Deployment of 300 National Guard troops to Chicago

[SYZ]

This is extremely concerning for the United States.

Trump has authorised the deployment of 300 Illinois National
Guard troops to Chicago to protect federal officers and
assets.

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson confirmed that the
president authorised using the Guard members, citing what she
called "ongoing violent riots and lawlessness" that local leaders
have not quelled.  "President Trump will not turn a blind eye to
the lawlessness plaguing American cities," Jackson said.

This is obviously the thin edge of the wedge for Trump's planned
takeover of the United States militarily—city by city and state by
state.  Has the average American citizen not yet noticed this?

   Seriously?   

[Thumpalumpacus]

This is obviously the thin edge of the wedge for Trump's planned
takeover of the United States militarily—city by city and state by
state.  Has the average American citizen not yet noticed this?

   Seriously?   

Yes, we've noticed this.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Three hundred troops wouldn't overload a restaurant in Chicago. T.rump just wants to be seen as DOING SOMETHING!!! His pawns will approve.

I lived in Indiana in 1968, had my own car, so I drove up to Chicago for the Democratic National Convention. Lots of kabuki goin' on, but outside the "protest zone" it was still just Chicago. So let's not overreact, please.

[Dānu]

With a compliant Supreme Court, there's nothing to stop him from declaring anything an invasion or a war or other emergency.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Very true, but he could face impeachment proceedings because THE MAN HAS NO GOVERNOR. The original loose cannon.

[brewerb]

300 won't accomplish shit, except to maybe make his base happy.  He's testing the water for bigger things to come.

[pattylt]

Perhaps the National Guard will be assigned trash duty like DC?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Perhaps the National Guard will be assigned trash duty like DC?

From the Air Force Times:

Show ContentSpoiler:

National Guard troops recently dispatched to Washington, D.C., were notified last week they would be authorized to carry service weapons “solely in response to an imminent threat,” according to a Guard statement.

Many guardsmen, however, were unaware the imminent threat posed would come in the form of unkempt flower beds and tree debris, their weapons akin to those wielded by an Anglo-Saxon fyrd under Alfred the Great.

But such is the reality for many of the 2,300 or so troops deployed to stem the “magnitude of the violent crime” in the nation’s capital, where threats of high-priced coffee, spandex-clad cyclists and more salmon pants than a Ralph Lauren factory loom around every pothole-riddled corner.

Beckoning deployed troops to these war-torn environs are custodial and landscaping duties, which have been colorfully labeled as “beautification” despite a police-call reality that has devastated enlisted morale since the Bronze Age.

Such D.C.-based chores reportedly once fell to National Park Service staff, but in the wake of significant NPS cuts, the administration, which has a well-established affinity for landscaping, has determined that personnel wearing orange reflector vests atop camouflage have the warrior ethos necessary to beautify.

Various critics, meanwhile, have suggested the beautification work runs counter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s oft-repeated mission statement of bringing “a warfighting ethos back to the Pentagon.”

“Everything else that distracts [from lethality] shouldn’t be happening,” he told a reporter scrum back in December.

True warfighters instilled with the warfighting ethos, however, know that a warfighting ethos is only at its warfighting ethos-iest when warfighters are fighting a war on boredom.

And here among the embattled mulch beds of D.C., cousin, boredom is ah-boomin.

“I think it’s nice, as a D.C. resident,” one Guard member told the Washington Post. “But there are different things we could be doing.”

That might be the case for many of the D.C.-based troops here, or those who came from Tennessee, South Carolina, Louisiana, Mississippi, West Virginia or Ohio, some of whom are spending their first days ever in the nation’s capital tending to patches of dirt.

But inside the soul of each unwitting service member is a warfighter who grows more lethal with each cigarette butt lifted from the mean streets of the National Mall.

Few training methods, after all, guarantee a better fighting force than boredom-induced annoyance.

To date, beautifying has reportedly commandeered so much time that junior enlisted have even given up observing the time-honored custom of throwing rocks at other rocks, a ritual medically proven to enhance one’s morale.

But who needs optimism — or even general mission directives — when one has earned the privilege of making rake and mulch as much a part of their being as their own beating heart?

“This is my rake. There are many like it, but this one is mine.”

Full stop. Period. American flag emoji.

https://www.airforcetimes.com/off-duty/m...lethality/

[pattylt]

Omg…laughing so hard…”this is my rake. There are many like it but this one is mine”. And yes, I know the movie the line came from. They should expand that to a cadence for raking!

[Thumpalumpacus]

Omg…laughing so hard…”this is my rake. There are many like it but this one is mine”.  And yes, I know the movie the line came from.  They should expand that to a cadence for raking!

There's nothing in the world quite like GI humor.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Omg…laughing so hard…”this is my rake. There are many like it but this one is mine”.  And yes, I know the movie the line came from.  They should expand that to a cadence for raking!

There's nothing in the world quite like GI humor.

Thought of three replies, but I think Pyrrho is still around.

[SYZ]

Trump has temporarily been blocked from deploying
California National Guard members to Portland, Oregon.

The announcement followed a ruling by the same federal
judge, Karin Immergut, who temporarily blocked Trump
from deploying Oregon National Guard troops to the city,
citing a lack of evidence necessitating the move.

Oregon Attorney-General Dan Rayfield said that Oregon
would "absolutely not be a party to the president's attempt
to normalise the use of the United States military in our
American cities".

