Louisville, KY: Cuban Community Rallies In Support Of Cuban Restaurant After BLM Issues “List of Demands”
The restaurant owner was allegedly told he “better put the letter on the door so your business is not f*cked with”
A rather alarming situation is developing in Louisville, Kentucky, in which local businesses are allegedly being issued demands from Black Lives Matter (BLM) activists and told that if they don’t meet the demands, their business might be “f*cked with.”
The demands are onerous, invasive, and ludicrous. They include everything from hiring quotas to training mandates to displaying a letter supporting reparations for black people to—perhaps most outrageous of all—paying a “recurring monthly donation of 1.5% of net sales to a local Black nonprofit or organization.”
While some area businesses have reportedly caved to the bullying demands, Fernando Martinez, a partner in a restaurant group, referred to the demands and alleged threats if he failed to comply as “mafia tactics.”
The Courier Journal reports (archive link here):
Fernando Martinez, a partner of the Olé Restaurant Group, was one of dozens of business owners in the downtown Louisville district who recently received a letter from protesters laying out demands that aim to improve diversity in the area, which is known for its locally-owned shops and restaurants.
Martinez has publicly denounced the demands on Facebook, calling them “mafia tactics” used to intimidate business owners. And on Thursday, a small group of protesters confronted him outside his newest restaurant, La Bodeguita de Mima, on East Market Street.
“There comes a time in life that you have to make a stand and you have to really prove your convictions and what you believe in,” Martinez wrote in his Facebook post. “… All good people need to denounce this. How can you justified (sic) injustice with more injustice?”
According to a press release, members of the city’s Cuban community will meet outside the NuLu restaurant at 4 p.m. Sunday to support the immigrant-owned business, which “has been subject to vandalism and extortion in recent days.”
The list of demands handed out to restaurant and other small businesses in the area contains the following (per the Courier Journal):
The demands and an attached contract, which were created by local organizers and activists, ask NuLu business owners to:
- Adequately represent the Black population of Louisville by having a minimum of 23% Black staff;
- Purchase a minimum of 23% inventory from Black retailers or make a recurring monthly donation of 1.5% of net sales to a local Black nonprofit or organization;
- Require diversity and inclusion training for all staff members on a bi-annual basis;
- And display a visible sign that increases awareness and shows support for the reparations movement.
Phelix Crittenden, an activist who works with Black Lives Matter Louisville, said the demands and related “NuLu social justice health and wellness ratings” were not meant to be a threat but were instead intended to start a conversation with owners about how their businesses can better reflect and support Black people.
Crittenden claims that the outrageous demands are not meant to be a threat; however, Martinez says that he personally was told that he better comply or that his business would be “f*cked with” and reported that a flower pot belonging to the establishment was smashed for emphasis.
The Courier Journal continues:
The release states that La Bodeguita de Mima was forced to close July 24 during a demonstration that shut down East Market Street, at which several protesters presented Martinez with the list of demands and said he “better put the letter on the door so your business is not f*cked with.”
The restaurant remained closed the next two days because “management and staff were concerned about safety,” according to the release. “30+ staff members (mostly immigrants) were unable to earn a paycheck.”
On Thursday, a small group of protesters returned to the restaurant after seeing Martinez’s post about the demands on Facebook. While there, one protester smashed a flower pot outside the business, while the rest spoke with Martinez and other employees about why the demands are needed.
Needless to say people have thoughts:
Black Lives Matter Louisville is threatening small businesses with "mafia tactics" that don't pay
They demand 1.5% of net sales to approved NPOs, diversity training, diversity hires
They vandalized a business that refusedhttps://t.co/lj6gBOR5U1
— Tim Pool (@Timcast) August 2, 2020
https://twitter.com/jeffmhsmith/status/1290025773164834816
#BLM Leftists Are Extorting Small Businesses, Vandalize Cuban Man's Restaurant For Not Paying Up Simple shake down tactics, the FBI needs to step in and arrest these animals of extortion
— william grider (@grider_william) August 2, 2020
#BLM nonsense. Where’s the logic in demanding “diversity”, from a minority owned business? This is called authoritarianism.
