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16 minutes ago, Life said:


Also, geopolitical foreign policy didn't ruin the Middle East. This area hasn't been stable since... well, go back to Sumeria, I suppose.

There's an argument to be made that foreign policy definitely did ruin the middle east. Most post Ottoman borders were made by western powers after all. Putting down the Ottoman's like a sick dog was definitely something Europe could do since the Ottoman's thought it was funny to bumble into WWI on the losing side but the new nations that were formed have turned out to be a very flawed construction. And then there's the creation of israel which definitely caused some disruption or Western influence on Persia eventually leading to the overthrow of the Shajh and the Iran we know today. 

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22 minutes ago, Life said:

because I prefer not going back to war (I really hope that I'm not the only person here who has actually done military service).

Not sure how not being friends with Saudi Arabia would start a war. Countries are already scared that the US is going to topple them (for somewhat good reason).

The point was that Israel being an ally of the US elite means jack shit when it comes to what's best for America. You as a nationalist as you've described yourself before should know this.

And no, I have no desire for military service. If my country had more dignity to do the right things then perhaps I very much would.

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I bring up military service because it has nothing to do with "pride for your country" and all that jazz. What it really does is teach you the actual value of a human life. Usually, those who have never served are either relatively naive when it comes to conflicts (example: believing that morality matters as opposed to being realistic) or they are absurdly cavalier with other people's lives.

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1 hour ago, Etrurian emperor said:

There's an argument to be made that foreign policy definitely did ruin the middle east.

I mean I'd go with failure to secularize into the post-modern ethos + the lingering influence of Old World religiosity in defining social values and maintaining civil order, in place of legal rationalism and humanist ethics has ruined the middle east.

...but sure... 
 

Edited by Shoblongoo
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37 minutes ago, Shoblongoo said:

I mean I'd go with failure to secularize into the post-modern ethos + the lingering influence of Old World religiosity in defining social values and maintaining civil order, in place of legal rationalism and humanist ethics has ruined the middle east.

...but sure... 
 

See, this, I can agree with you on. Minus the post-modern ethos where I'd substitute modernism instead. But that's simply because I highly disagree with post-modernism in all forms in a fundamental sense.

I've mentioned at least once that the Ultra-Orthodox here are nothing more than parasitic leeches and that's still a lot better than a lot of the religious sects in the general area.

Edited by Life
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14 hours ago, Shoblongoo said:

I mean I'd go with failure to secularize into the post-modern ethos + the lingering influence of Old World religiosity in defining social values and maintaining civil order, in place of legal rationalism and humanist ethics has ruined the middle east.

...but sure... 

If you look at pictures of Iran and Afghanistan in the 70s you will see that religious theocracy was a more recent thing. But this doesn't necessarily mean that what came before it was good. Iran had a backlash against the coup of 53.

And if you look at the Iranian revolution, well you'll see that it was a rebellion against a US-installed system and the Shah. 

A corrupt US and UK backed regime leading to an Islamic theocracy. Perhaps if Mosaddegh was allowed to continue you would have your (more) secular state. We can also talk about the US aligning themselves with the Mujaheddin and jihadists when it suits them.

That's without going into the entirety of Latin America. I've never said that there haven't been domestic problems in those regions but foreign policy has exacerbated them.

Edited by Tryhard
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33 minutes ago, Soapbar said:

David Koch dead at 79

 

I've been thinking of something else to say to go along with that but I'm not supposed to speak ill of the dead so I'll just leave it at that.

The best thing about today is that Charles Koch is getting to see just how happy the world is going to be when he croaks
 
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When I heard about David Koch's death, this quote was the first thing that came to mind:

Quote

The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones.

Fuck him. He played a large part in the build up of today's horrible political climate. Built up all that wealth selfishly just to drop dead at 79 and leave the country with a Frankenstein's monster and his cult.

6 hours ago, Soapbar said:

I've been thinking of something else to say to go along with that but I'm not supposed to speak ill of the dead so I'll just leave it at that.

