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Read the rules in the OP before posting, please.In order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a re-read to refresh your memory! The vast majority of you are contributing in a healthy way, keep it up! NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious. Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action. |
WASHINGTON ― Donald Trump was thrilled last week when a veteran at a Virginia rally gave him his Purple Heart. “I’ve always wanted to get a Purple Heart,” he said, dangling the medal typically awarded to soldiers wounded or killed while serving in battle. “This was much easier.”
That response didn’t sit right with Cameron Kerr, a Purple Heart recipient based in Virginia. As an Army veteran who lost his leg on the battleground in Afghanistan, Kerr was stunned to see Trump treating the prestigious award like a flashy new toy. He figured if Trump has really always wanted a Purple Heart, he should have to earn it “the old-fashioned way”: by going into a war zone.
So he’s raising money to help give Trump that chance.
“As with seemingly everything else in his life, Mr. Trump got [a Purple Heart] handed to him instead of earning it,” Kerr states on a GoFundMe page he launched Tuesday with the headline “Help Trump Get A Purple Heart.”
“I fully endorse his desire to earn one and would happily oblige his interest in doing so, by being one of the first to chip in to fly him to the conflict zone of his choosing,” Kerr wrote. “After all, you’re never too old to follow your dreams.”
By Friday afternoon, Kerr had raised $6,750. He told The Huffington Post he never expected to raise any money, other than maybe $100 from sympathetic family and friends. Then again, he said he saw a lot of people around him ― including vets he knows who support Trump ― whose “minds were blown” by the way the real estate mogul diminished the Purple Heart.
Source
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On August 06 2016 22:26 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:Show nested quote +When it comes to America’s military allies, Donald Trump told rally attendees on Friday, “You always have to be prepared to walk.”
Likening military negotiations to his history of business deals, the Republican presidential nominee once again criticized NATO and other military alliances in which he said the U.S. bears too much of the financial burden. In an interview last month with The New York Times, Trump said the U.S. should not come to the defense of its NATO allies if those nations are not meeting their financial contributions to the treaty organization.
At a rally Friday in Des Moines, Iowa, Trump once again said the U.S. should rethink how its military interacts with international partners.
“You always have to be prepared to walk,” Trump said. “You know, Hillary Clinton came out and said, ‘That’s terrible. He’s not going to stick with our allies.’ We’re going to stick, but once the ally hears her dumb talk, because it’s dumb, why would they ever pay?”
“Let’s say somebody like Hillary Clinton makes this statement, ‘We will never abandon our allies.’ I think those statements are beautiful. I think they’re great,” Trump said. “One problem: When you go in and say, ‘We will never ever abandon you, but you have to pay us more money,’ they’re going to say, ‘We’re not going to pay you more money if you’re not going to abandon us.’ You always have to be prepared to walk. I don’t think we’d walk. I don’t think it’s going to be necessary. It could be, though.”
Trump’s earlier statements about NATO came amid the Republican National Convention in Cleveland and were nearly unanimously condemned even by members of his own party. Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), a military veteran who has since said he will not vote for Trump, called the Manhattan billionaire’s foreign policy proposals “narcissistic” and “utterly disastrous.” Kinzinger took particular offense to Trump’s suggestion that American soldiers are "some kind of a protection racket that has to be paid to protect our allies, or I’m some kind of a mercenary force.”
At Friday’s rally, Trump highlighted America’s military alliance with Japan as an agreement particularly worthy of ridicule. He said that Japan, a key U.S. ally in the Pacific, should be forced to pay 100 percent of America’s military costs for protecting the island nation, not the roughly 50 percent it pays now.
“You know, we have a treaty with Japan where if Japan is attacked, we have to use the full force and might of the United States,” Trump said. “If we’re attacked, Japan doesn’t have to do anything. They can sit home and watch Sony television. No. What kind of deals are these? Folks, I’m being serious: What kind of deals are these?” Source
I've heard regular derision of the US's role as world police since GWB so he's pretty well capitalizing on that sentiment.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
Having "allies" under the US umbrella who are dependent upon it for support is generally not a bad thing. It does a whole lot for maintaining a sphere of influence that lets the US enforce its interests.
