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The mafia provided an outlet for those who believed they were disenfranchised. They would provide alternate police, control over certain neighborhoods, acquiescence from local pols and cops who are either sympathetic or paid off.

Of course, they have to be paid for such “insurance”.

I don’t know if the old model can work today.

Now, how they go about that is a completely different matter.

The boomers’ kids blame the boomers.
Who has been—and pretty much still is—in the drivers’ seats? The kids didn’t rack up 38T in nationl debt, but that’s their gift, their legacy from us. Big cities like Detroit, bombed out.
Boomers. Let’s take responsibility, or be irresponsible, like democrats.

You heard of ping lists? Same thing. Not hard.

if that were the only choice, I’d pick the mob in a heartbeat.

Good one!

re Voter ID.

If true, that ought to be enough to have the gang classified as a terrorist organization.

Exactly, destroyed.

She is helpless to fight those Mexican Government employees...they run the country ... Mexico’s deep state.

Cadavere eccellente...?

My first knee jerk thought was that a socialist creates scarcity and scarcity creates a lucrative black market for those good at capitalizing on black markets.

On the first day of school, confiscate all smart/cell phones. Lock them in a safe off site. The kids can get them back on the last day of school.

Nice thread hijack.

A parallel would be Czechoslovakia 1938. Of course The Sudetenland was just the pretext, but look at the map.

Czechoslovakia was a dagger aimed at the heart of Germany, and Hitler was not going to allow Czechoslovakia to become a base for British, French or even Soviet troops.

hate speech

lock him up for good

The what? 😳

From the Russian leadership’s perspective, that’s exactly how they frame it: losing Ukraine isn’t just a military or strategic defeat—it would be an ideological and civilizational collapse.

In their narrative, Ukraine is a buffer or frontline. If Russia “loses” there, they see it as the West’s cultural and moral influence advancing unopposed into what they consider the Russian sphere, threatening the survival of their traditional values.

All we have to do is to take a look at the UK today. Clearly, Russia is threatened by the encroachment of NATO through Ukraine even though you can argue that they were wrong to invade Ukraine.

Trump never said there would be 5000 sent out from DOGE. That was a suggestion by Musk to Trump who did not say yes or no to that.

During the 1977 blackout my grandmother lived in the Pelham Pkwy section of the Bronx. With all the looting and mayhem around NYC that night it was of the few neighborhoods that were relatively unscathed. There were quite a few "alledged" wise guys living there at the time