US Politics Mega-thread - Page 5593

On October 16 2016 00:55 Biff The Understudy wrote:

Well, I went berserk on IFP because I think his assertions are extreme (read crazy), his performance really poor and that he monopolized the thread the whole day with two basic ideas repeated ad nauseam in a cloud of random articles and links.

I could also have not done anything, and he would have kept shouting conspiracy theories at a speed that let no space for anything else.

On October 16 2016 00:46 ImFromPortugal wrote:









Well dude, to put it into perspective, this are the groups that united and fought together in the last offensive to break the siege of Aleppo:


Ahrar al-Sham https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahrar_al-Sham - Islamist
Jabhat Fateh al-Sham (Al-Nusra \ Aka Alqaeda) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Nusra_Front - Islamist
Jaysh al-Islam - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaysh_al-Islam - Islamist
Jabhat Ansar al-Din - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jabhat_Ansar_al-Din - Jihadist
Turkistan Islamic Party - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkistan_Islamic_Party - Islamist
Suqour al-Sham Brigade - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suqour_al-Sham_Brigade - Islamist
Liwa al-Haqq - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suqour_al-Sham_Brigade - Islamist
Ajnad al-Sham - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajnad_al-Sham_Islamic_Union - Islamist
Jaysh al-Mujahideen - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army_of_Mujahideen - Islamist
Thuwar al-Sham - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jabhat_Thuwar_al-Raqqa - FSA
Jaysh al-Nasr - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaysh_al-Nasr - FSA
Harakat Nour al-Din al-Zenki - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harakat_Nour_al-Din_al-Zenki - Islamist
Faylaq al-Sham - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sham_Legion - Islamist
FSA Northern Division - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Division_(Syrian_rebel_group) - Vetted by the US
FSA 13th Division - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/13th_Division_(Syrian_rebel_group)- Vetted by the US
FSA Mountain Hawks Brigade - Vetted by the US - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Hawks_Brigade
FSA Central Division - Vetted by the US


They seem pretty extreme to me. The majority wants to implement an Islamic State in Syria and use the Sharia as the law of the land.

On October 16 2016 00:59 zlefin wrote:

now that's the kind of citationing that's good and helpful! thank you.
Now, which version of sharia do each of those support, as there's an awfully large variation in the different interpretations.
Hmm, the wiki links for the ones marked vetted by us: one is absent, one link leads to an error of the source not being there, the other says they were supported, but no longer are. so I'm not seeing current US support for these groups that are working together. Sometimes a group is supported for awhile, then no longer supported as they change. How much current US support are they receiving?

EDIT: Oh great, now he made a whole post of wikipedia links to extremists groups. That helps, now we are convinced.

“We hate what they have done,” said a senior member of the Jaish al-Fatah group operating in northern Aleppo. “It is unimaginable to treat children like this. There is no justification for it. And nor is there for what the regime continues to do without the spotlight of scrutiny.”

The US state department said: “We strongly condemn this type of barbaric action, no matter what group is responsible. We do not comment on which groups are funded by the United States. We do, however, routinely vet the groups we work with and support and their human rights record figures prominently in that. We do not support groups that condone this sort of barbarity, period.”

which version of sharia do each of those support, as there's an awfully large variation in the different interpretations.

The Islamic Movement of Free Men of the Levant is an Islamist, reformist, innovative and comprehensive movement. It is integrated with the Islamic Front and is a comprehensive and Islamic military, political and social formation. It aims to completely overthrow the Assad regime in Syria and build an Islamic state whose only sovereign, reference, ruler, direction, and individual, societal and nationwide unifier is Allah Almighty’s Sharia (law). Translated into English by Malak Chabkoun at the Al Jazeera Center for Studies.[61]

On October 16 2016 01:04 LegalLord wrote:

In this case I agree, but I'm talking about FP discussion in general in my post.