The problem is that some in the US are arrogant enough to think that that sphere of influence can extend to all nations all across the world to the exclusion of other powerful nations. No empire in history has ever been able to do that and those empires didn't have to deal with their opponents have a "fuck it, we're doomed so let's just completely annihilate our attackers" option in the form of nuclear weapons. So the Wolfowitz Doctrine approach of trying to stop other foreign powers from gaining strength is ultimately short-sighted.
NATO really should have stopped at Germany. Moving eastward was a decision that will ultimately undermine the legitimacy of the organization and lead to more calls like those of Trump to get rid of an obsolete alliance.
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On August 06 2016 07:55 Nyxisto wrote:
No, alternative medicine is not an option instead of chemotherapy or any diseases that (western) medicine can't handle. That is absolutely ridiculous. There's also no 'balance' to be had in this discussion. To talk to a practionicer of the stuff about its effects makes as much as sense as talking to a Scientology member about Scientology. There's no legitimate alternative medicine community.
Yes, chemotherapy can ruin your quality of life, the advantage is of course that you continue to live.
Wow the extreme dogmatism expressed in this post and in a variety of other posts in this thread is astounding. Chemotherapy isn't even a guarantee that you will "continue to live", whatever that means in the first place. Does that mean longer than you would have without chemotherapy? Longer than you would have compared to any other possible treatment? It's a probabilistic guess that comes with probable downsides. Just like most western medical treatments. This doesn't just apply to chemotherapy, it applies to a variety of surgical techniques, diet recommendations, and lifestyle prescriptions.
There are obviously parts of alternative medicine that aren't scientific, but religious (like dilution homeopathy). To anyone who is paying attention, however, there are also avenues relatively uncharted by modern science (acupuncture, "supplements", etc.) that exist somewhere in the space between science/knowledge and religion/belief. Obviously there are charlatans in any area that is unmapped and unregulated. This is a given. So when Kwark rails against the "supplements" industry that sends thousands of people to the hospital every year he's not wrong. But he's also not entirely right either. Considering the many problems with the methodology of modern science, especially as it relates to diet, longevity, and optimal performance (see "p-hacking", problems with statistics usage in science, most of what we know is false, the incestuous relationship between the medical community and pharma) suspicion is not entirely unfounded that the prevailing wisdom 1) "western medicine" as dictated by your doctor is "proven" to be the end-all and be-all and 2) that "western medicine" is "complete" in the sense that it has charted (almost) all of the medical/physiological territory out there and so has the "best" remedies, might not be the whole truth.
The main problem in an "alternative" industry, like the booming supplement market, is not that people are selling "supplements" but that there are no quality standards. People should be able to ingest whatever they want, but an ethical industry seeking to fulfill that demand needs to provide exactly what they say they are providing. Likewise for acupuncture, the benefits are not always about a specific physiological response, but sometimes about triggering affective psychological states to improve well-being. Of course you won't know with "scientific" certainty what the efficacy of each supplement is, but anyone here who doesn't recognize 1) that scientific "certainty" across individuals is anything but "certain", 2) the possible benefits of placebo, and 3) the benefits of crowd-sourcing in directing the scientific investigation of promising "alternative" treatments via new methodologically sound methods, is reacting dogmatically in a way that is ironically unscientific. Yeah, there's a belief component in any "alternative" medicine, and many, if not the majority, of "practitioners", hucksters, charlatans, and snake-oil salesmen are simply fraudulent. But the reactionary, unreflective condemnation of everything that isn't the consensus opinion of western doctors smacks of religious Scientism that is just as bad, if not worse.
Where is the nuance? distinction? clarification? It's easy to shit on dilution homeopathy or dried rhino phallus. It's much harder to honestly discuss treatments, methods, and practices that show varying levels of promise but remain uncharted by science. As recently as a decade or two ago the "medical community" did not even agree that human growth hormone enhanced muscular hypertrophy. But a number of athletes were using it effectively to push their performance forward. We celebrate the explorers who helped the West conquer the world starting in the 16th century, but now we have libertarian-minded people unequivocally condemning the individual exploration of medical spaces where institutions, for a variety of reasons, are incapable of going at the present. The elevation of ossified institutional expertise, along with the dogmatic enshrinement of an inherently unstable body of "scientific" knowledge (see e.g. the links above), is part of a power structure that squeezes, disciplines, and leaves unhappy the vast corpus of lay people who are increasingly victimized by such things as opiate addiction, over-medication, and a general scene of slow death.
