Kern wrote:
Peter St. John wrote:
My defence is that I'm now an American citizen and don't do silly things like read
Congratulations! Was the test better than the UK one?
This wasn't your first political action?
Seriously, what's the mood like in Durham (I think that's where you are in North Carolina)?
No tough questions about American comedians from the 1970s, so I think a touch easier
I was actually disappointed that they picked the easiest ones from the 100, mainly!
Amusingly, I have been in NY for the past few days, managing to time a work trip with the President also being about eight blocks away (my timing is wonderful). So I wasn't in Durham to see the statue come down. But! Not only is Charlie Reese my councilor, I used to work for the company he works for, so it was quite something to see him get blasted to Twitter celebrity status.
On the subject of the statue, it's complicated. Firstly, due to the insanity of the NC GOP, it is illegal for Durham, a historically majority black city, to remove that statue. They literally passed a state law to prevent cities doing so. Secondly, these statues were mainly put up in the Jim Crow era as literal symbols of oppression, far removed from the time of the actual Civil War itself (about 50 years on). Finally, these statues shouldn't exist: these people were
traitors. Robert E. Lee commanded an army against the United States of America to continue the practice of slavery. The fuck he should have statues all around the country. So while I'm a bit uneasy about the property damage…it's about the 10th worst thing that happened on…wait, it was only Monday?
And our President, seemingly on a daily basis, given a clear and easy chance to say 'Nazis are bad' (perhaps the lowest bar any President could face and even one that W. could dance over), sided with the white supremacists. His White House disbanded anti-right-wing terror operations, Gorka is as close to a literal Nazi as you can possibly get these days, and Bannon ran a website stoking up fears of 'black crime'. The President has advocated violence against protestors, the press, and his political opponents. Sessions is a man that was deemed too racist to be a federal judge back in the 80s. Things are not good. Note also, that thanks to Obama, the economy is in great shape: who knows what'll happen if/when it turns.
On the bright side, I'm having a holiday in the UK next week! Everything is fine there, right, guys?