Louisville Cuban community to rally in support of La Bodeguita de Mima https://t.co/jXJc7VlZ4T
— Dave (@Wolffmann85) August 2, 2020
BLM are literally threatening business owners with a list of demands & forcing them to sign contracts or face retaliation. #VoteRedToSaveAmericahttps://t.co/JbY1EA1BDo
— Kimberly DeaBueno (@KimDeaBueno) August 2, 2020
The Cuban community turned out Sunday to defend one targeted restaurant, La Bodeguita de Mima, and to pushback against what they are calling the “extortion” and “intimidation” of their community by BLM.
We’re at La Bodeguita de Mima in Nulu where the Cuban community is holding a rally in support of the restaurant and its owner. @WLKY pic.twitter.com/eTuPP7OJak
— Deni Kamper (@denikamper) August 2, 2020
At La Bodeguita De Mima on E. Market St, where members of Louisville’s Cuban community are gathering to show support for owner Fernando Martinez. He said he was threatened by BLM protesters, who sent letters to business owners in NuLu demanding to improve diversity in the area. pic.twitter.com/sFJR5c0KNM
— David J. Kim (@_DavidJKim) August 2, 2020
Happening now: People from the Cuban community are rallying in Nulu outside of La Bodeguita de Mima to support the restaurant. Signs read “We are peaceful but don’t tread on us” and “No 2 Socialism in America”. pic.twitter.com/IpLx1Umyix
— Faith King (@FaithKingTV) August 2, 2020
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Comments
They are the new Mafia
Please can we have the old Mafia back?
Old mafia would clean these clowns’ clocks.
Boy, they sure know how to make you root for blacks, don’t they?
“paying a “recurring monthly donation of 1.5% of net sales to a local Black nonprofit or organization.”
In other words a protection racket. BLM is a criminal and terrorist organization, it is way past the time that they should have been crushed, stomped into submission.
Hmmm wouldn’t that be the definition of racketeering. If we had a justice departmet and they had a real local prosecutor, they might even get a RICO act going.
If this was the Italian mafia, they would be arrested already – unless, of course, they were big Democratic donors.
One Robert Muller made a name for himself by covering up for Whitey Bulger while he served as AUSA in Boston.
The Italian mafia, or hell, the Irish mob, the Russian mafia, the Yakuza, etc., wouldn’t be so stupid as to put their extortion demands in writing.
This is a slam dunk case. Why are they being protected? If the local prosecutor is bought and paid for by Soros to give violent leftists free run of the town and look the other way then the DoJ should step in.
Arminius, you wrote: “The Italian mafia, or hell, the Irish mob, the Russian mafia, the Yakuza, etc., wouldn’t be so stupid as to put their extortion demands in writing.”
Exactly my thoughts! The mafia are not stupid and would never demand a mark sign a contract. That’s n00b-level stupid.
Also, the threat is embedded in the “rating,” so even without the display of or suggestion of actual violence/arson/looting/etc., the implication, the threat, is clear.
This is happening across America, too, and people need to speak up about it.
Even worse is they are front running the govt and their racket. .gov wants their cut first.
This is what you get when for generations you told these people the rules didn’t apply to them. Doubt me what are quota and Affirmative action?
I’m getting low on tolerance and it’s being rationed at the filling station. Not to mention the price is rising out of reach.
.
BLM=black Louisville Mafia
BLM = BurnLootMurder
Some, Select Black Lives Matter… How to change minds and lose friends.
Again, who in government has failed to shut down BLM as a terrorist organization? That’s right, Trump’s Justice Dept. What is the point of Trumpism if these terrorist scum can reproduce?
People say that Trump has great political instincts, but I disagree. Covid-19 *could* have been turned to political advantage. Instead, it was used by the Dems. Urban riots are widely detested, but Trump can’t manage to snuff them out. He isn’t even taken seriously by the likes of @jack.
It’s infuriating. I’m tired of clowns like Ivanka and Jared as well doing things that have nothing to do with America First.
The government can’t “shut down BLM as a terrorist organization”. There is no such thing in law. It can arrest and try any individual who commits a crime. If it can demonstrate (and this is a tough thing to do) a pattern of the same individuals conspiring to commit many crimes it can arrest them. But there is no such designation as “terrorist organization” within the USA. There is such a thing as a “designated foreign terrorist organization”, but “foreign” is a key requirement.
