonder if this will lead to the same kind of protests as George Floyd's death, so far this one seems a whole lot less psycho-like than what Chauvin did...I mean, he grabbed a weapon for crying out loud.

You're applying too much common sense. Since the police chief resigned then the fact this guy grabbed a police taser makes no difference. Unless maybe a policeman gets shot dead it won't make any difference IMO (and even then I'm unsure whether the BLM protesters would care). Police is reduced to mere whipping boys now, whatever they do, it will be a wrong decision.

Been playing GPL & NASCAR Racing online over 15 years ago. Back then "warps" were the ultimate killers. I suppose bandwith is miles improved these days but nothing like a nice little glitch to spoil your run

Even female chiefs of police are forced to resign amid BLM protests. Guess feminists will stay oh-so-quiet here?

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53037953

40 minutes ago, heywoodu said:

One would easily think otherwise this past week or so  

It took NASCAR well over 100 laps to even show his car at Martinsville though   I believe they only showed him like two or maybe three times during the whole race. Danica Patrick got 5 times more coverage back in the day despite languishing in mid-pack all the time.

9 minutes ago, Grassmarket said:

And even if they changed the quota to allow 3 teams from the Americas then one of the bigger countries would immediately put a team together.

Yeah, I bet there are enough Americans with Hispanic background who can't make the USA team but would easily make some South America country competitive. Same as happens in baseball where Italy, Netherlands & Israel are supposedly doing well only for their rosters to combine 100% from players born & bred in USA & the Carribean Dutch colonies

11 minutes ago, Olympian1010 said:

Yep, Guyana has yet to qualify in a team sport. They have some tradition in Football and Rugby, but they aren’t really good at either. They did qualify a 7s team for the Pan Ams, but they were pretty much destroyed by everyone else in the tournament.

 

Guyana is the third best men’s team in the Americas. They beat Brazil twice during the 2018 Americas Challenge. They have also competed at the Mixed Doubles World Championships, but they haven’t had any significant results yet.

That's the problem, they will have to get some significant results in order to change the continental quota. The last time curling changed any quota was when Japan was unable to defend their silver medals in 2017 WCh since Asia only had two places in the tournament and now they have three to accomodate China, South Korea and Japan.

Not to mention there are always fewer teams at Olympics than WChamps. I don't think we'll see Guyana in curling at WOG anytime in the XXI century tbh.

7 hours ago, Olympian1010 said:

One of the Guyanese curlers was on the WCF’s Instagram today. He did a pretty series of stories that basically explained his background, how the federation was created, and the challenges the national team faces. He seems like a chill dude that the other curlers seem to get along with well. Guyana definitely has one of the best jerseys out of the all the national teams. I was a nice little watch if you’re interested (I think it will disappear in 3/4 hours). 
 

The Guyanese Curling Federation is up to 6 members (3 male/3 female). They are trying to recruit more players as well. It would be cool to see them at the Olympics one day. I think they have some quality players amongst their ranks right now, so hopefully they’re able to maintain their federation. 

Guyana at the Olympics in curling? Hmm... as long as Canada and USA suffocate all the quota for Americas I don't see anyone else qualifying from that region whatsoever.

Btw, I don't seem to recall Guyana fielding a team sport in Olympic Games history? Summer Games, let alone Winter!

6 hours ago, heywoodu said:

Djokovic once again made a bit of a fool of himself, saying it's "really impossible!" to 'only' bring one staff member to the court, which is what is being talked about for the US Open to happen. Some true words from Danielle Collins: "It's very easy for someone who's won over 125 million euros to say what we should do, but most of us don't even have an entourage at all."

 

Djokovic desperately needs to play some tennis or something (which I guess he does, but something serious then), his mental state is getting worse and worse judging by the things he says.

Yeah, it seems like Djokovic thinks he's bigger than ATP. However there's too much money being lost elsewhere so they could well roll without him.

Just now, Olympian1010 said:

Talk about a hasty generalization of an argument there. I mean, if I can remember which logical fallacy it is, it most be a truly dumb statement.

