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Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[Baffler]

A policeman shot and killed a young black male in St Louis today.  I've read a few stories, and there's varying reports of the details, so I'm not going to provide a link.  Some say the kid was 17.  Some say he was 18.  One that looks consistent is the victim was unarmed and shot 10 times.  The incident may have begun when he stole some candy from a convenience store.

The remarkable thing is that immediately following the gunshots, around 200 people poured out from surrounding buildings and put on an angry display, including death threats against police.  Sounds like the foreshadowing to a riot if the city doesn't take immediate steps to alleviate tensions.

Do you mean this one? Because this sounds a lot less clear cut.

Also, it seems the riots are already here.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

According to St. Louis County Police Chief Belmar, an unarmed 18-year-old, Mike Brown, was walking with a friend in the middle of Canfield when an officer attempted to exit his vehicle. Police said Brown pushed the officer back into the police car. According to police, Brown then entered the officer’s vehicle and a struggle ensued over the officer’s weapon.  Police said during the physical altercation a shot was fired inside of the car.

The second they can show me this bullet hole I will admit that this happened at all. And that it wasn't another police officer murdering an unarmed black kid. We've got plenty of precedent for that assumption.

[SalmonGod]

It's pretty crazy.  The claims regarding the circumstances of the shooting are incredibly varied.  Seriously all over the place.  When I first posted about the story, it was only a few hours old.  I think the guy's body was still lying dead on the pavement.  And if anything, there's even more confusion now than there was then.  The only part that's solidified is the victim's identity.

And all the content I'm seeing today indicates tensions are continuing to rise.  The city/police, predictably, aren't doing anything of substance to gesture any goodwill.  I'm seeing a lot of statements from locals regarding racial tensions - pointing out the police force standing opposite them is almost all white, and the roster of city officials is much the same.  I was in St Louis a couple months ago for a concert.  I only stayed overnight, and that was long enough for me to notice it myself.  The entire city seemed like it composed of only two demographics:  black ghetto and white hipster, and I saw zero interaction between the two, even when they were right next to each other.

And as usual, officials are staying tight-lipped about the whole incident, until investigations can be carried by an independent body:  the St Louis PD (!!).  A while later, the FBI stepped in to state they'll also conduct an investigation, which is somewhat better, but I think it's too little too late following the slap in the face that is calling the police department literally right next door an independent body, when those same police were there to stand over the dead body in their riot gear the day of the incident.

I predict more violence to come.

[GavJ]

Also ending the bloody drug war and legalizing pot.

Ending the drug war implies legalizing not just pot, but heroin, meth, etc.

Unless you do that, you still have super high demand for things that we are obligated to investigate and prosecute, creating incentive for international black market trade corridors since foreign production isn't scrutinized as effectively, thus bringing in cartels, ramping violence, etc.  Pot is just one slice of the pie.

Whereas legalizing these things, even with strong attempts to regulate, would likely cause its own brand of pandemonium which you may or may not think it better or worse.

[DJ]

Stopping persecution of users and focusing just on producers and distributors would be a good step, though. And I thought that's what makes the difference between waging an outright war and having a sane drug policy.

[scriver]

Also ending the bloody drug war and legalizing pot.

Ending the drug war implies legalizing not just pot, but heroin, meth, etc.

No, it does not.

[Frumple]

Think what you might be unaware of, Gav, is that pot is a gorram huge portion of the illegal drug trade. Between it and other (relatively) soft drugs (LSD, ferex, or, y'know, alcohol and tobacco, which are already legal), even if it didn't completely "fix" the legal side of the drug situation in the states, it would be a ridiculously massive improvement.

And for further bonus, it would rip the southern cartels a new asshole -- pot alone makes up something like a third of their income, iirc.

Beyond that, a simple decriminalization in general (of possession and use, if not necessarily the sale of) would go a tremendous distance in fixing the situation and getting people out of jails (so they can, y'know, work, take care of their families, etc., so forth, so on.).

[Reelya]

Legalizing pot would definitely cut a huge hole in the black market. I'm lead to believe the majority of prisoners are on drug charges, and the majority of those are for marijuana charges, so that's maybe an effective 25-30% drop in the prison population for a start.

There's also the claims of pot as a "gateway" drug, but the only sensible reason to claim this as opposed to alcohol as the "gateway" is that both pot and other drugs are illegal and the supply networks interact, so someone (or a location) who can get you pot is also likely to be able to hook you up with other illegal drugs. If it was sold in shops, there would be no "networking" effect automatically exposing other drugs to users, no more likely than going out for a beer exposes you to crack and LSD.

Many drug dealers sell a variety of drugs, so taking out pot cuts into the profits of many sellers of other drugs, which would put a fair chunk of them out of business - lose the pot seller, you've lost a guy who also sold many other types of drugs - this guy was the classic "gateway" dude.

Also, "total ban" and "fully legalize" are NOT the only options for harder drugs, especially opiate-based drugs like heroin. There's another model of handling heroin which is very effective - the Swiss model pioneered in the 1990s. In that model, they prescribe heroin to long-term addicts. This is a control, clean supply which is consumed with supervision, and they proactively find work for the participants in the program.

It was extremely successful, the initial group were 99% homeless junkies, and 85% unemployment. After 2 years or so, everyone had a house, and their unemployment levels were around 10%. All this put the heroin trade out of business (thus making it harder for non-addicts to find as well). On top of that, there was a 40% drop in property crimes in the region, plus they estimate the government saved 7 Swiss Francs for every 1 Swiss Franc they spent.

