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On August 05 2015 08:39 cLutZ wrote:
It should not be taken as a given that attacking a civilian population in a state that you are at war with is a war crime. This may be widely accepted now, but it lacks logic and shatters the basic theory of governance. If a government is a legitimate government (not always true, for instance Saddam Hussein likely was not) their actions are necessarily imputed to the citizens, because if that was not true, they would not be a legitimate government. Those civilians are most likely powering the war machine that is at war with your country, they are at war with you.
If bombing civilians is a war crime, then people who don't like anything a government does are not obligated to pay taxes, for instance.
It is factually a given that "attacking a civilian population in a state that you are at war with is a war crime". The Geneva Convention (IV) relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of 1949 explicitly prohibits the killing of civilians (art. 3). This breach of the convention is seen to constitute a war crime, something that has been accepted in customary international law and is directly included in article 8 ("War Crimes") of the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.
This does not shatter in any way "the basic theory of governance", since there is a difference between a government and its citizens. Whether or not a state's citizens actually elected a government that decides to participate in a war is irrelevant to the fact that 1) their government is not allowed to deliberately target the civilians of opposing states and that 2) opposing states are not allowed to deliberately target the state's civilians.
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On August 05 2015 09:06 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2015 09:01 Acrofales wrote:On August 05 2015 08:43 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 05 2015 08:39 cLutZ wrote:
It should not be taken as a given that attacking a civilian population in a state that you are at war with is a war crime. This may be widely accepted now, but it lacks logic and shatters the basic theory of governance. If a government is a legitimate government (not always true, for instance Saddam Hussein likely was not) their actions are necessarily imputed to the citizens, because if that was not true, they would not be a legitimate government. Those civilians are most likely powering the war machine that is at war with your country, they are at war with you.
If bombing civilians is a war crime, then people who don't like anything a government does are not obligated to pay taxes, for instance. That's basically exactly why ISIS inspired terrorists think civilians are legitimate targets. Are you saying you agree with them? Nice reductio ad ISISum you got going there. It's really not though. He opened with "attacking a civilian population". If he meant as collateral damage then maybe, but it sounded like he was suggesting attacking civilians shouldn't be assumed to be a war crime. Whether they both fall under the umbrella of terrorism in his view, I don't think he made clear.
Exactly. The very basis of the idea of war crimes is exactly that even in war, not everything is justified, even if it helps achieve victory. Noone is arguing against the fact that a war crime might help achieve a goal. That is one of the reasons they are committed a lot even by rational people.
However, i would like to think that we are slowly reaching the point where we as people decide that some things should not be done. Murdering civilians is one of those things. And that is even if it would somehow help you to murder those civilians.
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On August 05 2015 08:43 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2015 08:39 cLutZ wrote:
It should not be taken as a given that attacking a civilian population in a state that you are at war with is a war crime. This may be widely accepted now, but it lacks logic and shatters the basic theory of governance. If a government is a legitimate government (not always true, for instance Saddam Hussein likely was not) their actions are necessarily imputed to the citizens, because if that was not true, they would not be a legitimate government. Those civilians are most likely powering the war machine that is at war with your country, they are at war with you.
If bombing civilians is a war crime, then people who don't like anything a government does are not obligated to pay taxes, for instance. That's basically exactly why ISIS inspired terrorists think civilians are legitimate targets. Are you saying you agree with them?
To be clear, I am not sure I agree with me. What I am saying is you can't just make a blanket statement of killing civilians=war crime. Certainly there is the collateral damage issue, but it is more about the intentional killing of civilians that I have the moral hangup on.
Imagine a France vs. Germany war that is going on in 2015 and the actual battles are on the border, but France decides to strike in the heart of the country in Minuch to demoralize (terrorize) the other country. Germany should certainly be outraged about this, however, the government of Germany doesn't have a moral claim against France because they would have imprisoned/killed those same people if they refused to support the war effort through taxes.
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On August 05 2015 09:21 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2015 08:43 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 05 2015 08:39 cLutZ wrote:
It should not be taken as a given that attacking a civilian population in a state that you are at war with is a war crime. This may be widely accepted now, but it lacks logic and shatters the basic theory of governance. If a government is a legitimate government (not always true, for instance Saddam Hussein likely was not) their actions are necessarily imputed to the citizens, because if that was not true, they would not be a legitimate government. Those civilians are most likely powering the war machine that is at war with your country, they are at war with you.
If bombing civilians is a war crime, then people who don't like anything a government does are not obligated to pay taxes, for instance. That's basically exactly why ISIS inspired terrorists think civilians are legitimate targets. Are you saying you agree with them? To be clear, I am not sure I agree with me. What I am saying is you can't just make a blanket statement of killing civilians=war crime. Certainly there is the collateral damage issue, but it is more about the intentional killing of civilians that I have the moral hangup on. Imagine a France vs. Germany war that is going on in 2015 and the actual battles are on the border, but France decides to strike in the heart of the country in Minuch to demoralize (terrorize) the other country. Germany should certainly be outraged about this, however, the government of Germany doesn't have a moral claim against France because they would have imprisoned/killed those same people if they refused to support the war effort through taxes.