That's certainly the rule. I'd say David Koch can count as an exception to it.

Edited by Dr. Tarrasque
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4 hours ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:

When I heard about David Koch's death, this quote was the first thing that came to mind:

That line is meant to be ironic because Marc Antony didn't think of Caesar as an evil man. Even out of context this would assume that Koch left a bad legacy but was still a good man with those deeds now forgotten.

You should really reread that entire monologue again because you horribly misused that line here.

Edited by Life
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On 8/22/2019 at 3:53 PM, Etrurian emperor said:

There's an argument to be made that foreign policy definitely did ruin the middle east. Most post Ottoman borders were made by western powers after all. Putting down the Ottoman's like a sick dog was definitely something Europe could do since the Ottoman's thought it was funny to bumble into WWI on the losing side but the new nations that were formed have turned out to be a very flawed construction. And then there's the creation of israel which definitely caused some disruption or Western influence on Persia eventually leading to the overthrow of the Shajh and the Iran we know today. 

The Sykes-Picot Agreement and the Balfour Declaration. Whilst making promises to the Arabs, France and Britain decided to give themselves Syria-Lebanon, and Transjordan-Iraq + Palestine, and concurrently promising a vague "national homeland" (they intentionally never said "nation-state") to Zionist Jews. I think Britain controlled part of Yemen for a time b/c it was a good stopping point en route to India. And Afghanistan, which is really more Central Asia but gets lumped in with the Middle East from time to time, I'm aware is somewhat a buffer state agreed to by Russia and Britain to keep Russia from getting too close to British India. 

A Middle East professor I once had, if you had to get a quick answer no lecture from them on the question, said they'd blame the British when it comes to who originally started the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. To be fair, they did recently publish a book on the world history of the Balfour Declaration.

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1 hour ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

The Sykes-Picot Agreement and the Balfour Declaration. Whilst making promises to the Arabs, France and Britain decided to give themselves Syria-Lebanon, and Transjordan-Iraq + Palestine, and concurrently promising a vague "national homeland" (they intentionally never said "nation-state") to Zionist Jews. I think Britain controlled part of Yemen for a time b/c it was a good stopping point en route to India. And Afghanistan, which is really more Central Asia but gets lumped in with the Middle East from time to time, I'm aware is somewhat a buffer state agreed to by Russia and Britain to keep Russia from getting too close to British India. 

A Middle East professor I once had, if you had to get a quick answer no lecture from them on the question, said they'd blame the British when it comes to who originally started the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. To be fair, they did recently publish a book on the world history of the Balfour Declaration.

I pretty much agree with the idea of blaming the British if you need a quick go to answer but it's a lot more complicated than that.

 

It's important to remember that the Jews and Arabs did some pretty awful shit to each other prior to Milchemet Ha'atzmaut (Israeli War of Independance) but since then, the sheer passivity of Israel is actually rather shocking.

 

My position on it is very simple. We conquered the land, we don't owe the Palestinians shit and we've already paid our pound of flesh (second Shakespearean reference in 5 posts). As I said earlier, in this part of the world, might makes right.

Edited by Life
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Not to break the flow of current discussions and interrupt but can someone please link me or tell me how I can watch the 2nd (July) debate. For the life of me, I spent an earnest 19+ minutes. I phrased it "July Dem debate", "2nd democratic debate", then I tried "full democratic debate", "full July democratic debate", and after still not finding anything going up to three pages on each of those searches I got to searching "where is July debate video?", "How to see 2nd democratic debate", and so forth. That fact that I came here is just me throwing in the towel. Like holy shit, why can't I find a 2 hour video. I even used YouTube search engine with filters toggling on duration greater than 20 minutes and tried using words like detroit, Wednesday, and what not since this debate was held differently than the June debate.

 

Did something happen at the debate that they pulled it from the internet? 

