Anna: Fuuuuuuuuuck this. Like, I could post a graph here of police brutality stats or something to be educational, but nah, we all know the problem. We have probably seen footage of cops using police brutality against people protesting them for using police brutality. But there’s also a lot of good stuff too. Communities marching peacefully, local governments ending contracts and studying budgets to make adjustments, Ben and Jerry’s making a run for corporation I hope takes over. I am glad the news footage from other countries is calling it like it is, and hopeful we can keep up the pressure until real change is made.
Also it’s 2020 how the fuck is the 3rd amendment topical again.
Monty: “Again” implies it was ever topical before. I mean, there was one Supreme Court case like 200 years ago, but I don’t even think that’s big enough to count. The Third Amendment is really an artifact of the degree to which American politicians were horrified by the fallout of the French Revolution and became terrified of the possibility of a military dictatorship. It’s always good to remember that events across the ocean have had that kind of impact for a long time.
Speaking of which…
It is undeniable that what’s going on in the US is the biggest story in Israeli news right now. This week I taught a class for railway conductors and it was all they wanted to talk about. A lot of people, even very left-leaning people, are genuinely shocked that the Trump presidency is faltering. It’s been such a shock to the system after all these quiet, uneventful years of minimal news coverage that committee members within my party are convinced that the US is in the midst of a full-blown revolution. I’ve been away so long that I can’t be sure if they’re wrong.
And it’s not as if we don’t have our own big issues. Netanyahu’s personal lawyer was caught hiring a private intel firm to extort Defense Minister/political rival Benny Gantz. The Netanyahu family may be investigated anew for insider trading. There’s a sizable chance that while you read this I’m out protesting annexation plans by Netanyahu– plans that the US have urged to put on hold while this crisis unfolds across the Atlantic. (are you trying to out protest me)
But even Netanyahu et. al. don’t seem to get it. There’s this weird disconnect where they see Trump confronting this crisis but they genuinely seem not to comprehend that he is part of it. In the Likud mind, Trump is just watching this happen passively. I’m hearing this attitude from Likud rank-and-file in Tel Aviv. They know there’s always been racism and police brutality in the US. But they don’t see what Trump has to do with it.
It’s very strange to live in a world where the entire last three years of US domestic politics is breaking news. And right now, that’s about all I can say.