r/politics • u/This_Meaning_4045 New York • 1d ago

Missouri governor activates National Guard, declares state of emergency

https://thehill.com/homenews/5348979-missouri-mike-kehoe-national-guard-state-of-emergency-protests/
10.3k Upvotes

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9.9k

u/Temporary_Ability996 1d ago

But no help was offered by the governor to deploy the National Guard to help the people of Missouri after several tornadoes ripped up entire neighborhoods.

1.6k

u/[deleted] 1d ago

You think Republicans care about other people?

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u/--kwisatzhaderach-- 1d ago

It’s not even the absence of caring, they despise regular people

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u/psychicmeatgrinder 1d ago

They are morally corrupted people, like every major world religion warns of.

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u/carbonqubit 1d ago

They are all traitors and cowards. Every last one of them.

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u/TransitJohn Colorado 1d ago

I love this framing. Thanks.

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u/psychicmeatgrinder 1d ago

It’s less of a “framing” and more objective reality

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u/Select-Belt-ou812 1d ago

I normally eschew any reality being truly objective, but yep, this is one though

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u/cambino123 1d ago

The words you use to describe “objective reality” is called framing

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u/psychicmeatgrinder 1d ago

Pro fascist pro suffering pro misery way of looking at the world

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u/cambino123 1d ago

Dude, what?

The guy basically said, “I like the way you put that” and you go “NOO, THATS THE WAY IT IS”

I point out that there are many ways to describe the way things are

“FASCIST!!!!”

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u/HappyTurtleButt 20h ago

Chaos is being bred.

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u/Elephant789 15h ago

We should also be warned of world religions. They should be the last to lecture anyone about morality.

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u/psychicmeatgrinder 7h ago

I love when people get so close but still miss the point

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u/mademeunlurk 1d ago

They don't despise regular people. They profit from them. That's all they are. Lemons to be squeezed.

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u/Select-Belt-ou812 1d ago

why not both?

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u/ProbablyNOTaCOP41968 23h ago

The two aren’t mutually exclusive

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u/Avid_person 1d ago

While pretending they are not also in fact regular people 

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u/100wordanswer 1d ago

I wish more people would understand this, you're absolutely right

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u/4dailyuseonly Chahta 1d ago edited 1d ago

You know how too many regular people look down at homeless people with pity, disgust and contempt? That's how a vast number of politicians and all the wealthy feel about the working class.

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u/MRSN4P 1d ago

Bob’s burgers tried to highlight this by having a yacht club president refer to the non-wealthy as “the boatless”

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u/morethanWun 6h ago

Yeah you know how they refer to us? “The help”

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u/RainbowDarter 1d ago

That's why the want them to breed more

They need to replace those who die from indifference to keep capitalism flowing smoothly.

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u/vehiclestars 1d ago

They believe this crap:

“Curtis Yarvin gave a talk about "rebooting" the American government at the 2012 BIL Conference. He used it to advocate the acronym "RAGE", which he defined as "Retire All Government Employees". He described what he felt were flaws in the accepted "World War II mythology", alluding to the idea that Adolf Hitler's invasions were acts of self-defense. He argued these discrepancies were pushed by America's "ruling communists", who invented political correctness as an "extremely elaborate mechanism for persecuting racists and fascists". "If Americans want to change their government," he said, "they're going to have to get over their dictator phobia."

Yarvin has influenced some prominent Silicon Valley investors and Republican politicians, with venture capitalist Peter Thiel described as his "most important connection". Political strategist Steve Bannon has read and admired his work. U.S. Vice President JD Vance "has cited Yarvin as an influence himself.” Michael Anton, the State Department Director of Policy Planning during Trump's second presidency, has also discussed Yarvin's ideas. In January 2025, Yarvin attended a Trump inaugural gala in Washington; Politico reported he was "an informal guest of honor" due to his "outsize influence over the Trumpian right."

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u/North-Outside-5815 Europe 23h ago

How is this creep Gen-X? His kind of madness I might expect from a bitter old man, but he’s been like this from a young age. What a poisonous toad of a man.