To anyone helping me out with this, no links to highlights, no opinion pieces, no take aways, or anything other than the full video itself so I can come to my own interpretations of what was said. I don't want other people's perception on it. 

(Sorry if I sound cranky. It's 3am and I haven't slept plus I smash my thumb a little bit ago)

 

Also @Dr. Tarrasque you planning on attending the 3rd debate? It's in Houston. Isn't your city like an hour away?

Edited by Tediz64
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17 hours ago, Life said:

That line is meant to be ironic because Marc Antony didn't think of Caesar as an evil man. Even out of context this would assume that Koch left a bad legacy but was still a good man with those deeds now forgotten.

You should really reread that entire monologue again because you horribly misused that line here.

I know how the quote is used in that piece. It still came to mind because of how true it is of him if it's not mean to be Ironic because the man and his brother are truly just a pieces of shit. Long story short their wealth and ideology starts with their dad who built polluting oil pipelines for Joseph Stalin in the 1930s and supported segregation and white supremacist groups. The brothers have continued and did everything in their power to disguise their intent to do away with environmental legislation for their own profit as their libertarian values and funding whatever groups sought to do reduce the power of the government like the current Tea Party Republicans that are pretty much in it to cash in on the corruption the Koch brothers themselves started.

10 hours ago, Tediz64 said:

 

Also @Dr. Tarrasque you planning on attending the 3rd debate? It's in Houston. Isn't your city like an hour away?

3 hour drive. And no, the previous 2 debates have been a joke enough as is. I don't see value in physically attending a 3rd debate when the previous 2 did next to nothing to change my views on these candidates. I'm just glad they're starting to drop and still hoping for Beto to take on (and hopefully beat) Cornyn in the Senate.

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15 hours ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:

3 hour drive. And no, the previous 2 debates have been a joke enough as is. I don't see value in physically attending a 3rd debate when the previous 2 did next to nothing to change my views on these candidates. I'm just glad they're starting to drop and still hoping for Beto to take on (and hopefully beat) Cornyn in the Senate.

Has he announced a Senate campaign as opposed to president? Oh yeah Cornyn's seat is going this year. 

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7 hours ago, Tediz64 said:

Has he announced a Senate campaign as opposed to president? Oh yeah Cornyn's seat is going this year. 

Beto hasn't yet. He foolishly keeps trying to "restart" his presidential campaign while Dems around him are suggesting that he unseats Cornyn.

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On 8/24/2019 at 5:20 AM, Life said:

My position on it is very simple. We conquered the land, we don't owe the Palestinians shit and we've already paid our pound of flesh (second Shakespearean reference in 5 posts). As I said earlier, in this part of the world, might makes right.

Okay. But the Palestinians don't owe the Israelis anything either, and might may make right but it doesn't grant legitimacy. If your argument boils down to having stolen the land by force and that the losing party can just go rot away then why exactly should the losing party ever stop fighting? If taking the land by force is the rightful way of doing things then that's the only way they'd get their land back and ''we don't owe them shit'' doesn't give them a single incentive to ever lay down arms. 

And its not just about the Palestinians either. If your justification for seizing land is simply that you had the power to do so then that's also a fair justification for other countries. Maybe a country stronger than Israel will decide that them being stronger than Israel gives them the right to seize the land by force. Maybe Russia thinks being stronger than Poland gives them the right to destroy Poland a third time, maybe Japan would really like to take Korea back once it restores its army and perhaps France will think its amusing to conquer the smaller Belgium. Especially in an era were wacky demagogues are seizing power we really shouldn't foster this kind of behavior when it comes to international relations. 

If your position ever becomes common we will be back to the times where war is the norm. The world became a much better place when we abandoned that mindset after the world wars and I'd rather not return to those days within my lifetime. 

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1 hour ago, Etrurian emperor said:

Okay. But the Palestinians don't owe the Israelis anything either, and might may make right but it doesn't grant legitimacy. If your argument boils down to having stolen the land by force and that the losing party can just go rot away then why exactly should the losing party ever stop fighting? If taking the land by force is the rightful way of doing things then that's the only way they'd get their land back and ''we don't owe them shit'' doesn't give them a single incentive to ever lay down arms. 