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On August 07 2016 02:37 LegalLord wrote:
Having "allies" under the US umbrella who are dependent upon it for support is generally not a bad thing. It does a whole lot for maintaining a sphere of influence that lets the US enforce its interests.
The problem is that some in the US are arrogant enough to think that that sphere of influence can extend to all nations all across the world to the exclusion of other powerful nations. No empire in history has ever been able to do that and those empires didn't have to deal with their opponents have a "fuck it, we're doomed so let's just completely annihilate our attackers" option in the form of nuclear weapons. So the Wolfowitz Doctrine approach of trying to stop other foreign powers from gaining strength is ultimately short-sighted.
NATO really should have stopped at Germany. Moving eastward was a decision that will ultimately undermine the legitimacy of the organization and lead to more calls like those of Trump to get rid of an obsolete alliance.
I think its funny when American FP discussions are emblematic of the very arrogance they are meant to criticize. Sure, the US has been working on a very broad sphere of influence through diplomatic mechanisms like NATO for many decades now, and this definitely relates back to a certain kind of self-identified exceptionalism in governance and culture. Nevertheless, to look at the scope of NATO and see nothing but Americans pushing their agenda is to miss the willing membership of other nations, many of which receive unilateral benefits from being a member. The military consultative feedback loop inherent to NATO participation has led to the improvement of literally ever member nation's military knowledge/technology base. Granted, not every member nation benefits under NATO to the same extent, but to characterize NATO as nothing more than power-hungry international Americanism is to overlook a lot of other dynamics at play.
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On August 07 2016 02:37 LegalLord wrote:
Having "allies" under the US umbrella who are dependent upon it for support is generally not a bad thing. It does a whole lot for maintaining a sphere of influence that lets the US enforce its interests.
The problem is that some in the US are arrogant enough to think that that sphere of influence can extend to all nations all across the world to the exclusion of other powerful nations. No empire in history has ever been able to do that and those empires didn't have to deal with their opponents have a "fuck it, we're doomed so let's just completely annihilate our attackers" option in the form of nuclear weapons. So the Wolfowitz Doctrine approach of trying to stop other foreign powers from gaining strength is ultimately short-sighted.
NATO really should have stopped at Germany. Moving eastward was a decision that will ultimately undermine the legitimacy of the organization and lead to more calls like those of Trump to get rid of an obsolete alliance.
while there are many reasons why NATO perhaps shouldn't have expanded; I don't think delegitimizing is one of them; nor the foolish unsound rantings of trump-likes who just don't know what they're talking about, since moving eastward didn't affect the obsolescence or lack thereof.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On August 07 2016 02:58 farvacola wrote:
I think its funny when American FP discussions are emblematic of the very arrogance they are meant to criticize. Sure, the US has been working on a very broad sphere of influence through diplomatic mechanisms like NATO for many decades now, and this definitely relates back to a certain kind of self-identified exceptionalism in governance and culture. Nevertheless, to look at the scope of NATO and see nothing but Americans pushing their agenda is to miss the willing membership of other nations, many of which unilaterally benefit from being a member. The military consultative feedback loop inherent to NATO participation has led to the improvement of literally ever member nation's military knowledge/technology base. Granted, not every member nation benefits under NATO to the same extent, but to characterize NATO as nothing more than power-hungry international Americanism is to overlook a lot of other dynamics at play.
It's not in its entirety an American agenda, but the net effect is that all but a few nations basically rely on the US military for their defense. Part of the goal is also to stop other nations from developing their own nuclear weapons, which is an obvious goal of any current nuclear power and one that has been quite successful. For the most part other nations are just happy to have the US do most of their military work for them, and to add jobs working directly or indirectly for the US military.
And it's not a bad thing to have an alliance like that, but in recent years it has indeed been the epitome of US arrogance far more than it has been a legitimate security umbrella. Many of the newer members are nations in central Europe that really just wanted to be part of the EU (without really having any benefit to taking sides in any potential conflict in spheres of influence) but were sort of coerced into NATO as a package deal. A few very desperately wanted to be in NATO but for stupid reasons that are suicidal to the alliance as a whole. It really should have stopped at Germany.
On August 07 2016 03:04 zlefin wrote:Show nested quote +On August 07 2016 02:37 LegalLord wrote:
Having "allies" under the US umbrella who are dependent upon it for support is generally not a bad thing. It does a whole lot for maintaining a sphere of influence that lets the US enforce its interests.