On October 16 2016 01:13 Biff The Understudy wrote:

The thing is that if IFP was saying something like:

"I think the US policy in Syria is a bit shady and I don't trust the fact that they seem to support groups without looking in detail at who they are (insert quotation), and I think they should sustain Assad despite the fact we all agree he is a horrible butcher because of this and that..., and I don't trust the job the previous administration, and so Clinton, have done. The relationship the US had with Saudi Arabia is also completely messed up and I think Trump can do something about it because of xy",

maybe we would listen to him. Unfortunately, his argument consists into

"Hillary is an evil psychopath who supports and arms Al Qaeda (insert 600 wikipedia links more or less unrelated)".

Again, the problem is rarely, in my opinion, a lack of charitable behaviour, but the way people present facts and opinions. If you present an informed in a comprehensive way without being an obnoxious d***, usually the conversation, even if heated up, goes somewhere.

On October 16 2016 01:21 oBlade wrote:

This is how we spin the denial of sexual assault allegations into a psychological diagnosis.

On 13 March 2016, al-Nusra Front and Jund al-Aqsa seized the headquarters of the 13th Division after an overnight battle for control of Maarrat al-Nu'man. Division 13 was involved in a truce with the Syrian army since February 27. Several fighters have deserted before the conflict with the Nusra began. Division 13 has confirmed that al-Nusra and Jund al-Aqsa captured all of their weapons.

The group received funding, including salaries for its fighters, from the CIA, before being cut off in December 2014 following battlefield reversals at the hands of the al-Nusra Front.[13]

The group also participated along with other Fatah Halab factions in the shelling of the Sheikh Maqsood neighborhood in Aleppo.[6]

On October 16 2016 00:10 zlefin wrote:
I wonder if there's a decent way to do a math analysis of the how much ideological area a party can cover and still stick together, and how that compares to various possible coverage areas for a party.
My impression is that around 1.5 to 2 standard deviations (ona bell curve) seems about how far you can cover on a single axis. then the question becomes how orthogonal various issues are.

On October 16 2016 01:28 a_flayer wrote:
13th Division - received weapons from the US, funding from Qatar.
This was not intended, fair enough. Still, this could be used as evidence to suggest that maybe giving weapons to people isn't such a good idea because you don't know where they're going to end up.

Northern Division - received weapons from the US, funding from Qatar.
Gave weapons and funding, voluntarily joined with al-Qaeda. Granted, the US cut off the funding once they discovered this, but still this is exactly the problem. You give people weapons, they run off and use them to fight for wherever they think they gain the most. This is why not interfering is the more appealing option to me in most of these cases. I read people here suggesting that such a viewpoint is perhaps uninformed of the nuances, but I think that is nonsense when it comes to giving people weapons. Weapons tend to remove nuance from confrontations and push towards extreme responses.

Mountain Hawks Brigade - received weapons from the US, funding from Qatar.
These guys are nice, killing civilians on a large scale. Keep it up, USA.


Also, Biff, maybe you're confusing what I say versus what IFP is saying. I tend to be quite critical of Hillary and her presidential candidacy, while IFP has been mostly focused on Syria.

On October 16 2016 01:21 oBlade wrote:

This is how we spin the denial of sexual assault allegations into a psychological diagnosis.

On October 16 2016 01:53 PassiveAce wrote:
the insidious 'they' strikes again

On October 16 2016 01:34 Biff The Understudy wrote:

Well look, what you point out is perfectly legit; that the Obama's administration support of the syrian opposition has been a fuck up, and that weapons have ended in bad hands because the country is a clusterfuck. And they should have figured that out, the line between the secular opposition and jihadi is really, really thin. And you can blame Clinton, and the Obama administration for playing with fire, although it has to be said that there were and are not too many options (I guess the kurds are a blessing in that regards).

On October 16 2016 01:29 IgnE wrote:


you do realize that this would be the modern day equivalent of counting how many angels can fit on the head of a pin right?

Trump’s enthusiasm advantage has evaporated: 70 percent of his backers “strongly” supported him last week. That’s 63 percent now. For Clinton, it’s 66 percent, up from 57 percent.