EPTedit: first on page 1000, that's gotta be worth something.
US Politics Mega-thread - Page 1000
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Now that we have a new thread, 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 complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets. Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source. If you have any questions, comments, concern, or feedback regarding the USPMT, then please use this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/website-feedback/510156-us-politics-thread | ||
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m4ini
4215 Posts
edit: first on page 1000, that's gotta be worth something. | ||
KwarK
United States43966 Posts
On December 21 2018 12:46 m4ini wrote: I'm not that far into presidents of the past, isn't Woodrow Wilson considered one of the best american presidents ever? edit: first on page 1000, that's gotta be worth something. He was crazy crazy racist. And not just by the standards of the time. By the standards of the time there were a bunch of black civil servants. He shut that shit down. It's still not entirely clear why he keeps bringing Wilson up though. | ||
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Plansix
United States60190 Posts
On December 21 2018 12:46 m4ini wrote: I'm not that far into presidents of the past, isn't Woodrow Wilson considered one of the best american presidents ever? Memorable due to the top hat. Didn’t do a bad job, but wanted to create the League of Nations and failed. Libertarians and fools who worship Jefferson see him as the start of the US interventionism. They like to claim the US should be isolationist because “better” for some reason. But also they fail to address that he concept of international flights didn’t exist when Jefferson was around and the US economy didn’t rely on international trade. Edit: Kwark is also right, super racist. | ||
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m4ini
4215 Posts
Fair enough, i stand corrected. So far i can't see a correlation either then. edit: lol yeah, isolationism in 1920 and now have two very different outcomes. Not that i'd actually disagree entirely with the notion of "not sticking your nose in every pile that's brown", but germany doesn't do many wars anymore (except, well, the ones the US started), and i wouldn't call germany isolationist. There's quite a distinctive difference between "justified war" and "unjustified war" or "scapegoat for interests enforced by military". | ||
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Plansix
United States60190 Posts
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m4ini
4215 Posts
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Introvert
United States4951 Posts
On December 21 2018 12:55 m4ini wrote: Hm, okay, that's surprising. Guess one doesn't stop learning, i, for some reason, actually thought that he was considered one of the good'uns. Fair enough, i stand corrected. So far i can't see a correlation either then. Wilson and that era really got the progressive movement into full gear in the federal government, he is/was well liked by that kind although the incredible racism, even for that time, has dimmed his star. I mean some (at least one off the top of my head) universities have the "Wilson School of X." your belief that he is popular is true among a certain persuasion. In many ways he changed the way the presidency was viewed, again in a left wing direction. he is certainly very popular among a certain set. edit: i swear another school had a Wilson school of something but I can't find it, maybe I'm wrong or it changed. Swear I've seen it more than once. | ||
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m4ini
4215 Posts
That being said, there's no star for me if he's as racist as people here say he was. That being said: being progressive certainly is a positive, for me. | ||
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Plansix
United States60190 Posts
On December 21 2018 13:00 m4ini wrote: It's 4am, is it me or is this sentence really hard to read? Nah, I fucked it up and I’m also super tired and playing dead cells. | ||
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m4ini
4215 Posts
On December 21 2018 13:11 Plansix wrote: Nah, I fucked it up and I’m also super tired and playing dead cells. Good, was concerned lol. It's time anyway, i'm out. Thanks everyone for explaining Wilson to me, as i said, you never stop learning. | ||
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Wegandi
United States2455 Posts