The problem is that some in the US are arrogant enough to think that that sphere of influence can extend to all nations all across the world to the exclusion of other powerful nations. No empire in history has ever been able to do that and those empires didn't have to deal with their opponents have a "fuck it, we're doomed so let's just completely annihilate our attackers" option in the form of nuclear weapons. So the Wolfowitz Doctrine approach of trying to stop other foreign powers from gaining strength is ultimately short-sighted.
NATO really should have stopped at Germany. Moving eastward was a decision that will ultimately undermine the legitimacy of the organization and lead to more calls like those of Trump to get rid of an obsolete alliance. while there are many reasons why NATO perhaps shouldn't have expanded; I don't think delegitimizing is one of them; nor the foolish unsound rantings of trump-likes who just don't know what they're talking about, since moving eastward didn't affect the obsolescence or lack thereof.
A few additional bad motives in addition to the original, perhaps more legitimate/understandable/acceptable one, undermines the organization as a whole. It draws attention to what is wrong with the organization and the wrong direction it is heading, and that isn't really inaccurate.
Trump's sentiment is extremely simplistic, but it drew a lot of attention because it resonates with a lot of people. He isn't some outlier, he just drew attention to a lot of issues that the "status quo people" (or "the establishment" or whatever term you like best) would rather not touch upon.
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legal -> Just because it resonates with people doesn't mean it's not idiotic. and I gladly touch upon all the issues as a status quo person (admittedly one with very little power) and it's more like a few issues.
and i'm not really seeing bad motives too much; and plenty of acceptable ones.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
This isn't the Geopolitics Megathread, so I'll refrain from going into all of the major dealings of the alliance and how ultimately short-sighted many are. I'll just say that it's an organization that had and has a purpose that is valid (if blatantly imperialist in nature) but that recent developments have just been borne of a foolish arrogance that does make the question of, "is NATO obsolete?" completely valid. And as with many things Trump has said and been widely criticized for, he is taking a simplistic perspective that nonetheless touches upon issues that are legitimate and undervalued. While it is true that popular consensus doesn't make any action justified, it is also true that that fact is too often abused by beneficiaries of the current state of affairs to just ignore public opinion. See for example the current crisis in the EU; dismiss perfectly valid public discontent and it grows and gets far worse.
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I'm not the one who dismisses valid discontent; only the invalid ones. That some others fail to do things properly is on them.
and it's not really imperialist.
if someone wants to claim NATO is obsolete, they'd need to actually make the argument, and all the ones I have seen made don't hold up to scrutiny.
and i'm not gonna care if you make a vague claim of some dealing being short-sighted; it's not uncommon for all deals to be imperfect, and for some good and some bad to happen. mostly your claim is to vague for me to usefully respond to.
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Yes, NATO is obsolete. Europe is in dire need of more Transnistrias, Donbasses and Abkhazias /s
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As if we needed a millionth reason to vote against Trump/Pence, it looks like Pence pushes for Creationism to be taught in public schools' science classrooms; the video of him speaking repeatedly shows him misusing the word [scientific] "theory" and him having basically no understanding of evolution or science. Sigh. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/abletochoose/2016/08/mike-pence-evolution/
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The former CIA director, Mike Morell, who served under several presidents of both parties endorses Clinton.
He gives two reasons : that he has worked with her and has been convinced by her integrity and temperament :
I spent four years working with Mrs. Clinton when she was secretary of state, most often in the White House Situation Room. In these critically important meetings, I found her to be prepared, detail-oriented, thoughtful, inquisitive and willing to change her mind if presented with a compelling argument.
... and that thinks Trump is a genuine threat to American security. His analysis of what happened with Putin is chilling. He points that Trump is so narcissistic that anyone can manipulate him with a few compliments:
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia was a career intelligence officer, trained to identify vulnerabilities in an individual and to exploit them. That is exactly what he did early in the primaries. Mr. Putin played upon Mr. Trump’s vulnerabilities by complimenting him. He responded just as Mr. Putin had calculated.