And its not just about the Palestinians either. If your justification for seizing land is simply that you had the power to do so then that's also a fair justification for other countries. Maybe a country stronger than Israel will decide that them being stronger than Israel gives them the right to seize the land by force. Maybe Russia thinks being stronger than Poland gives them the right to destroy Poland a third time, maybe Japan would really like to take Korea back once it restores its army and perhaps France will think its amusing to conquer the smaller Belgium. Especially in an era were wacky demagogues are seizing power we really shouldn't foster this kind of behavior when it comes to international relations. 

If your position ever becomes common we will be back to the times where war is the norm. The world became a much better place when we abandoned that mindset after the world wars and I'd rather not return to those days within my lifetime. 

You're right. It doesn't. That's why we should push for peace on our terms or raze it to the ground if no peace can be realistically  achieved. As Golda Meir once said, "there will only be peace when the Palestinians learn to love their own children more than hating Jews". Rashida Tlaib confirmed it; her ideological position is more important than blood. It sounds awful but as I said above, Western morality doesn't exactly apply to lands that are run by theocracies from the 15th century and a fractured democracy circa 19th century.

What makes it more frustrating is that we are willing to give up land that we won in defensive wars where we were invaded first for peace. We want two things: recognition that Israel is going to exist and Jerusalem (I personally would be happy to give up the second). Since we don't get either, we're stuck between a rock and a hard place while tying our own hands behind our backs.

Western morality is so bourgeois and naive sometimes.

Hell, we even end up doing this: https://www.timesofisrael.com/supreme-court-bans-extreme-right-gopstein-and-marzel-from-election-race/?fbclid=IwAR2tgBjgwSlKsXkz1DL2Mj7WzXCIRMZnDs9dqyOyNUp6zVWyTd2riOynkRY

Yeah, our Supreme Court actually banned a party from running for the Knesset on the grounds that they are the spiritual successors of Kahane and would actually create an apartheid state.

Edited by Life
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Yoooooooooooooooo.  Latest round of primary polling  has Biden all the way down at 19%, with Bernie and Warren tied at 20%

Image may contain: text

Two weak debate performances + a string of gaffs and unforced errors on the campaign trail, and that frontrunner lead is gone

Its a race now. Game on guys. (I'm rootin' for Warren) 

Edited by Shoblongoo
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Tomorrow is the last day to qualify for the 3rd debate. Looks like it'll now be just 10 debaters, which means one night, everyone with a chance of winning able to cut off and criticize the others.

 

The Monmouth pollster did admit though that the poll leaned towards the younger side, which works against Biden and his strength with the older electorate.

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2 hours ago, Phoenix Wright said:

i'm curious--why warren?

She's pretty close to where I am on most policies.

And she's an actual policy wonk who identifies problems + gets into the weeds on substantive proposals; not some bumper-sticker sloganeer resting upon shallow talking points and applause lines.   

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13 hours ago, Phoenix Wright said:

i'm curious--why warren?

EDIT: Misread.

For most people I know who support her, she's basically Bernie with clearer and broader policies. She's my #2 after Bernie, but even I can acknowledge she's better than Bernie at addressing a handful of issues at a time. Bernie seems to pick one talking point for a month, and then beat it into the ground before moving onto the next one.

Edited by Slumber
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Lol @ the narrative that Biden is somehow losing

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-primaries/democratic/national/

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/28/biden-leads-polls-1476649

Just because one poll puts him even with Warren/Sanders means jack, it's an outlier

Also this is a primary and is determined by delegates who do you think is going to win the South???

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statewide_opinion_polling_for_the_2020_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries

Biden is still favored to win. I don't know how it'll go (and I can't vote it in either), but Biden leads double digits and is in a good position I would say

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