Milhouse and his K-Mart law degree lie again:
18 U.S. Code § 2331.
(5)the term “domestic terrorism” means activities that—
(A)involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State;
(B)appear to be intended—
(i)to intimidate or coerce a civilian population;
(ii)to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or
(iii)to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and
(C)occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States; and
I’m no lawyer. I’m honest. But your citation appears to be a definition of an expression rather than a criminal charge. There are no specifications of penalty for conviction of such activity. Indeed, included within the definition there are criminal charges mentioned, suggesting this is merely a social observation rather than a law. In any case, badmouthing people rather than discussing issues sounds to me more like terrorism than rational discourse.
Wrong, wrong, wrong, and wrong again. Nowhere in that irrelevant section you cited is there any mention of a “domestic terrorist organization”. That’s because there is no such thing. There are acts of domestic terrorism. The people who do them can be prosecuted. But there is no such thing, under US law, as a domestic terrorist organization.
Perhaps your mistake is simply that you don’t realize that there is such a thing as a foreign terrorist organization. The secretary of state has the authority to designate such organizations, and it then becomes a crime to give them material support of any kind. Moral or verbal support, of course, cannot be banned because it’s protected by the first amendment, but material support can be and is banned, even if it takes the form of words. But there is no domestic equivalent to this law, and the first amendment probably prevents one.
Milhouse, your ignorance of the law is boundless and magnificent.
Where did you go to law school and where are you licensed to practice law? Post a copy of your degree and a link to your bar profile.
You’d never even make it past the LSAT with your wooden, narrow-minded, and shallow inability to think outside the view field of 20×50 binoculars (try it sometime if you’re not too busy hammering out more stuff for the ACLU).
As I said above: Badmouthing people rather than intelligently discussing issues sounds to me more like terrorism than rational discourse.
Notably missing from that mindless rant is even one scrap of information, or one argument. That’s because you’re nothing but a vicious ignorant boor, resenting anyone who knows more than you, which is pretty much everyone.
I am an attorney. But I have not had the time to properly research this. However, I will bet my last dollar that somewhere in the U.S. Code and in the Kentucky statutes there are laws against this type of horseshit. If they are not enforced by the government, well, nature abhors a vacuum and it is up to the individual citizen to preserve law and order.
There are certainly laws against extortion. If the victims have filed a complaint the authorities will investigate it, and if the evidence supports the complaint criminal charges will surely be brought against the individuals involved.
But none of that is relevant to JasonL’s claim that the federal government should have “shut down BLM as a terrorist organization”. That simply cannot be done, because there is no such status.
R.I.C.O.
RICO has nothing to do with terrorism. RICO is just a fancy name for criminal conspiracy. Nobody can just designate an organization as one of those, you have to prove that specific individuals did specific things.
No Milhouse. You just shot your credibility in the foot. The sheer pressure of a government investigation is usually enough to attenuate and/or dissuade persons from continuing to act in unlawful ways. Hell, even IRS agents could make these lowlife shakedown artists crap their pants.
That’s not relevant to the topic. BLM cannot be “shut down as a terrorist organization”. Nor can it be shut down as a RICO without proving that specific individuals did specific things, multiple times.
But, they “identify” as Africans…
I’ll say something more nuanced…
Trump has an odd feral opportunism that has things he does succeeding on occasions n in ways I don’t see coming. I can see the pattern of results, n have a vague sense of the mechanism(s). I don’t see the movds coming, nor have a sense for how be finds them.
Another nuance…
“Trumpism” as Pres Trump’s guiding principles in practice is more a collection of preferences n heuristics than a developed tbeory of whatever. In this he is much like the last guy, tho the last guy put more work into lofty-sounding rhetorical cover.
Likewise, I often look at what he does and ask myself how that’s going to accomplish anything. A few days, weeks, or months later it becomes obvious it actually does work.
There are things going on behind the scenes with Trump, and they almost always work out the way he wants them to.
.
“There are things going on behind the scenes with Trump, and they almost always work out the way he wants them to.”
I think there are things going on behind the scenes. I think they’re weirdly amplified by what looks like a very crafted choice rubric, finding a seam through the arrayed forces.