California Governor Gavin Newsom said; "The commander-
in-chief is using the US military as a political weapon against
American citizens...  we will take this fight to court, but the
public cannot stay silent in the face of such reckless and
authoritarian conduct by the president of the United States."

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Presidential tantrum predicted at dawn.

[brewerb]

Omg…laughing so hard…”this is my rake. There are many like it but this one is mine”.  And yes, I know the movie the line came from.  They should expand that to a cadence for raking!

There's nothing in the world quite like GI humor.

If I remember the movie correctly didn't Pyle give a name to his weapon?

My rakes name would be 'overbite'.

edit: needs for panache, Major Overbite

[mordant]

Three hundred troops wouldn't overload a restaurant in Chicago. T.rump just wants to be seen as DOING SOMETHING!!! His pawns will approve.

I lived in Indiana in 1968, had my own car, so I drove up to Chicago for the Democratic National Convention. Lots of kabuki goin' on, but outside the "protest zone" it was still just Chicago. So let's not overreact, please.

Yes and IIRC the special units they are in the process of grooming for this kind of work would not make more than a performative dent in a country this size. The problem doesn't lie there, so much as in the lines it can cross and how much it can desensitize, demoralize and indoctrinate the masses to just roll over and accept a totalitarian state. In a way, all they NEED to make is a performative dent.

There are also places where they have a lot more leverage. For example, once Palantir can pattern match me to posting "anti Christian propaganda" in places like this or "supporting Antifa" with postings on general social media or can see from location pinging my phone that I have frequented protests or meetings of unapproved organizations, they could command banks holding my life savings to impound them and refuse to engage with me on the matter. (In fact this is already happening to some people just on the basis that banks right now are less accountable than usual).

So I'm more concerned about that kind of thing over the medium to long term than I am about waking up some morning to the thump-thump of Apache helicopters hovering over the graduate student housing I live next to, with ICE zip lining down to break in and haul people kicking and screaming into unmarked vans. To deport all the Asian students in this city of under 100,000 with the limited resources and sheer ineptitude of this regime in "wet space" is a lot more work and much more hit-or-miss than just inconveniencing a few electrons to ruin me financially (for example). Or shutting down or screwing with social security or disability or Medicare or things like that.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

There's nothing in the world quite like GI humor.

If I remember the movie correctly didn't Pyle give a name to his weapon?

My rakes name would be 'overbite'.

AI Overview
In fiction, particularly historical romance novels, a "rake" is a charming, handsome, but morally dubious man, often a libertine or womanizer, who lives for pleasure rather than duty or long-term relationships. While a literal rake is dissolute, a fictional rake is usually a "lovable scoundrel" whose charisma and charm make them likable, with the archetype often involving a redemption arc where love causes him to give up his rakish ways for good.

[Minimalist]

If I remember the movie correctly didn't Pyle give a name to his weapon?

"Charlene"

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Close enough for government work

[pattylt]

I’m thinking about ICE and my city in Colorado. Firstly, we are a red area (Boobert is our house rep) and secondly, we are 45% Hispanic. If ICE comes here and I’m sure we have quite a few illegals, they could devastate the city…basically shut it down if legal Hispanics start refusing to go to work. I’m sure Trump will start in Denver if sends ICE or National Guards but our county might just beg him to “clean up” our area just for funzies.

We have gangs. Both white and brown ones. Most of the gang activity is focused on each other and it’s been pretty quiet the last 5 years or so. The city did a lot of focus on gang activity back then and it seems to have worked. Let’s not stir up the hatred and fighting again, shall we?

[Charladele]

Illinois is now suing the Trump Administration for sending troops to Chicago.

[SYZ]

Before a federal judge blocked Trump from putting members
of California’s national guard on the streets of Portland, Oregon,
late last Sunday, the state’s Republican party welcomed the
planned deployment in celebratory posts on on their official
Facebook, Instagram and X accounts.

On all three platforms, the statement was illustrated with an
image that seemed designed to support Trump’s false claim
that protests against immigration sweeps in Portland are so
out of control that the city is “burning to the ground”. On one
side of the image, a line of police officers held riot shields; on
the other, a crowd of young men held up flares that lit up a
night sky filled with red smoke.



It turned out that the image was not a photograph of a real event
in Portland, but instead a fabrication created by combining two
photographs of scenes that unfolded in South America in 2008
and 2017 respectively.

These are the two South American images used by Trump...

          

      The first officer’s shield, on the left, is marked “Policia”,
      the Spanish or Portuguese word for police.   

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Given that the policia were floating above the crowd I wonder how many people were fooled by that image?

[pattylt]

Given that the policia were floating above the crowd I wonder how many people were fooled by that image?

Most of them.  They believe what they want to believe.  Truth isn’t a concept they embrace very well.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

There's a cure for stupid, but you have to solve the combination lock. (1-2-3.)

[SYZ]

White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller was interviewed
today on CNN regarding Trump's plan to deploy National Guard
troops in Portland, Oregon. Miller's viral moment came immediately
after, when he appeared to cut himself off mid-sentence, leaving
his statement incomplete.

He literally froze, being apparently unable to speak.  Mini stroke maybe?
Or just common or garden stupidity?     The man is evil, whatever.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1975271590876053773

Considered one of the most influential figures of the Trump administration
and the Trumpism movement, his politics have been described as far-right,
anti-immigration, and white nationalist.     Miller is also on the Southern
Poverty Law Center's list of extremists.