[Amuys]

Doesn't the legal system depend upon pot charges as a large part of their income?

[Reelya]

Well that's entirely parasitic on the tax-payers so its no loss. Actually, cutting into their business will bring down legal costs in general. A lot of out of work lawyers will drive down the price.

It's like if someone was going around breaking peoples legs, and you try and stop them and people protest that your actions will put the leg-plaster guys out of business.

It's basically the broken-windows fallacy: we can boost the economy by smashing everything.

[Amuys]

Yeah I'm just pointing out it's a bit fucked up on the legal system's profiteering on their part.

[Frumple]

Oh, it's not just the legal system. There's an entire industry (more than one, really) surrounding the legal side (prosecution, investigation, enforcement, etc.) of crime, and a lot of people involved with it have a very vested interest in making sure "business is good". Even if it means hurting the nation as a whole or causing a lot of unnecessary misery for a lot of people.

[nenjin]

Oh, it's not just the legal system. There's an entire industry (more than one, really) surrounding the legal side (prosecution, investigation, enforcement, etc.) of crime, and a lot of people involved with it have a very vested interest in making sure "business is good". Even if it means hurting the nation as a whole or causing a lot of unnecessary misery for a lot of people.

A privatized legal and incarceration system is one of the worst things to ever happen to this country. You know what's often in direct conflict with real justice? Profit.

[Frumple]

Yeah, pretty much. Actually had like a 350 word mini-rant on the subject, but it was more vitriol than substance and I nixed it instead 

Suffice it to say there's some bastards in business I'd like to see drawn and quartered even worse than normal for corporate scum. Crime shouldn't pay* -- period. Not even if you're not the criminal. Profiteering from crime is frankly so close to as bad as the actual crimes involved it's hard to tell the difference, t'me.

*Because little incentivises fixing the goddamn problems like outright profit loss.

[Duuvian]

 Racketeering mayor makes deal with criminal bankers.

Spoiler:  From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libor_scandal (click to show/hide)

A study by economists, Snider and Youle, in April 2010, however, corroborated the results of the earlier Wall Street Journal study that the Libor submissions by some member banks were being understated.[28] Unlike the earlier study, Snider and Youle suggested that the reason for understatement by member banks was not that the banks were trying to appear strong, especially during the financial crisis period of 2007 to 2008, but rather that the banks sought to make substantial profits on their large Libor interest-linked portfolios.[29] For example, in the first quarter of 2009, Citigroup had interest rate swaps of notional value of $14.2 trillion, Bank of America had interest rate swaps of notional value of $49.7 trillion and JPMorgan Chase had interest rate swaps of notional value of $49.3 trillion.[30] Given the large notional values, a small unhedged exposure to the Libor could generate large incentives to alter the overall Libor. In the first quarter of 2009, Citigroup for example reported that it would make that quarter $936 million in net interest revenue if interest rates would fall by .25 percentage points a quarter, and $1,935 million if they were to fall by 1 percentage point instantaneously.[31]

On 19 December 2012, UBS agreed to pay regulators $1.5 billion ($1.2 billion to the US Department of Justice and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, £160m to the UK Financial Services Authority and 60m CHF to the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority) for its role in the scandal.[54] The investigations revealed that UBS traders had colluded with other panel banks and had made over 2,000 written requests for movements in rates from at least January 2005 to at least June 2010 to benefit their trading positions.[55] According to transcripts released by the UK's Financial Services Authority, UBS traders also offered financial inducements to interdealer brokers to help manipulate rates by spreading false information. In one exchange between a UBS banker identified as Trader A and an interdealer broker, the banker wrote,

    if you keep 6s [i.e., the six-month JPY Libor rate] unchanged today … I will f—ing do one humongous deal with you … Like a 50,000 buck deal, whatever … I need you to keep it as low as possible … if you do that …. I'll pay you, you know, 50,000 dollars, 100,000 dollars… whatever you want … I'm a man of my word.

Subsequent trades between UBS and this broker generated more than $250,000 in fees to the broker.[56][57]

Spoiler: From http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-14/only-wall-street-wins-in-detroit-crisis-reaping-474-million-fee.html (click to show/hide)

Wrong-Way Bets

Detroit also entered into swaps contracts with UBS and SBS Financial Products Co., which serves as a counterparty on swaps transactions.

The arrangements are a bet on the direction of interest rates and can raise costs if they move unexpectedly.

Rates fell, leaving a liability of $439 million on June 30, 2012, according to a city report. That has fallen to about $350 million as rates went back up, said Jack Martin, Detroit’s chief financial officer.

The borrowing “likely contributed to our current problems,” said Martin, who took his job in May, 2012. “It was the way people did business back then. We are where we are now and working hard to right the ship.”

The city makes periodic swap payments from money generated by casinos.

The above leads a dabbler in economics like myself to believe there is strong evidence that the banks involved of course found ways to profit while still insured against the losses incurred from their own manipulation of interest rates, and now instead of going after the banks the insurer left holding the bill has decided to try to recoup their losses from retirees because sure let's take more money out of circulation in Detroit's economy:
http://www.freep.com/article/20140730/NEWS01/307300209/Syncora-appeals-Detroit-bankruptcy

http://www.freep.com/article/20140812/NEWS01/308120096/Detroit-bankruptcy-Syncora-mediation

If I understand it correctly, the state and private sources donated money to a fund to keep the Detroit Institute of Arts by essentially purchasing it but leaving it intact. Pensioners voted and passed a deal that cut their pensions but did not eliminate them.