Are you drunk posting?
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On August 05 2015 09:13 kwizach wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2015 08:39 cLutZ wrote:
It should not be taken as a given that attacking a civilian population in a state that you are at war with is a war crime. This may be widely accepted now, but it lacks logic and shatters the basic theory of governance. If a government is a legitimate government (not always true, for instance Saddam Hussein likely was not) their actions are necessarily imputed to the citizens, because if that was not true, they would not be a legitimate government. Those civilians are most likely powering the war machine that is at war with your country, they are at war with you.
If bombing civilians is a war crime, then people who don't like anything a government does are not obligated to pay taxes, for instance. It is factually a given that "attacking a civilian population in a state that you are at war with is a war crime". The Geneva Convention (IV) relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of 1949 explicitly prohibits the killing of civilians (art. 3). This breach of the convention is seen to constitute a war crime, something that has been accepted in customary international law and is directly included in article 8 ("War Crimes") of the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. This does not shatter in any way "the basic theory of governance", since there is a difference between a government and its citizens. Whether or not a state's citizens actually elected a government that decides to participate in a war is irrelevant to the fact that 1) their government is not allowed to deliberately target the civilians of opposing states and that 2) opposing states are not allowed to deliberately target the state's civilians.
Agree, a government that has signed such a treaty should be bound by it.
However, in my previous example, assume they had not. Doesn't the French government have an obligation to prevent resources that will cause the death of French citizens from being brought to bear against them? Many goods are fungible in that type of situation, so a shortage of bread in Cologne causes a shortage on the front lines, which saves French lives. This is real in all wars, WWI was won, in no small part, by the British starving the Germans, many to death. The war machines of a government and its people are necessarily inseparable given that all countries have limited resources.
Edit, and importantly, the Germans in this situation would also terrorize their own population, in Cologne, if they refused to support the war effort.
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On August 05 2015 09:06 Jormundr wrote:
Rofl. That's not reductio ad absurdum at all. It's not GH's fault clutz is apparently as ethically challenged as some of the worst mujahideen.
lol this is fucking hilarious.
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On August 05 2015 09:21 cLutZ wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2015 08:43 GreenHorizons wrote:On August 05 2015 08:39 cLutZ wrote:
It should not be taken as a given that attacking a civilian population in a state that you are at war with is a war crime. This may be widely accepted now, but it lacks logic and shatters the basic theory of governance. If a government is a legitimate government (not always true, for instance Saddam Hussein likely was not) their actions are necessarily imputed to the citizens, because if that was not true, they would not be a legitimate government. Those civilians are most likely powering the war machine that is at war with your country, they are at war with you.
If bombing civilians is a war crime, then people who don't like anything a government does are not obligated to pay taxes, for instance. That's basically exactly why ISIS inspired terrorists think civilians are legitimate targets. Are you saying you agree with them? To be clear, I am not sure I agree with me. What I am saying is you can't just make a blanket statement of killing civilians=war crime. Certainly there is the collateral damage issue, but it is more about the intentional killing of civilians that I have the moral hangup on. Imagine a France vs. Germany war that is going on in 2015 and the actual battles are on the border, but France decides to strike in the heart of the country in Minuch to demoralize (terrorize) the other country. Germany should certainly be outraged about this, however, the government of Germany doesn't have a moral claim against France because they would have imprisoned/killed those same people if they refused to support the war effort through taxes.
Sorry, but this is literally the dumbest thing i've ever read.
edit: forget what i said, i just saw your second posting. That might take the cake.
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United States42714 Posts
Scott Walker makes over 200k a year and has a negative net worth. That's the kind of financial discipline and leadership he brings to his personal life and I imagine we're all looking forward to seeing what he can do for America.
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On August 04 2015 23:01 GreenHorizons wrote:
As for the heat and shootings it's a pretty simple connection.
When it's hot people are outside. When a bunch of rivals are outside (exposed) it's the most practical time to go after them. They are lightly clothed (no vest or .22/.380 resistant clothing), which also makes them easier to ID.
Also more gatherings and such. Not to mention people get irritable in uncomfortable heat.
On August 05 2015 00:08 YoureFired wrote:
There's also a correlation between heat and students being out for summer, and not being in school is a huge determinant of gang activity/crime.
Yes, these are both very good points. When it's hot, people are generally out of school and are more likely to hang out outside where tensions can easily escalate to major violence.
The real issue with the heat is that it pushes people together more often. The added irritability caused by heat is just an exasperating issue.