 

I’m going watch whatever films I feel like watching. That’s called human rights.   

And I'm gonna refuse to watch Disney films. That's also human rights or not?

Btw, BBC censored Michael Jackson's music based on these pedophilae accusations so it's not exactly a fallacy like you say  

https://www.forbes.com/sites/guymartin/2019/03/03/the-leaving-neverland-fallout-bbc-decides-to-nix-michael-jacksons-catalog-from-radio-play/#3acad0573622

People simply grow up. If not then you end up like Michael Jackson - from pop icon to pedophilae accusations

Who the hell watches Disney movies anyway? Once you graduate from high school, this stuff should be ignored. I find it strange when adults watch stuff intended for teenagers

I was expecting Haecki to make the jump by year 3-4 on World Cup and I feel like her first two seasons were actually better. Maybe it's the expectations but she's had a number of very bad days. Kamila Zuk is the perfect example where junior success can't quite make the difference in seniors, I mean Marketa Davidova was her main rival back in junior and she's doing a lot better overall in World Cup. And there is pressure on Davidova with Koukalova and Vitkova gone. Haecki should be having Davidova-like results but she doesn't.

Since the "We'll never apologize for America" shtick is very much a common theme for US Presidents for over 50 years, it's pretty obvious why USA will never join ICC. Someone is fighting another lose cause

Vojthas is definitely not named Matthew

Selina Gasparin is 36 years old, she will probably retire after Beijing OG. The "rise" of the Swiss women's team has an expiration date and Lena Haecki has been extremely frustrating to watch the past couple of years. When she had a bad day then it's really bad.

I talked about Raubichi making the most of the Russian venues blacklisting and Nove Mesto has a chance to be carried by Marketa Davidova even with Koukalova and Vitkova gone.

5 minutes ago, Olympian1010 said:

I was just saying that UWW (while being heavily “persuaded” by the IOC) might be inclined to remove Greco-Roman, for the more “youth” Beach Wrestling. Personally, I think Wrestling is safe like you said.

I just don't see Beach Wrestling as Olympic sport. Russia and Middle East countries have enough money to influence IOC's decision Asia is a desired market for anyone so any Asian-strong sports like badminton are here to stay as well.

Wrestling has a long history in Eastern Europe, ex-USSR and Middle East. It's gonna be extremely tough to remove it from the Olympics as it's also one of the ancient classics. There was an uproar when they tried to get rid of it already so I just don't see that happening. Thankfully wrestling is big in US high-schools and college so I don't suppose USA will push to get rid of that too much.

Golf & tennis are two sports where Olympic gold medal is worth less than a win in Major. These two sports could be easily removed and I wouldn't lose sleep over it. Women's golf being dominated by the South Koreans is another reason USA might wanna look pass it after a while. Then again, golf only got back in 2016 so I suppose it will have to stay for a while yet - unless more big names will openly ignore it like they did in Rio (zika virus was an obvious BS excuse).

1 minute ago, Olympian1010 said:

I think the fact that Wallace is going to race with a “Black Lives Matter” livery on his car this week already turned those people away.

I'm talking the future. Races are still closed to the public as we speak so there's nobody to turn away to begin with.

Wallace in no Dale Jr or Jeff Gordon. He's not the face of NASCAR and with his results, there's little chance he ever will be.

Will they turn away fans in Confederate gear too? Watch out those empty seats change their mind in the foreseeable future.

12 minutes ago, Olympian1010 said:

Gone With the Wind will be back though. It’s not gone forever. It’s just having a prompt about historical context added to it. The same could/should be done for other films. 
 

I’m going to refrain for this discussion further, as it detracts from the more important issues we’re dealing with at the moment.

If USA hasn't learned a history lesson some 160 years after the Civil War, they will never learn it IMO. Just how long can you wait?

I can understand most US people think Africa is a country but re-education on Civil War and slavery in 2020? Like really? What have you been doing the past several decades (other than fighting wars in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq & Afghanistan)?