I Told You So

When I was younger, I made it a point never to say “I told you so” even when I had, because it struck me as annoying and arrogant even when it was justified.  Well, those days are gone.  I’ve been warning people about what I see coming, and largely being ignored (when I’m not being dismissed as paranoid or overly cynical), for decades now, so maybe if I rub some noses in it when events prove me right in spades, a few more will start fucking listening.  Take the current protests, for example; regular readers know I’ve been writing about police brutality for a very long time, and I’m certainly not alone in recognizing policing as a dangerous societal malady.  But even many soi-disant “leftists” who claim to be against police violence haven’t been against policing itself, and have long comforted themselves with fantasies about “reform”; many of them now seem to be waking up to the recognition that the only “reform” that will work is defunding, disarming, downsizing and eventually abolishing them.  Furthermore, these same people have blathered nonsense about gun control for years, foolishly concerning themselves with rare acts of violence by private citizens instead of recognizing the need for citizens (especially minorities) to be armed against the depredations of government actors; I notice they’ve been a lot quieter for the past week, and some have even started talking about the Second Amendment they until recently idiotically criticized as an anachronism.  And then there are the protests themselves; I’ve been predicting since at least early April that the first riots would occur on May 1^st (I was off by one day; it was April 30^th) and would become a major crisis by the end of May.  Obviously, the current riots are mostly about cop violence, but if you really think anger at government declaring them “nonessential”, stealing their livelihoods and “locking them down” like prisoners aren’t contributing factors, I have nothing to say to you.  Also:  if the whole idiotic “lockdown” scheme was really necessary to control the spread of the virus, why isn’t anybody panicking & shaming the protesters gathering in vastly larger crowds than their “leaders” declared acceptable?  I think that’s enough; you get the picture, and if I keep listing examples I’m just going to get more insufferable than I already am.  But Cassandra is done being polite, and isn’t ever going to let y’all forget that she warned y’all about that fucking horse.