He kind of grabs a mechanism in place that can’t be hijacked or stymied for that one next thing. Then presents an outcome that the wanna-be opposition actually gain from … if they go along. He gets what looks like a little win, by letting them get what looks like a big win. BUT, in the event, he wins bigly, n they have to go along to get their taste.
The only folks who object are more interested in demonstrating their Authoritah, or OrangeManBad, than the professed result — public rejection on those terms is a win for him, too. (Lookin at you San-Fran-Nan.)
I think if you survive at all in real estate development, let along in NYC, you get good at navigating this way. The weakest player in real estate is the developer.
I speculate TheOrangeCrush has a Spidey-sense for the pick-up-sticks tangle of forces in front of him: he can just see the thing that settles it in his diretion.
Literally every character accusation can be true, without impacting this at all. Add in that he likes to “win”, meaning mostly get some spotlight doing something other people couldn’t, especially said he couldn’t, and well, The Screaming D’s continue driving him through his character flaws toward greater success. He’d never have done any right, conservative thing, except that’s the only way they’ll let him win.
/Example:
This notion isn’t fully baked, so it’s not shorter.
Take the recent industrial development investment in Rochester, NY(*). How does anybody block this? It’s bad for TheResistance, but mucking with it is worse for them.
– He’s now upstate’s patron. (Take that Proconsul, but mess with it n you’re taking stuff away.)
– How do the hacks come at this? (Without bringing up StartupNY, The Natl Photonic Center, NYSERDA, Suny-Polytechnic, Cuomo-the-Younger’s Hunger Games, etc. He’s getting something done, n how’s that Buffalo Billion working out for you?)
– It co-opts the city, county, regional economic development authoritah. (Sorry, “authoritahs.” It’s NY. They’re in the securing patronage game, n here is some…)
– It co-opts a ton of opportunists n parasites that infest the region. (Breaking that down is too much inside baseball. Net: the way this is set up, no, the usual local suspects can’t be in charge, so it’ll maybe work. They’re parasites, so they’ll play along anyway if the spice is flowing, n they can try for a cut.)
– Connection to an externally supervised supply chain program — they’re a supplier — creates pull toward success, dozens of outside constituencies n generates PR every place the output is used. (Our new business uses the unobtanium from the Trump thing in Roc. So Senator somewhere else, *your* constituents want this thing to succeed.)
– Kodak is a known brand. It has 5th grade-level mindshare, so the chattering classes will glom on to it. (“Stuff from that Kodak rejuvination initiative.” If they try to talk it down, that visibility works against them.)
– It’s advertising every time somebody gets a dose of whatever. Dare I say Hydroxycut?
– It’s a forcing function on trying stuff. “We brought capacity on line to try this, that, the other. We’re working to get it through the CDC / FDA / NHS / Emergency Dreamy Dr. Random approval process, to get it to you.” (Creating capacity – loudly, leaving delivery to someone else is genius; and the opposite of what most folks would go for.)
– Creates untenable political position for opposion in terms of economic development, natl security, health delivery, developing science n technology, n more. (What, we should leave that sitting there when we can do something?)
– Zapps the “he’s not doing anything” people. (Lookin at you Chuck-y.) Oh, you mean do more like that Health System Chemical Production thing reviving that crater in UpState? (Now they gotta promote what he did, argue that it didn’t help, or make their proposals in terms of this exercise as a success rubric.)
– Developing that capacity from scratch is a low 10-billion$ n decades problem. (How’s that Buffalo Billion working out?)
– And what’s he doing? Using the residual awesomeness in place to Make America Great Again.
(*) It’s not so much “Kodak.” One of Rochester’s problems is they can’t do PR, so the only thing people know is it’s someplace Kodak went to die. This exercise can work because it’s very un-Kodak-y: essentially reanimating the remains of Eastman Chemical, which historically supplied high-quality feed n reagent chemicals to, well, everybody. From that POV, the “imaging” business was just a particular customer, but was also the pubic face — all the Machiavellians had to try to run the imaging business, not the supporting operations.
There are about 3 similar world-class capabilities in the post-Kodak debris, still only mostly dead. About the same number of related capabilities in the remains of the pilot fish, somewhat deader, but also less work to revive.
Fighting for liberty and the constitution which protects it. He is opposing the progressive fascist movement which is attempting to transform our country into their fascist utopia, like the USSR.
