Court strikes down limits on filming of police in Arizona (opens in new tab)

Reagan had gun control, the War on Drugs, 40% higher military spending, top down union busting via legislative technicalities. He’s wasn’t for small government at all, just lower taxes really.

Most of them. Not that they actually implement small government when they get into office, but they'll scream it from the rooftops because to the "small town folks," small government equates to turning a blind eye to social justice issues. Cutting spending is never eliminating waste from government, because they'd never think of cutting the military budget. They always specifically target social services due to Reagan's welfare queen mythology that exists to this day.

Reagan wasn't "small government" either, by the way. He expanded the government faster than any other POTUS in history outside of world wars. His economic policies also gave both parties the green light to spend like it's going out of style, although Republicans are notably bad when it comes to actually making economic sense with their taxes versus their expenditures.

Funny you should say that but the former governor (Doug Ducey) who signed this law was actually a pretty old-school, conservative Republican. I was very disappointed he signed this bill considering the rest of his record. I get the feeling he knew it wouldn’t stand legal challenges (but it was still disappointing).

In a saner Republican Party he would have been a good Senator or even Presidential nominee. Unfortunately, that isn’t the age we live in.

Yes, a great analogy

> ... It advances dead cat legislation and reactionary edicts...

The legislative circus is a sideshow to the main event, which is fundraising from a small core of donors (which is a perversion of 1A, but we digress...).

A right of center stone dais. The majority in the Democrats don't actually want progress, they just want to maintain the previous "normal." That is despite their opposition pushing further and further right and making parts of the new "normal" facets of the old extreme. Most of this ceding of ground and drift further right has been to foster a large authoritarian surveillance system that they both benefit from. It's hard to tell if the cooperation with the Republicans towards that system is fully intentional or just a useful secondary effect of the Democrats' tactics of trying to appeal to the broadest voter base possible. Maybe a bit of both depending on the official (such as Joe Manchin).

> the modern Democratic party is

An amorphous blob. A winning strategy against an opponent who cedes the centre.

Center right, by any reasonable analysis. Largely pro corporate, fairly disinterested in change from the status quo.

Very, very few even question capitalism, let alone call for its replacement.

A foil to capture people who don’t identify as Republican, but with actions that align pretty firmly on “right of center”.

Would you mind shedding light on how you find the republican party "anti-reactionary"? In my mind, they are quite reactionary.

They just don’t want to be in another rap video. I think you should be able to post a sign on the exterior of the house that says “Video recording in progress. By entering the premises, you grant the use of your likeness” just like when TV shows shoot in public places.

> You will also be within 8 feet of a cop as a passenger during any traffic stop.

IIRC, the law (bad as it was) did have an exception for people in the vehicle during traffic stops.

IANAL, but from a common sense perspective:

- most police have body cams now, so presumably, their voices and actions are already being recorded

- citizens interacting with police don't have a reasonable expectation of privacy, so they cannot opt out of being recorded

So it seems fine that citizens can create their own copy of the incident that's already being recorded.

To flip it on it's head, I can't think of a reasonable, let alone constitutional, argument for "I can record you but you cannot record me"

Of course, this leaves out the case where they don't have body cams/aren't recording. In that instance, though, we already have a pretty strong precedent that people cannot have a reasonable expectation of privacy in public spaces. That's why we can take selfies, vlog, talk on the phone, etc regardless if people are in the background. Not to mention straight up record whatever is around - dashcams, security cameras, etc.

I'm not sure what your point is. I consider them both anti-American. Although my level of disgust is inherently higher with anything resembling and corrupting the American flag.

I'm not a fan of flags anyway and I look down on people who care about them.

If you think they sum up a political viewpoint, you're wrong, and it's still a sad commentary on the superficial nature of the debate we've been reduced to.

[edit] it took me three reads of your comment to realize you were basically backing what I was saying. I'm an idiot, and I'm drunk at the moment. But yeah.

What you read into The Thin Blue Line flag depends heavily on where you land on the political Spectrum.

Gadsden was a general in the Continental Army, so it's not like they were a complete anarchist.

Unless someone's a complete anarchist, they understand that you need the rule of law and order to protect the civil liberties they hold dear.

The type of person that has a thin blue line sticker probably does not view the police as the primary threat to their civil liberties

Since the start of the century, many western democracies added freedom for marrying people of the same sex as you. Abortion laws also got more progressive in several countries in the last 20 years. There's been an erosion of privacy and other things but there's some areas with extra civil liberties.

> I cannot think of a single major change in any major Western country since the start of the century that I would call an improvement of individual rights.

Would gay marriage rights not fall under an improvement of individual rights here? If not, why?

I consider GDPR in the EU (and similar initiatives in other jurisdictions) to be an improvement of individuals' rights. I agree with the general sentiment though, very little else (if anything) has progressed.