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How would hitting the federal debt ceiling defund the police which is mostly funded from state and local sources?
A good point, and makes me less worried. Although, with that said, the FBI is IIRC the main org dealing with domestic terrorism and rebellion.
I feel like you think aus is better because you live there. Have you done a lot of travel?
Only been to Singapore (and NZ, but I was a baby so I don't remember).
Before I swung right I would have said NZ was better and it's still close; the USA was likely better in the 90s/00s before the culture war went white-hot and before you let mass looting/lawlessness happen in a bunch of your cities.
There isnt mass lawlessness unless you only watch fox news. Even "shitholes" like sf are safe and clean if you stay off one bad street.
We saw the largest single-year increase in violent crime ever recorded immediately following the Floyd riots. The violent crime rate has since declined somewhat, but is still massively elevated over the pre-Floyd baseline. There's good evidence that the elevated crime rate extends to other categories as well, given the effects on major business chains. That seems like good evidence for "mass lawlessness" from vectors other than Fox News.
I don't feel particularly unsafe. Do you?
It appears that you've moved from statements of fact to statements of emotion. Would that be fair description?
To answer your question, yes, I feel significantly less safe than I did in 2020, and I felt less safe then than I did in 2014 when all this mess kicked off. I think this feeling is the result of an accurate assessment of the evidence available, given the events of the last decade. Things are a lot worse now than they were before, and there are a lot of solid reasons to expect the trend to continue.
You were ready to go to war a decade ago. Now you're happy just to chat about it online. I would think that to any reasonable person, it seems like you feel more safe now.
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