tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post8498593355905959624..comments2023-11-22T01:14:54.298-08:00Comments on amor mundi: Queer Resistances and Abolition DemocracyDale Carricohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02811055279887722298noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-17654055876097600792017-06-20T07:16:18.003-07:002017-06-20T07:16:18.003-07:00Either white supremacy is history or we all are. Either white supremacy is history or we all are. Dale Carricohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02811055279887722298noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5956838.post-20976230729203658652017-06-19T12:48:32.439-07:002017-06-19T12:48:32.439-07:00Speaking of democracy, there was an astonishing ar...Speaking of democracy, there was an astonishing article<br />in the New York Times the other day:<br /><br />https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/17/us/michelle-oconnell-jeremy-banks.html<br />--------------<br />A Mother’s Death, a Botched Inquiry and a Sheriff at War<br />By WALT BOGDANICH<br />JUNE 17, 2017<br /><br />. . .<br /><br />St. Augustine forms the core of a very red county that in 2016<br />voted overwhelmingly for Donald J. Trump and for Sheriff Shoar,<br />re-electing him to a fourth term with 85 percent of the vote.<br /><br />The sheriff’s persona plays well on this political stage. Speaking<br />to a Christian prayer group in 2015, he railed against gun control,<br />separation of church and state and especially Washington.<br />America’s problems began, he said, when the government<br />“tried to outlaw our faith.” He blamed the media for<br />“burning down Ferguson” and spreading the “false narrative”<br />that police officers are bad people who must be watched<br />with body cameras. Along the way, he sprinkled in a little<br />Shakespeare on the brevity of life.<br /><br />Sheriff Shoar, who declined to speak for this article,<br />draws support from an important Florida constituency:<br />law enforcement and the military. He is a former member<br />of the Florida National Guard and a past president of the<br />Florida Sheriffs Association, where he recently welcomed<br />his newly elected brethren with an ethics lecture titled<br />“Keeping the Tarnish Off the Badge.” . . .<br />====<br /><br />The rest of the article reads like something out of a Tennessee Williams play.<br />(Certainly the scenery is right out of a Tennessee Williams play.)<br /><br />Of course, the Failing New York Times (TM) portrays this authoritarian,<br />alleged-office-abusing Florida sheriff as the bad guy. But note that<br />he was reelected last year with 85% of the vote.<br /><br />The stereotype of the corrupt, "good old boy" southern sheriff comes<br />to life!<br /><br />It would seem that in a lot of places, local politics isn't much better than what<br />we're currently seeing at the national level. Chest-beating strong men who brook<br />no opposition (as Henry VIII says to Thomas More in _A Man For All Seasons_)<br />seem to be the kind of guys (of course they're guys) a lot of the public wants<br />barking the orders (and pointing the guns).jimfhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04975754342950063440noreply@blogger.com