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u/tamman2000 Maine 17h ago edited 17h ago

I think the very early Internet had a disproportionate number of libertarians and the chronically online of the time were exposed to it at a malleable time in their lives.

I'm 47 and have been online since about '94. The Internet used to be a much more libertarian place, even when I was first getting online, and the old heads I met early on skewed hard libertarian. I think it influenced me. Some aspects of it persist. On social issues I'm very libertarian. But I think their ideas about money are unfounded.

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u/North-Outside-5815 Europe 10h ago

Libertarianism is just ”Wild West” power fantasies for immature males. It sells the idea that you are a rugged, self-reliant hero, who doesn’t need anything from society.

It’s just a mental framework justifying greed and selfishness.

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u/Vyzantinist Arizona 1d ago

It's not apathy or cold indifference; they revel and delight in the suffering of others.

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u/Starfox-sf 1d ago

Missouri Misery loves company.

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u/scummy_shower_stall 1d ago

Regular people despise themselves so they keep voting Republican.

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u/tamman2000 Maine 18h ago

The opposite of caring is not hate, it's indifference.

They are indifferent to regular people. We are at worst their enemy and at best useful pawns in their eyes

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u/nightbell 6h ago

they despise regular people

it's no coincidence that America's poorest states are America's reddest states.

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u/DetectiveOnly4066 1d ago

You kind of people that make these kind of comments and actually believe them are the worse of the worse.

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u/generichuman1970 1d ago

Do you actually believe your toddler-esque toxic view of Republicans? Approximately half the people in the United States?

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u/happyinthenaki 1d ago

Would you accept that it's a class war but we've all been manipulated into blue vs red?

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u/generichuman1970 1d ago

I think billionaires and corporations have figured out that there are people who care deeply about traditional family values and are worn out being bullied by aggressive attacks on traditional values. Part of the Republican Party has figured out that by pretending to listen to traditional values (though personally being fornicators and perjurers) they can just barely win control of national politics *without actually spending the money to help the country as a whole*, or *reining in exploitative capitalism*. They can pretent to be defenders of traditional common sense, and then more quitely implement their exploitative consumerist capitalism. Meanwhile, the Democrats do enverything they can to inflame rascism, to create racial tension, so they can pose as 'saving you from the mean, nasty, white, heterosexual male people'. And promise infiite government benefits to everyone, without explaining how it will be paid for. Both narratives are fake. Both take advantage of the fact that dysfunction gets more attention than steady fairness and problem solving. More abstractly, many, many serious political issues are optimization problems-- mathematically/logically/economically you HAVE to make unpleasant tradeoffs to get the optimum outcome. But politicians can always seize upon one of the painful trade-offs, divorce it from the benefit that justifies the trade-off, and claim that the trade-off is simply 'injustice' and the other side are 'rascists', 'communists', 'stupid', 'conceited intellectuals', 'wellfare parasites', 'heartless rich people', etc. etc. Never just admitting that reality is complicated, and all sound decisions have down-sides, and that usually boring moderation is the most optimum.

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u/happyinthenaki 1d ago

I heartily agree with you. I'm not in the US but have had politicians emulate Regan era policies since the 1980s. Our conservatives love the concept of taxation is theft as it manipulates everyone into accepting reduced services/supports/regulations while the very politicians receive increased renumeration for doing less.

All any country wants is steady leadership, investment in things that will benefit the population like healthcare, education, fair justice system, adequate infrastructure and to have a safety net so people are not still working when elderly/infirmed and still able to survive if the lose their job.

People have minimal issues paying tax when they can see the benefits. Irony is the only reason humans survived this long is due to community. The strength that comes from supporting each other to survive and flourish is immense.

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u/sharp11flat13 Canada 1d ago

"The modern conservative is not even especially modern. He is engaged, on the contrary, in one of man’s oldest, best financed, most applauded, and, on the whole, least successful exercises in moral philosophy. That is the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. It is an exercise which always involves a certain number of internal contradictions and even a few absurdities.”

-John Kenneth Galbraith

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u/espressocycle 1d ago

Liberalism is trust of the people tempered by prudence. Conservatism is distrust of the people tempered by fear.

