John Oliver's Last Week Tonight

He’s also the guy who once said that the US hadn’t suffer Islamic terrorist attacks until Obama took office.

He then tried to correct by saying “since 9/11” even though that’s also wrong.

Yeah, I know, he is the guy who blamed Obama for everything...I am kind of surprised that he hasn't blamed him for Stormy Daniels yet.

"I'm kind of annoyed with John because that's all low hanging fruit versus the fact Rudy waged a campaign against poor people to turn Manhattan into a gentrified theme park for the rich."

Gentrification alone, as a concept, but Rudy vs. The Big Rotten Apple as a case study, could fill an entire LWT main segment alone.

Stupid question but...where exactly did the poor people go?

Stupid question but...where exactly did the poor people go?

A farm upstate. A kindly old couple takes care of them with all the other poor people.

But generally, they just get dispersed to wherever they can get housing or they become homeless.

edited 8th May '18 3:36:51 PM by CharlesPhipps

"Away."

That's basically it. The people getting rid of them didn't care where they went as long as they didn't stay there. The actual homeless people just moved to different boroughs, but the poor people with homes probably had to move to entirely different cities because they couldn't afford to stay anywhere else in New York.

'ed

edited 8th May '18 12:42:25 PM by Discar

Most of the theories about what causes and prevents crime are wrong. There are two factors that dominate everything:

1: Childhood lead exposure makes people a lot more violent. A lot. This resulted in the huge crime wave of the 80s, and then when it went away again, people creditied all the things people tried to stop said crime wave with working.. but nope, that is not where the numbers are at, crime fell because kids with less heavy-metal induced brain damage do less crime.

2: The better the police are at solving crimes - that is, the higher the odds of a given crime resulting in that person being caught, the lower the crime. Not length of sentencing, not "visible presence", just straight up, "Find burglar, arrest burglar" policing competence matters a whole lot.

I agree completely about the police thing... but did you seriously just blame heavy metal for high crime? Please tell me that's a euphemism and you don't mean the music.

I believe he means literal lead.

I also believe that's untrue and the crime "waves" of the time weren't actually that huge by comparison but simply larger reporting of violent crime.

edited 8th May '18 3:37:56 PM by CharlesPhipps

Oh, I thought that was a typo, and he was trying to say that what's in your childhood leads to metaphorical brain damage and crime. Which is an insulting metaphor.

Sorry for snapping at you, Izein. I mean, I don't have the numbers to know if metal poisoning was really such a major influence, but at least you're not pulling a New Media Are Evil.

Edit to respond to edit: Yeah, the news becoming more profit focused and using If It Bleeds, It Leads has made the world look like it's constantly getting worse when actually things are almost constantly improving. Crime is way down, but according to all the major news outlets most cities are practically rioting.

edited 8th May '18 3:26:03 PM by Discar

Here's some articles on the gentrification of New York.

Which notably, Trump profited from immensely.

War on the Poor: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2007/05/message-you-rudy-giuliani/

http://nymag.com/anniversary/40th/50652/

https://www.citylab.com/life/2017/08/vanishing-new-york-gentrification/537126/

edited 8th May '18 3:29:59 PM by CharlesPhipps

Drum summarizing the research. https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2016/02/lead-exposure-gasoline-crime-increase-children-health/

If you want, you can sit your ass down in a university library and read the papers. The link is solid, and also shows up in historical data for other sources of lead poisoning, and the mechanism is obvious - Lead causes brain damage in ways which is bad for impulse control.

And yes, John Oliver did do a whole main segment covering lead poisoning.

edited 23rd May '18 10:37:37 PM by M84

It's not just a matter of media coverage, crime did go up a lot in the '60s and '70s, stayed high through the '80s, and then dropped through the '90s and 2000s. It's still higher now than it was in the early '60s:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_States

In Canada, homicide rates similarly went way up in the '60s and early '70s, but had an overall downward trajectory from the late '70s onwards, though the big declines were in the '90s.

edited 23rd May '18 4:09:35 AM by Galadriel

Wait, are you honestly telling me that the reason why Americans are, well, kind of stupid (naturally not all of them, but on average they are behind most developed countries), is because they poison themselves with lead and don't bother to do anything about it?

This is just...wow......

Not really. Or not any more. Brain damage is one of the last symptoms of lead poisoning, and any medical professional is going to catch it long before that point.

Of course, with the whole Flint, Michigan debacle and "Clean water is not a human right" bullshit, maybe we'll be heading in that direction again. Who knows.

Eh...no? Lower intelligence is one of the FIRST symptoms of lead poisoning, and nearly impossible to catch....

I'm not a medical professional myself, but as far as I know it starts with irritability, fatigue, then weight loss, pain, vomiting, and finally permanent brain damage. Thankfully I haven't actually had to deal with it in my city.

, I would suggest clarifying whether you're referring to acute or chronic poisoning to avoid misunderstandings.

I am not talking about permanent brain damage, I am talking about a lower intelligence, due to the lead damaging your nerves. Your brain can be totally okay, but you won't be able to use it as you should if it isn't properly connected.

Hell, John Oliver even referred to the study in question in his segment.

This is a very controversial and not at all substantiated view.

There was a LOT going on, society wise at this time.

There was an episode on Mexico's elections.

So we have El Bronco (an utter lunatic), Anaya (daaw he's adorkable!), and the front runner, who is Left Wing-ish Mirror Universe Trump.

Please don't have El Bronco win. Please. This man is out of his gourd.

edited 25th Jun '18 1:53:12 AM by NickTheSwing

I am sad that El Bronco exists because it means that name probably can't be used by a Mexican hoss wrestler.

El Bronco and Trump having a debate would be...special.