“Fernando Martinez, a partner of the Olé Restaurant Group, was one of dozens of business owners in the downtown Louisville district who recently received a letter from protesters laying out demands that aim to improve diversity in the area, which is known for its locally-owned shops and restaurants.”
What a pathetic lie by the Courier Journal! The terroristic threats are not an effort by the Red Guard to “improve diversity”, any more than the Nazis sought to “promote good citizenship and a sense of civic pride” by attacking Jews. The nuclear hot hatred black Marxists have for non-blacks is well documented, and this is just another example. Credit Martinez and other Cubans for recognizing the futility of appeasement now rather than later.
Not only do some blacks hate non-blacks, high on the list of those they hate with a passion are the Latinos. Right behind whites.
“Diversity” is a synonym and disguise for “black”, and has been for quite some time.
Might be time for some Rooftop Cubans.
Yes, tell the Cuban community how great socialism is! That should go well.
Are blacks so helpless that they have to resort to extortion? Most entrepreneurs start businesses to support themselves and their families; now theyre expected to “support black people” too? Cant they support themselves?
No. They are parasites.
Not if they live in a democrat held city and/or state.
Not so much helpless as unimaginative. Script kiddies looking for walking-around money.
I’m sure the Louisville police will step right in when one of the business owners defends his property and interests. ONLY then.
For God sakes , we have the organization and the leaders name
Where the freak are you BARR?
He’s busy making TV appearances where he can sound tough and reasonable at the same time, all the while running out the clock to “sorry, we can’t do anything now because it would influence the election” time — and practicing his bagpipes.
You have no idea what investigations are going on behind the scenes til they are complete. Barr isn’t the enemy here.
The Dems are certainly not treating Barr like they think he’s a fellow Swamp creature.
That is likely very true. But if the Feds don’t hurry up on their investigation, events are going to get away from them. This has the potential to get ugly very quickly.
Maybe Barr could show up with a B.A.R.?
It’s the job of the local FBI and US Attorney. And if this only just happened it will take them some time to conduct an investigation and make arrests.
It would be nice if LE anywhere gave a damn about the criminal acts being committed by BLM. This is blatant extortion, so where is the Louisville MPD?
They are probably following orders, or operating speed traps. Speed traps bring revenue and require little effort. And, remember: the Supreme Court says the police are under no obligation to protect or defend the public. So, they don’t.
Actually, they are under no obligation to protect individuals preemptively. An officer is not going to be assigned to you because you were threatened. They are there to protect the public as a whole–preserving the peace by enforcing the laws.
Just like they all did in Minneapolis, Portland, Seattle, Charlottseville…
Have the victims complained to them? That’s not mentioned in the story. They’re not psychic, and they can’t act because they read something in the paper.
Milhouse would like you to be stupid enough to believe that his socialist buds at the newspaper would report honestly if they had complained.
Step away from the gaslight, Milhouse. We see you.
If a criminal complaint had been filed it would be in the story.
“and support Black people”
We’ve been there far too long. Black people might consider self-support. You know, what the rest of us do.
They picked the wrong community to mess with. The Cubans know this type of behavior all too well.
They didn’t learn after what happened with the Goya brand either.
Goya’s not Cuban. Still, your point is well made.
I’m implying that the hispanics tend to stick together and people, hispanics and non hispanics rallied behind a brand that produces a quality product. I live near Miami and know the community quite well.
Actually “Hispanics” don’t stick together. They don’t even recognize the existence of such a category. Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, Mexicans, Argentinians, Colombians, etc. may respectively together, but they don’t see the others as having anything more than a language in common.
The only ones who do see themselves as having a common identity are the ones whose leftist ideology overrides their ethnic identity, and call themselves by the unpronounceable epithet “Latinx”. And they won’t stick up for Cuban refugees, because they’re enemies of the revolution.
If BLM weren’t so fixated on white Americans, they might realized who were the absolute worst slave owners in the Western Hemisphere. Hint: they spoke Spanish and Portuguese.
Exactly, and they destroyed several indigenous cultures while the were at it.
To be fair, many of those cultures needed destroying.
It struck me that when the Tlaxcaltec got beaten by Cortez, they figured that they might have useful allies against the Mexica. As for others, I suspect a lot of the non-Mexica in the vicinity probably thought they were getting a better deal when they saw that the worst the victorious Spanish did was break the idols, make people bow to a cross, and pour a little water over people rather than eat them.