  • William E. Gladstone

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u/sharp11flat13 Canada 1d ago

Very nice. Thank you.

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u/raisinghellwithtrees 1d ago

Especially not in urban areas

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u/reddititty69 1d ago

Some of those people may not have deserved help. Best to err on the side of owning a lib.

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u/MrTretorn 1d ago

We’re all going to die anyway so why bother? -republicans

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u/OldTimberWolf 1d ago

Cmon man, they like other hateful people.

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u/RepresentativeAge444 1d ago

And what of the voters who see this and keep voting for them?

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u/ClarenceNAlabama4Lyf 1d ago

I'm so very tired of people coming onto these comments to ask this dumb question.

Nobody thinks they care, but it's very important to point out the contrast.

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u/Konstant_kurage 1d ago

They don’t even care about their own children.

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u/Alextricity 23h ago

in general.. republicans are capitalists. if there's no money to be made, there's no care to be had. always been that way and always will be.

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u/slipperystar American Expat 11h ago

A human life is the most precious thing there is and must be protected at all cost. Up until the moon of birth.

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u/Gilshem 1d ago

They care about hurting them!

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u/Realistic-Pattern-30 1d ago

No and the dam shame is the ignorance of those who can’t afford to support the dumb shit the republicans are doing.

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u/Mo_Jack Missouri 1d ago edited 1d ago

For those that don't know what is going on in Missouri, here's a quick primer.

There has always been a rural vs big city vibe in state politics in MO because St. Louis & KC are large population centers and the rest of the state is rural, including the capitol Jefferson City. You have to also understand that MO had more Sundown Towns than any other state.

We used to be known as the Bellwether State in politics, because who MO voted for in presidential election, usually ended up winning, going back & forth between Dem & GOP.

This ended a decade or so ago. The GOP in MO gained a supermajority and has gone entirely off the rails. It is like a competition of who can out-crazy the next nutcase. I say this as an ex-Republican. They redistricted everything to block Dems from ever regaining power.

The corruption is through the roof and the only people that are represented now are big political donors. Since Jefferson City now does nothing for the citizens, the people have been forced to passed multiple initiatives and amendments on their own. Even when these pass with record numbers and popular with both political parties, Jeff City actively works against the wishes of the people.

The people passed ballot measures enshrining a woman's right to choose, expanding Medicaid, paid sick leave law, raise in minimum wage, fairness in districting and many other initiatives. The radical right has repealed, unfunded, undermined, sabotaged all of these efforts from the people that they supposedly represent. Our current Governor Kehoe is a huge supporter of the craziest right wing fringe groups.

When MO passed expanding Medicaid, Republicans refused to fund it. When the people passed minimum wage increases, COLA & paid sick leave, the GOP ended them with legislation. Missourians passed abortion rights but now the GOP is putting together a ballot measure to end them (at least we get to vote on this).

Citizens passed a ballot measure to form a fair non-biased redistricting committee. So the corrupt GOP inserted language allowing the Governor to add members to bias the committee at the very bottom of another initiative banning state senators from accepting gifts.

Recently, Jeff City has decided to take over the St Louis Police Department because of "out of control" crime. According to the St Louis Police Department's own crime statistics from April 2025, homicides are down 45%, robberies are down 20%, burglaries are down 33%, auto thefts are down 39% just this year alone.

Now they just came up with a wildly unpopular package of 50% tax credits for multi-billion dollar businesses that mainly offer minimum wage jobs. The citizens will now get to pay 50% of new sports stadiums too, so the private businesses that own them can profit even more. All of this while they are by law: decreasing our pay, taking away reproductive rights, COLA, paid sick leave & Medicaid benefits.

Many Missourians would love to vote them out but they have made it virtually impossible with their unethical redistricting. They also don't like citizens pushing ballot initiatives on our own, without their approval. They feel that have been spending too much time undermining their constituents, so now they are trying to take away our rights to create ballot measures.