On December 21 2018 12:53 Plansix wrote: Memorable due to the top hat. Didn’t do a bad job, but wanted to create the League of Nations and failed. Libertarians and fools who worship Jefferson see him as the start of the US interventionism. They like to claim the US should be isolationist because “better” for some reason. But also they fail to address that he concept of international flights didn’t exist when Jefferson was around and the US economy didn’t rely on international trade. Edit: Kwark is also right, super racist. What does international flights and trade have to do with entangling alliances, foreign wars, and an enormous military budget with an over eager CIA, Pentagon, and Executive Branch to wage global war? I mean, if you knew 1/10th about Jefferson and libertarians you'd realize we're not Pat Buchanan lmao. Ya isolationist....also for open borders and free-trade. You make me laugh, plus the little bit about worshipping Jefferson. Didnt you use Jefferson as a crutch for an argument not that long ago? I distinctly remember you being pretty adamant about it to. Lmao. Plansix dont ever change. I mean, it's not like I spelled out why the US should be a neutral party on the world stage and have a non-interventionist approach. Coolidge a great President, put it best - the business of America is business. I guess we should repeal the first amendment as well because they didn't have twitter, facebook, and blogs in the 1700s. How antiquated are they geeze. Get with the times. Oh that thing about quartering soldiers...don't need that one. Same with the 4th amendment because they didnt have cell phones and all sorts of gadgets back then. Top flight argument. PS: Its not like Madison, Washington, and Jefferson were unfamiliar with the current MO of the US. We have few differences today to the British Empire of their time. The same arguments against the British Empire apply to the last 100 years of US foreign policy. | ||
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Aquanim
Australia2849 Posts
On December 21 2018 12:41 m4ini wrote: ... People don't want the USA to start wars. People do want the USA to clean up their wars. It really isn't that complicated. Because if you don't, and i really hope i'm wrong here, the next 9/11 (or worse) is always around the next corner. ... | ||
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Wegandi
United States2455 Posts
I did in the last few pages. I don't think I need to re-iterate the same argument that much. Also....do these "clean ups" have an expiration date? The shit in Iraq/Afghanistan has gone on for almost 20 years. Ya'll sound like John McCain, god rest his soul. (Though I'm sure at the time you disagreed with his stay in Iraq forever, even if ya'll now parroting the same lines lol; plus pretty sure EU would have gone ape-shit had McCain defeated Obama with the attendant ratcheting up of US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan that would followed...so let me say that I don't take this argument from EU people at face value. Reeks too much of partisanship) | ||
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Aquanim
Australia2849 Posts
On December 21 2018 14:19 Wegandi wrote: I did in the last few pages. I don't think I need to re-iterate the same argument that much. Also....do these "clean ups" have an expiration date? Sure they do. Said expiration date involves not leaving the USA's allies in the lurch without warning. I don't see that you've addressed m4ini's point at all - you've made a lot of noise but not said anything substantial. To put it in your terms, you've dodged the question of when a reasonable "expiration date" would be. Instead you keep shrieking that most everybody else in this conversation thinks there shouldn't be one at all, despite repeated statements to the contrary. | ||
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raga4ka
Bulgaria5679 Posts
On December 21 2018 10:45 iPlaY.NettleS wrote: So they don’t have the ability to look back and say Yes, i supported the decision to withdraw US troops from Vietnam.That the idea we needed to keep troops there to stop Russia wasn’t worth the money spent and lives lost? Not to mention the war in Syria is OVER.ISIS is defeated.There is even less reason to be in Syria than there was to be in Vietnam although the overriding similarity in both cases is the people of those nations did not want US troops there.Which is sadly overlooked by many. Well the final goal of USA coalition in Syria was to topple Assad, like the one supported in Libya. To bad Russia, Iran and Assad already won this war after they took back Aleppo, and unless false flag chemical attacks spread all over Syria and in to Israel that triggers a heavy USA involvement, there is no winning this war. Prolonging it will probably make it worse. Trump has campaigned to move out of Syria even before election, so I don't know why people are shocked or upset by this news, he was going to do it way earlier If it wasn't for staged chemical attacks. If you wan't to blame someone blame Obama he left the chaos in Syria to Trump who didn't want non of it... I doubt Turkey will go on a slaughtering fest of Kurds, USA has probably negotiated some terms for leaving, but life will be hard for Kurds and they can kiss their dream of independent country goodbye... Curious to see what's France and UK goal in this since they are staying, stuck in this proxy war with Israel and Saudi Arabia together, they still want to topple Assad? | ||
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Wegandi
United States2455 Posts