On August 05 2015 02:11 KwarK wrote:
The temperature line is pretty arbitrary. Obviously shootings you have 100% of max set at whatever the highest number was and 0% being no shootings at all but with temperature I doubt 0% is absolute zero. If they just use 0 celsius or whatever as zero then 50% max temperature will be a point halfway between the highest and a totally arbitrary point. I suspect whoever made the graph is aware of this and made it that way to show correlation closely.
Sorry, I made that graph quickly in excel. I hate using two separate values for the Y axis and putting degrees of temperature and shootings on the same Y axis wouldn't make much sense. So I used Fahrenheit (I'm American, we use Fahrenheit) starting at 0 to the maximum average and distributed the rest of the temperatures as a % of the maximum. Conveniently, it worked extremely well.
I should have just used two separate Y axis and then scaled them so that the top values of each would be at the top of the graph and the bottom values would each be at the bottom. That would have been a more sensible graph, but it also would have resulted in an almost identical graph to what I put together.
It would be interesting to put together graphs for 2003-2015 (where overall murder rates stayed reasonably steady). Unfortunately, I don't have a good source for that monthly information (other than parts of 2014). If someone does, post it here and I'll put it together with the temperature and we can see if there's a longer term correlation.
However, when shootings don't remain steady, then the correlation will fall apart since the temperature remains reasonably steady year over year. In those cases, I'd make a separate graph for each year and see how well shootings correlate to temperature within the year.
So I do apologize if the graph was seen as being shady. Not meant to be, just meant to illustrate a point.
The point of my initial post was to show people that there is a general increase in shootings in warmer months in the United States. If people are decrying the violence because it is higher than it was a few months back and they see it as a bad trend, then they've ignored the bigger pattern. The pattern is that there are always more shootings during the hotter months and a decrease in shootings in the colder months.
The worrisome trends are the Year over Year increases. So if July 2015 was more violent than June 2015, that's expected. However, if July 2015 was more violent than July 2014, that's a concern. In Chicago, we had 322 shootings in July 2014 and 320 shootings for July 2015. Actually a slight decrease. Unfortunately, we had a bad increase YoY in January (+47.5%), March (+75.8%), and May (+19.2%). And we'll likely have a total yearly increase from 2014 (unless it gets really cold really fast).
On August 05 2015 02:32 Acrofales wrote:
There's some other things that don't jibe between the temperature and the shootings in that graph. We are talking about Chicago here. While there is research that shows that high temperatures are correlated with aggression, the difference there between January and February (probably between an average of -3 and -6 centigrade), is between freezing and FREEZING. Nobody is getting more aggressive when it is -3 outside as compared to -6..
TLDR: it's just way too neat.
As a lifelong Chicagoan, I would say that nobody wants to go outside anymore in February. It's almost always bitterly cold. January is still a mix of some okay days and some bitterness.
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On August 05 2015 11:54 KwarK wrote:
Scott Walker makes over 200k a year and has a negative net worth. That's the kind of financial discipline and leadership he brings to his personal life and I imagine we're all looking forward to seeing what he can do for America.
So he runs the state of Wisconsin about as well as he runs his personal life?
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I don't think Donald Trump understands foreign relations
http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/04/politics/donald-trump-mexico-wall-pay/index.html
The third time O'Reilly asked, Trump said, "I'm gonna say, 'Mexico, this is not going to continue, you're going to pay for that wall,' and they will pay for the wall. And Bill, it's peanuts, what we're talking about."
I think it's going to take more to get them to pay for a wall then just telling them to.
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On August 05 2015 14:12 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote:I don't think Donald Trump understands foreign relations http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/04/politics/donald-trump-mexico-wall-pay/index.htmlShow nested quote +The third time O'Reilly asked, Trump said, "I'm gonna say, 'Mexico, this is not going to continue, you're going to pay for that wall,' and they will pay for the wall. And Bill, it's peanuts, what we're talking about."
I think it's going to take more to get them to pay for a wall then just telling them to.
I've been going through lol scenarios in my head where Trump actually is this downright fucking amazing negotiator and gets all this done. 4 years later, the US has an outstanding economy due purely to Trump getting us a ton of amazing deals.
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On August 05 2015 14:12 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote:I don't think Donald Trump understands foreign relations http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/04/politics/donald-trump-mexico-wall-pay/index.htmlShow nested quote +The third time O'Reilly asked, Trump said, "I'm gonna say, 'Mexico, this is not going to continue, you're going to pay for that wall,' and they will pay for the wall. And Bill, it's peanuts, what we're talking about."
I think it's going to take more to get them to pay for a wall then just telling them to.
Lucky for him, neither do his supporters.
Foreign policy by dictate is what they expect.