As for the Tlaxcaltec, post-conquest, the ones who survived smallpox were granted rights to bear arms, ride horses, be addressed as Don or Dona, and saw their chiefs granted Spanish titles of nobility. In short, all the privileges that the Spaniards’ own Arab colonizers had denied.
Exactly.
Reparations? They can kiss my ass. Most of the slaves brought here would have been enslaved in Africa anyway. By being brought here as valuable property (not a unusual state of being back then) they were probably better off than in Africa. Perhaps caucasians should demand reparations from well to do blacks for the societal cost of dealing with the rampant criminality and all around thuggish behavior of some blacks. There’s a reason why our jails and prisons are full of black men and its a very large expense housing, feeding and keeping them healthy.
How are well-to-do black people responsible for the crimes of criminals who have nothing to with them, just because their skin happens to be the same color? Are you willing to pay for all the crimes committed by white people?
By the same rationale that they seek to take my wealth as reparations for stuff that happened 150 years ago just because my skin is white.
Willing or unwilling, clearly I am expected to. Shoe, meet other foot.
You’re right. There IS a reason. That reason is centuries of repression by whites, driving up crime because most people need to eat, whether or not they can afford to. And further exacerbated by social and legal policies which made things worse for Blacks even after slavery was outlawed.
All the racist Jim Crow bullshit of which I or my immigrant grandparents had absolutely nothing to do with. You sound like AOC advancing the lie that criminals steal to buy food. Have you looked at the black community? Morbid obeseity, covered in tattoos; has nothing to do with food.
Check the data, look at the realities under which minorities are forced to live. There is a hierarchy in this country much as in places like India, with the dominant class living in luxury, the declining middle class living comfortably, the poor struggling, and temporary immigrants doing work that even the poor won’t do for the unlivable wages offered. That latter permits the food & agriculture industries to profit outrageously, offers somewhat healthy food to the rest of us (except those too poor to afford it), and keeps the rich and powerful rich and powerful. Yep, where diets are driven by poor income, the foods consumed are fattening and unhealthy. And those poorer populations don’t have access to country clubs for exercise, either. Besides, it’s very important that we keep the driving the underclass into prisons, because there’s a lot of profit to be harvested there. Not to mention the slave labor they can employ.
Garbage. Every point you try to make is garbage. Country clubs to keep fit? Outrageous profits? Unhealthy food causing obesity and crime? Garbage.
I guess recognizing sarcasm is not one of your strengths. Nor is recognizing injustice. Outrageous profits are just that. Where are all the right-wingers who worship Capitalism when a job pays so little that nobody in the country will perform them? They believe that it’s fine to reduce costs by importing labor, then refusing those folks citizenship. Venal and evil is what that is, not Capitalism. Or at least not the kind of Capitalism that encourages a nation to balance its affairs internally so as to ensure adequate production and distribution of essential products in good times and bad. If this virus had really been horrible, we’d have no food to distribute rather than just seeing huge volumes of agricultural products being buried.
I’m also fascinated that you would describe all blacks by stereotype: fat and tattooed. This is you idea of analytical? I bet there are one or two non-tattooed folks in the black community. And some quite possibly fit into average clothing sizes.
Crime is not caused by “people needing to eat”. One has to be as stupid as AOC to believe it is.
Certainly not all crime. But people who are starving, and particularly folks who see their families starving, can be seduced by the prospect of nutrition to engage in unlawful activities that they would avoid in less challenging circumstances. This is a stark contrast to those special folks who are occasionally discovered and sometimes even convicted of greedy, illegal activities despite already being well off. THEY are not driven by hunger to lie, cheat, and steal. It’s just part of their acquired nature. I’m a great believer that there are honest people in the world. I even know a few. But in the end, we live in a world riven by selfish, amoral, greedy villains. Perhaps most of them really are driven by selfishness, but some are just trying to provide for their families in a society which penalizes them in all kinds of ways for circumstances which are not their fault. And, yeah, sometimes those circumstances could be avoided by them if they were more thoughtful. But our culture makes individual prosperity out of adversity difficult for some of our fellow citizens. Others, from different backgrounds, thrive despite adversity in their youth. Life is uncertain. But certainly our culture produces varying results based on preconceptions and outright prejudice.