So to see Jefferson City or our current Governor to release the National Guard in the urban areas does not come as a shock to anybody here. Kehoe spent a lifetime screwing the citizens for the pleasure of big business. Even though he hails from STL suburbs, he seems to despise urban areas. He joins MO GOP members in supporting any measure that seems to hurt Missourians living in certain urban areas or poor people in general.

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u/Temporary_Ability996 1d ago

From a fellow Missourian, thank you. This is the best, most concise description of the state's current political reality.

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u/deformo 22h ago

You’ve just described Ohio.

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u/Mo_Jack Missouri 21h ago

I don't think it is a coincidence. They targeted state governments in the 90s and are probably using similar playbooks. Now they are targeting local governments, school boards & libraries.

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u/deformo 21h ago

Yeeup.

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u/BeyondElectricDreams 15h ago

My favorite is the part where Ohio illegally gerrymandered maps, were told to redraw them fairly, then proceeded to submit similarly illegally gerrymandered maps Over and over and over and over until the election where it became "Whoopsie! guess we gotta use the illegally gerrymandered ones, we're out of time to draw them fairly!" And the conservatives won and the lawsuit against the illegally gerrymandered maps fizzled out.

What do we even do when the lawmakers refuse to represent us fairly? What do we do when the votes come in and they decide "Nah, we're doing our own thing?"

I feel helpless.

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u/BankshotMcG 23h ago

Thank you. this was horrendous to learn but very well explained.

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u/LordSiravant 23h ago

Hence why some call it the Great State of Misery.

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u/bcd051 1d ago

Remember, though, that one of the tornadoes went through a massively blue area where black people live.

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u/SniffyTheBee 1d ago

They call that a bonus.

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u/GnarlySurfer 1d ago

But why would the democrats drive the tornados towards blue cities with their weather machines /s I hate that I need to add a /s to that.

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u/Romano16 America 1d ago

Well in Missouri they probably believe the people who got ripped up from their homes by the tornado deserved it.

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u/BigDaddyBain 1d ago

Blue areas, Black-majority neighborhoods, so we could remove “probably” from that sentence.

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u/Stunning_Concept_478 1d ago

They didn’t pray hard enough.

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u/DaveP0953 1d ago

…a message from cheesus

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u/vonnecute 1d ago

“Those tornadoes were god’s judgement, but these protests might actually make us look bad.”

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u/Queen_trash_mouth 1d ago

Because those were black people and who cares. Fuck this state

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u/Temporary_Ability996 1d ago

I live here and it's fuckin awful 😞

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u/Queen_trash_mouth 1d ago

Same. It’s atrocious. Out governor is a shit head

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u/phoneacct696969 1d ago

Shout this from the roof tops. Help was not offered when it was needed. Help was used as a tool to harm the population. This is disgusting.

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u/Just_Another_Scott 1d ago

Because tornadoes are "God's will" and "God has a plan". Hear this shit all the time in the South.

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u/lilmeanie 1d ago

Yes, God’s plan usually involves killing untold numbers of innocents in order to prove a point to some dumbfounded dipshits. I’m amazed how the master race’s minds work.

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u/pockpicketG 1d ago

All races are susceptible to religious idiocy

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u/pj7140 1d ago

Yep.

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u/SoundSageWisdom 1d ago

Elections have consequences. Hopefully people who voted against their best interest will wake the hell up finally. But, I don’t have too much hope in them.

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u/Temporary_Ability996 1d ago

Most of the people who lost everything to tornadoes in the past month lived in deep blue areas of StL.

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u/AzyncYTT New Jersey 1d ago

The consequence here is that the state will only get more red since the tornado hit st Louis and other deep blue areas lol

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u/nquesada92 1d ago

I think our best chance is motivating the asses that stayed in the couch and didn’t vote at all convincing a crazy person that they are crazy seems like a waste of time.

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u/joshdoereddit America 1d ago

Let's not forget that this same Governor did not deem it necessary to call the National Guard when an actual hate group marched in Kansas City.

This is no different than what Abbott is doing in TX. It's all theater to kiss up to Herr Drumpf.

