Tom Clancy’s US Politics Thread

Life without parole for the Ahmaud Arbery murderers.

Technically one guy did get life with parole, but it’s a 30 year sentence until eligible and he’s in his 50s.

They are all going to spend the rest of their existences wondering why the actual fucking fuck he uploaded that video

They’d be free men if not for that

This statement from the defence is still mind-blowing:

Hogue said: “Turning Ahmaud Arbery into a victim after the choices that he made does not reflect the reality of what brought Ahmaud Arbery to Satilla Shores in his khaki shorts, with no socks, to cover his long dirty toenails.”

I just read up a bit about it myself. Things like people in the local courts being a close friend of one of the killers, police departments not investigating the killing until weeks and weeks after the incident, etc. Basically corrupt shitheads trying to sweep it under the carpet. Just an awful example of how low humanity can be sometimes.

Thing about the US is, that basically all the stuff you saw on the A Team with local police departments and sheriffs - it's all true.

Repulsive

IIRC, they likely wouldn't have had a case to answer if it hadn't been released. It basically came to light and forced people to take action. I might have the sequence of events wrong though.

That is psychotically grotesque and sadly representative of the defenses' attempt to imply he was some sort of raging rampaging criminal not an "honest jogger". I mean, if the combo of khaki shorts, no socks, and too-long toenails makes one a criminal, there are several times in my life (including at least once during lockdown) I should have been jailed (or presumably according to the defense, lynched). It's wild because presumably at least some of the jury know you can, in fact, jog w/o socks and be fine (depending on the shoes).

Their main "evidence" was that Arbery went on to a house which was under construction and had a look around, but didn't touch or take anything, and they implied he was looking to nick something. But their entire case for even that (which still doesn't warrant chasing someone with a truck and multiple firearms anyway, let alone murdering them - it doesn't even warrant calling the police - no crime was committed!) was that completely undermined when the owner of said house-under-construction said that loads of people had done that - including several people from the street (presumably because humans are nosy fuckers).

I suspect this approach from the defense actually prevented people sympathizing with the murderers in question, rather than successfully demonizing the victim. Made them seem even more like they killed someone for being poor and in the wrong neighbourhood.

That was quite a thing. What a horrible example of a human being.

The main thing I assumed about him, from that clip, is that he's racist and admitted it publicly. Not that I expected better of him.

Well he'd better tell his wife, because she's Taiwanese.

Yes it's possible for people in mixed-race marriages to still be racist in other ways, or against other groups. And maybe he still is. But he would probably go about it a smarter way than just literally saying "African Americans aren't real Americans lol". His actions are way more important.

as you say, I'm not sure that means anything.

A Freudian slip as they say.