No one commits significant crimes because they are hungry. Poor in the USA don’t have a problem with hunger or starvation. Their problem is being too fat.
It is the ghetto gangster culture that many blacks embrace which is the reason for black failure. They make poor choices and suffer the consequences. They choose ignorance over the work required for education because education has no value to them. They choose to leach off society on welfare rather than work for a living because it’s easier. They choose to be criminals than obey the law because it’s easier. So they choose the easier path and in so doing choose failure.
While I’m inclined to agree with much of what you said, the fact is that during every economic downturn, crime goes up. So it is a multi-factorial and somewhat cultural phenomenon. But one of those factors is desperate need.
I don’t think it’s true that “during every economic downturn crime goes up”. It certainly wasn’t true in the past, and I doubt it’s true now. For instance the Great Depression was not accompanied by a great crime wave; crime was probably down from the ’20s.
Also, there is no starvation in the USA. There’s “food insecurity”, but that is a very different thing. In much of the world “food insecurity” is known as being filthy rich.
Poverty does not cause crime. (But the same personality and cultural traits that incline a person to crime also incline them to poverty.)
Your economic analysis seems taken straight out of Marx. And Marx had no idea what he was writing about.
Immigrants do work that Americans won’t do, not because the pay is too low but because they refuse to do it for any pay. It’s not economic, it’s cultural. Ask any dairy farmer and they will tell you of their efforts to hire Americans; even those who apply for the jobs quit after one day. They’d rather go without money than do this work, especially since they know the welfare system won’t let them starve. Immigrants are simply more willing to do certain things, because they don’t have a cultural assumption that those jobs are beneath them. Their cultural assumption is that if you want to earn money you have to do unpleasant things, and this work is no more unpleasant than many other jobs.
You wrote: “Your economic analysis seems taken straight out of Marx. And Marx had no idea what he was writing about.”
This is exactly right, and Marx actually denounced his crazy in his later years, not that this gets much notice from the 21st century’s “enlightened” (i.e. “woke”) morons who have never taken two seconds to research on their own and just spew whatever is drummed into their empty little heads by equally clueless educators and activists. ultraskeptic is a clear troll, but so far, a well-behaved one.
Herr Prof. Dr. Milhouse. While there are well-respected arguments favoring your notions regarding crime and joblessness, there are also some supporting my (perhaps mistaken) recollection of information I read somewhere years ago. E.G. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2015/03/do-recessions-increase-crime/
I will concede that you may be right (though I vividly remember reading about increases in crime by nomads during the Depression). That hardly makes a Marxist. Nor, for that matter, does it join me to any other blanket labels. Marx may not have gotten much right, but I know of nobody who gets everything wrong, either. Well, maybe one person. I’m not a fan of stereotyping and labeling. Washington had slaves. Yep, he did. So what? He did a huge number of wonderful things, and had a flaw which was normal behavior at that time for Americans, Brits, etc. Even Africans had slaves, and sold them to Americans.
So, too, with Marx. His notions were well-intended (I’m hardly well read on this issue, having done my learning before you were born), and that counts for something to me, despite the accusations that his ideas caused widespread murder and suffering. That, too is a flawed notion. Human nature causes all of these problems, and a misunderstanding of human nature leads to all kinds of errors in behavior. I’ve been robbed a bunch of times – and I live in the boonies. Should I blame Capitalism for that? Or can I just assign the blame to certain less than moral individuals whose evil behavior has been exponentiated by our horrible, misconceived, totally irrational sequel to Prohibition? I prefer to take a more analytical approach, which means that I usually disagree with everyone. Especially experts. And you sound like one, so I have to disagree. But not with everything.
Did no one in their “organization” even for a moment point out the horrible optics, let alone the dubious legality, of this “community outreach” program? They couldn’t all have believed this was a good idea, right?
Venezuela is arriving ahead of schedule.
“the FBI needs to step in and arrest these animals of extortion”
Har, har, har. Why do you think these people think they can get away with this? Because they can get away with it. We have a performance-art Attorney General with a corrupt and inutile DOJ.