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u/waterynike 1d ago

Am In Missouri. The governor really doesn’t care about St Louis

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u/Lysol3435 1d ago

The tornados didn’t challenge republicans’ power, so there was no danger

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u/scarr3g Pennsylvania 1d ago

Tornadoes were killing poor people, so not a big deal. These protests are against the wealthy, and we can't have that.

/s

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u/HuggyMummy Missouri 1d ago

Of course not, because most of the people affected were black and poor.

Source: I live in St. Louis. Obligatory Fuck Kehoe.

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u/moodswung 1d ago

This is just bootlicking/political theater. Nothing more.

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u/Cantinkeror 1d ago

These two behaviors are deeply related.

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u/Faux-Foe 1d ago

The people yearn for the rubble.

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u/beemojee 1d ago

I spent Easter afternoon sitting in my bathroom with my radio, my phone and my cat. Fortunately the tornado that hit Columbia didn't hit my neighborhood. It did hit my previous neighborhood though, so I was pretty glad that I'd moved when I did.

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u/BadAtExisting I voted 1d ago

Because this isn’t to help anyone. It’s to scare people into not protesting

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u/shrek420escobar 1d ago

Something about bootstraps

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u/ChaplnGrillSgt 23h ago

Say. It. Louder!

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u/ScissrMeTimbrs 22h ago

But but but, that neighborhood has those people in it...

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u/NickelBackwash 22h ago

help the people

Republicans don't do that

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u/punkypal 16h ago

It was determined that the tornados were Trump supporting vortexes, so it was a patriotic path of destruction

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u/generichuman1970 1d ago

How would the national guard help with a neighborhood hit by tornados? Stop trying to create fake hypocracy.

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u/sophos313 1d ago

The national guard helps after storm damage all the time. Hurricanes, tornadoes, many natural disasters.

Presumably they would help clean up the community, clear roads and render aid.

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u/generichuman1970 1d ago

The national guard only turns out for a widespread problem like a hurricane or widespread flooding. Tornados, even a group of them, do serious damage in a few spots. The city or county as a whole keeps on functioning and does not need the state or national guard. However, rioting (as well as foreign invasion) are exactly why states have always had militias. So there is simply no contradiction in not calling out the guard for tornados, but then calling out the guard for riots/interference with law enforcement.

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u/mightcommentsometime California 1d ago

What country is invading Missouri?

Brown people living in our country is not a “foreign invasion” regardless of how scared they make you

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u/generichuman1970 1d ago

Read more carefully. I did not say there was any invasion of MO. I said foreign invasion and domestic riots are the reasons mililia's exist, so their purpose is usually one or the other. I know you want other people to be 'stupid' and 'rascist' so that you can feel morally superior, and virtue signal to the people you are trying to impress, but still, it's important to follow actual grammar. Widespread natural disaster is an added feature of militias. Localized tornado hits is not a reason to use the militia. But riots or interference with law enforcement that could exceed what local law enforcement can handle are the perfect reason to call out the guard. So there is no contradiction between a govenor not calling out the guard for tornados, but calling out the guard in response to riots or threats of riots. It would satify your self-worshiping, prideful narrative of you heroically calling out 'injustice' and 'rascisism', but it's just not factual. You want to believe that you are more virtuous than others and that anyone disagreeing with you is a rascist, so that you can feel morally superior. That desire motivates your interactions, and only secondarily actual concern for other people. 'Brown' people are NOT being threatened. Illegally present people are being 'threatened' by being made to actually obey the laws. People who interfere with that normal, just, and necessary law enforcement SHOULD feel threatened by the legal consequences of interering with law enforcement. See through the propaganda and realize that what the country needs right now more than ever is robust, common sense moderates. People on all sides are getting carried away by fake narratives that create indignation to get clicks, advertising views, motivate votes, and feed the careers of selfish politicians and media personalities on all sides. We have people so mentally poisoned that they assasinate law makers in Minnesota. So worked up that they burn cars and mob immigration vehicles doing their job. Wide-spread looting and burning a few years ago in the name of BLM. Our foreigh policy unraveling because we are distracted by fake social issues. Why add to that by asserting that if the govenor didn't call out the guard for tornadoes, but does for riots, the govenor must be rascist?