On August 05 2015 14:57 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2015 14:12 Karis Vas Ryaar wrote:I don't think Donald Trump understands foreign relations http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/04/politics/donald-trump-mexico-wall-pay/index.htmlThe third time O'Reilly asked, Trump said, "I'm gonna say, 'Mexico, this is not going to continue, you're going to pay for that wall,' and they will pay for the wall. And Bill, it's peanuts, what we're talking about."
I think it's going to take more to get them to pay for a wall then just telling them to. I've been going through lol scenarios in my head where Trump actually is this downright fucking amazing negotiator and gets all this done. 4 years later, the US has an outstanding economy due purely to Trump getting us a ton of amazing deals.
He appears to be a great negotiator in general, but he's never had the leverage of the most powerful military in the world or the ability to cut off the foreign aid faucet.
I think he would either get the best deals ever, start WWIII, or both.
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On August 05 2015 15:06 GreenHorizons wrote:
He appears to be a great negotiator in general, but he's never had the leverage of the most powerful military in the world or the ability to cut off the foreign aid faucet.
I think he would either get the best deals ever, start WWIII, or both.
One thing I will say in support of Trump: I think too much emphasis is placed on the idea of having loads and loads of experience in this or that. When someone is president, they have a giant staff of advisers. Does Trump really need foreign policy experience? Or is being president really just about being a leader and knowing how to form a good team? Is it not possible that someone who is a really good leader, charismatic and well spoken could be a great president? I'd argue it's more about the team than the person.
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On August 05 2015 11:54 KwarK wrote:
Scott Walker makes over 200k a year and has a negative net worth. That's the kind of financial discipline and leadership he brings to his personal life and I imagine we're all looking forward to seeing what he can do for America.
His supporters are more impressed in his resolve in breaking union strength as part of addressing Wisconsin's three-billion projected budget deficit. Through the protests, recall attempts, and police harassment, he stuck to the plan and campaign promises and won fiscal reform.
I'm sure the smarter route involves a Walker Family Foundation and 6-figure speaking tours. But, you know, there's a candidate you can support with better personal business acumen, despite being dead broke after a brilliant time in her life.
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Trump should watch Roger Waters preform live. Lots of wall building.
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On August 05 2015 15:18 Danglars wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2015 11:54 KwarK wrote:
Scott Walker makes over 200k a year and has a negative net worth. That's the kind of financial discipline and leadership he brings to his personal life and I imagine we're all looking forward to seeing what he can do for America. His supporters are more impressed in his resolve in breaking union strength as part of addressing Wisconsin's three-billion projected budget deficit. Through the protests, recall attempts, and police harassment, he stuck to the plan and campaign promises and won fiscal reform. I'm sure the smarter route involves a Walker Family Foundation and 6-figure speaking tours. But, you know, there's a candidate you can support with better personal business acumen, despite being dead broke after a brilliant time in her life.
Did he break the strength of the State Troopers union in your opinion? I really don't think he did.
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On August 05 2015 15:17 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On August 05 2015 15:06 GreenHorizons wrote:
He appears to be a great negotiator in general, but he's never had the leverage of the most powerful military in the world or the ability to cut off the foreign aid faucet.
I think he would either get the best deals ever, start WWIII, or both. One thing I will say in support of Trump: I think too much emphasis is placed on the idea of having loads and loads of experience in this or that. When someone is president, they have a giant staff of advisers. Does Trump really need foreign policy experience? Or is being president really just about being a leader and knowing how to form a good team? Is it not possible that someone who is a really good leader, charismatic and well spoken could be a great president? I'd argue it's more about the team than the person.
I agree with you that a candidate doesn't need a huge amount of experience. We keep electing guys with a crap-ton of experience and politics has remained screwed up. Instead, a candidate needs to be charismatic, have good general goals, form a good team, and then lead that team to accomplish the broad goals he has set.
I don't necessarily think Trump is good at any of that. His charisma is questionable and he's often seen as a bully. I'd have to look into his general goals a little more, but his idea of foreign policy seems to be to bully the world around and try to force everyone to do what he wants. That doesn't mesh with my idea of good goals. Whether or not he can form a good team in a political arena has yet to be seen. I think he tends to surround himself with sycophants, which is probably not exactly the best way to create a good team. The only good news is that he does seem to be able to push his team around and get them to do exactly what he wants. I guess that could be considered a form of leadership.
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If experience was important to most voters, Obama wouldn't have won. It really doesn't seem like it's a terribly helpful talking point. It didn't help Romney or McCain.
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The word is "statesmanship", and Trump has none of that. It's also the primary reason I voted for Obama.
President doesn't control the economy. So much policy is in the hands of Congress. President's biggest job is being the face of our country. Why anyone would want that face to be Trump's is... so saddening. Terrifying, really. Guy isn't President yet and he's already pissing off allies and making me embarrassed.
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EPT