If a business complied then the BLM mafia will demand a percentage of every salary being paid to black employees; or a percentage of the money given to black businesses being helped. If you don’t pay then no job or business.
Our nation needs blacks to stand up and reject BLM or the end will not be pretty
Diversity racketeers, not soon to be lost in a black hole… whore h/t NAACP. #BabyLivesMatter
So, the ex-Cubans are willing to support America and American principles. That’s a good sign.
Who else?
Anybody?
We might get a good deal if we gave China the Antifa and BLM thugs and took their Hong Kongers who appreciate living under a Common Law system.
Passing thru Louisville? Please visit that restaurant soon and spend a little money. Hopefully Mexicans and Venezurlans here in Louisville will join the Cubans standing up to these BLM thugs.
Call these idiots what they are – black, goose-stepping National Socialists.
Brownshirts with brown faces, but Brownshirts nonetheless.
For those that might now know the history of Hitler’s ‘Brownshirts’:
https://www.historyhit.com/hitlers-bullyboys-the-role-of-the-sa-in-nazi-germany/
For those who read the ny times and watch XiNN and MSNBC as their only source of news, and might not know who Hitler was:
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/adolf-hitler
This looks like a government program!
Jesse Jackson pioneered this business model. But he was smart enough not to say what would happen if his demands were not met.
Bravo for the Cuban community stepping up to defend their own against BLM/Antifa.
Caucasians could learn a thing or two from their example…
How did the “Hispanic community” respond in LA? Hint: Majority-black neighborhoods like Compton and South Central ain’t no more.
And all the TDS sufferers should reflect that this article is from 2013. Who was President then???
articles.latimes.com/2013/jan/25/local/la-me-0126-compton-20130126
I love how whenever a leftist gets busted, they fall back to “we were just trying to start a conversation”
Except conversations are two way, the leftist only tells you what you must do and expects you to not say anything back
I teach in a gang-troubled high school. When a kid was knifed to death right after leaving school at the end of the day, our school administration called it “an incident”. The Left–and the institutions it has corrupted–has a talent for euphemism.
Criminals gonna criminal and BLM is a straight-up criminals’ lobby: of the criminals, by the criminals and for the criminals. Their main goal is to get rid of law enforcement, duh.
MOST icons of the Black Lives movement died while committing attempted murder: Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Charleena Lyles, Alton Sterling and many others. Purely on the basis of race BLM sides with these attempted murderers over the people they were trying to murder. That is racial sympathy for murder, the most evil extreme of racism possible.
Nothing could be worse for law abiding blacks than the ascendency of the BLM criminals’ lobby. To the extent that BLM’s anti-police movement succeeds and policing is pulled back law abiding blacks are victimized first by the doubling of black crime rates, then by the stigma of that crazy high and crazily rising black criminality.
Maybe BLM issuing an actual list of criminal extortion demands will help clarify the issue for more people.
The Democrats/anarchists/Marxists will send jet fighters to bomb flyover country if they regain full party control of D.C.
“oH tHat’s RIdiCuLouS!”
Yeah, and most of what we’re witnessing these past few months with the WuFlu & the riots (selective prosecution and selective non-prosecution) would have been considered “ridiculous” a few this time last year.
2020 is the year of the boiling frog, and germs like Milhouse and others who think they’re so smart or clever by law-schooling topics to death are the very ones putting us on the stove & turning up the heat.
They don’t care about the law. Law means nothing to them. Norms and culture are the real levers of power and they have their hands on all of them. All we ever do is react to them, and they love it.
Politics is swallowing the law whole. The law is becoming irrelevant. And it is going to get worse.
Go to Hell. Quickly.
Incredibly foolish.
I’ve lived in South Florida. Cubans don’t play that racism game… and they’re one of the most heavily-armed groups of people you can find. They learned that bitter lesson from Castro, when they had to flee for their lives from Che’s Communist goons.
BLM would do well to back down on this one.
BLM started during the Obama administration on the false pretense of Hands Up, Don’t Shoot. They have raised over 1 billion dollars in their quest to improve Black Lives. Can anyone point to one accomplishment of improvement this anarchist group has recorded?
obummer and holder extorted banks into paying massive “fines” directly to obummer’s community mafia organizations for obummer’s re-election to avoid the legal expense of fighting fake charges in court. obummer and holder ought to be in prison.