Mr. Putin is a great leader, Mr. Trump says, ignoring that he has killed and jailed journalists and political opponents, has invaded two of his neighbors and is driving his economy to ruin. Mr. Trump has also taken policy positions consistent with Russian, not American, interests — endorsing Russian espionage against the United States, supporting Russia’s annexation of Crimea and giving a green light to a possible Russian invasion of the Baltic States.
In the intelligence business, we would say that Mr. Putin had recruited Mr. Trump as an unwitting agent of the Russian Federation.
Which, unfortunately makes sense.
Meanwhile Karen Bass who seem to know what she is talking about asks for a psychological diagnosis of the Donald. Because he presents every single symptom of Narcissistic Personality Disorder as described in the DSM.
Anyway. Looks like most people are coming slowly back to their senses. The guy is just really dangerous.
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Probably voting for Gary Johnson at this point. What I don't get is why some high profile republicans have switched over to endorse HRC instead of third party. W/e I've lost faith in our political system.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On August 07 2016 03:47 zlefin wrote:
I'm not the one who dismisses valid discontent; only the invalid ones. That some others fail to do things properly is on them.
Well, that's a nebulous enough statement that there's really no way to determine one way or the other whether that's true. But probably a discussion for another time.
On August 07 2016 04:35 Biff The Understudy wrote:The former CIA director, Mike Morell, who served under several presidents of both parties endorses Clinton. He gives two reasons : that he has worked with her and has been convinced by her integrity and temperament : Show nested quote +I spent four years working with Mrs. Clinton when she was secretary of state, most often in the White House Situation Room. In these critically important meetings, I found her to be prepared, detail-oriented, thoughtful, inquisitive and willing to change her mind if presented with a compelling argument. ... and that thinks Trump is a genuine threat to American security. His analysis of what happened with Putin is chilling. He points that Trump is so narcissistic that anyone can manipulate him with a few compliments:
As I've said before, I'm always suspicious of the opinion/political leadership of law enforcement / intelligence / military types and that while some are good, many are dangerous and don't even realize it.
His praise of Hillary Clinton is basically a blanket praise of warhawking. If you read between the lines, all of his lines of praise are either generic and meaningless - "good preparation and listens to advice" - or praising that she advocates military actions. He doesn't praise her for deescalation, for preventing conflicts, for defusing a tricky situation. This is well in line with what most intelligence agents will say and while I am 0% surprised, I am also going to say that that part isn't worth listening to. That's not even going into the many, many flaws of Hillary Clinton's foreign policy over the years, which is just all too easy to criticize if I were to want to do so.
His criticism of Trump is pretty on point though. Putin's FP remarks are often very targeted and meant to influence how others act, and the praise of Trump was likely that. There are definitely a few remarks that Trump made that aren't really compatible with any feasible US FP approach, and that would serve foreign interests much more than US interests. Trump does bring up a few good points but also the criticism of his easily influenced personality is definitely valid as well.
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On August 07 2016 05:10 biology]major wrote:
Probably voting for Gary Johnson at this point. What I don't get is why some high profile republicans have switched over to endorse HRC instead of third party. W/e I've lost faith in our political system.
presumably because they think HRC is better than Johnson. I mean, it's not an impossible conclusion to make (also some people just wouldn't want to vote third party due to the strategy). I'd say it depends on how right/left the republicans are. The ones that are more middlish might prefer HRC to Johnson.
you're not supposed to have faith in the political system, what took you so long :D
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On August 07 2016 05:10 biology]major wrote:
Probably voting for Gary Johnson at this point. What I don't get is why some high profile republicans have switched over to endorse HRC instead of third party. W/e I've lost faith in our political system.
politicians are practical
voting 3rd party is not the most practical way of making sure trump doesnt win
also people like meg whitman would still rather see hrc than johnson in office, i think, for selfinterested reasons...
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On August 07 2016 05:10 biology]major wrote:
Probably voting for Gary Johnson at this point. What I don't get is why some high profile republicans have switched over to endorse HRC instead of third party. W/e I've lost faith in our political system.
yeah not really getting part either. I'd assume it's supposed to hammer the message home really good or something like that.
Saying they'd rather have you vote for Hillary as a statement is a lot stronger comming from a Republican high profile guy than saying you should vote 3rd party.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
I've heard before that the major reason (or at least one of the most important reasons) that Trump is opposed by "the establishment" (as opposed to Republican voters in general) is his foreign policy. If that's the main reason then supporting HRC makes perfect sense.
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EPT