On December 21 2018 14:59 Aquanim wrote: Sure they do. Said expiration date involves not leaving the USA's allies in the lurch without warning. I don't see that you've addressed m4ini's point at all - you've made a lot of noise but not said anything substantial. To put it in your terms, you've dodged the question of when a reasonable "expiration date" would be. Instead you keep shrieking that most everybody else in this conversation thinks there shouldn't be one at all, despite repeated statements to the contrary. Expiration date is immediately and unconditionally. We marched in and we can march right out and back home. You keep making assumptions that the intervention itself is reasonable, when its not. I completely rebuke this assumption present in the underlying conversation. It also seems to me that even under said assumption how almost two decades of conflict with the region being worse than when we started....and by a very large margin I might add, is somehow the reasonable position (to stay and fuck it up even more with some platitudes about allies...kurds which means more involvement in the internal affairs of iraq and turkey lol). So, please, spare me the global war and policing is soooo reasonable. The american empire is dying. The rest of the world is just going to have to fuck itself up pretty soon. Yep. The reasonable position is to continue to antagonize everyone in the region and ally with everyone against everyone else....or do we so quickly forget that we armed ISIS and the "moderate" rebels lol. Fighting Saudi's war in Yemen, etc. Yeah, reasonable for politicians and the CIA to play geopolitical war games when the last 75 years have shown how much an utter failure that position is. But I'm the unreasonable one....yeah sure, ok. PS: Your expiration date is so vague, we'll likely be there 100 years like John McCain wanted. Good for you guys to defend the honorable John McCain after his death. | ||
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ReditusSum
79 Posts
I have yet to hear a solid gameplan for what "not abandoning the Kurds" would look like beyond some kind of vague statements that we need to stick by our allies. What does not abandoning them look like? Do we say fuck it and start an open war to establish a new state of Kurdistan? Do we give them a shitload of heavy arms and train them to use them? Do we piddle around with varying levels of troop deployments in the area for the next 50 years hoping that all the ethnic and religious groups in the Middle East that have been fighting each other since Ur was a thriving city will somehow come together, put aside their differences, and learn to live together in peace and harmony? At what point are we allowed to decide that it is time to come home? It's not enough to say: "When there is no more threat to the Kurdish people" without giving a realistic time-frame and goal of when and how that is going to happen. It is not fair that we used the Kurds as pawns to fight ISIS. Then again, it isn't fair for them to use us to try to establish a new ethnic State out of pre-existing borders. Withdrawal from Syria This is a similar problem. I haven't really heard any solid ideas on exactly what we are supposed to do here that don't either suggest open war, or are some kind of vague "this is never going to end" mission that is unsustainable and probably immoral. Assad is not going to stop doing what he is doing unless he is stopped, and Iran and Russia have signaled that they are willing to step in if it looks like he's going to be stopped. Now, maybe they are full of hot air and they'll back off if we decide to Shock and Awe, but how long are we going to keep playing that game before someone decides that the cost of throwing down is lower than the cost of giving in? You can't keep on stepping on people's toes forever, eventually they are going to take the chance of slugging you in the face. Maybe we beat Iran and Russia and China (and whoever else has a bone to pick) in a straight-up fight... or maybe we don't. Either way the cost would be unimaginable. So that leaves us with the same "piddle around with varying levels of troop deployment with no actual goal and hope the situation magically solves itself" strategy that hasn't worked in Afghanistan and definitely won't work in a country where the dictator is still alive and running half the country you're trying to "stabilize." Taking out Assad will require, at a minimum, hundreds of thousands of troops, trillions of dollars, and an American populace willing to put up with yet another war in a desert country the Average Joe can't point out on an unmarked map. Coming home from Afghanistan: Pretty soon we're going to have an American soldier killed in Afghanistan who was born after 9/11. It is time to come home. | ||
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WolfintheSheep
Canada14127 Posts
I mean you're already fucking yourselves over with trade agreements. I suppose military alliances were the next logical bridges to burn. | ||
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Aquanim
Australia2849 Posts
On December 21 2018 16:41 Wegandi wrote: Expiration date is immediately and unconditionally. We marched in and we can march right out and back home. You keep making assumptions that the intervention itself is reasonable, when its not. I completely rebuke this assumption present in the underlying conversation. It also seems to me that even under said assumption how almost two decades of conflict with the region being worse than when we started... I don't particularly think the United States' constant meddling in the Middle East is reasonable or doing anybody much good. That doesn't mean I think the United States should just pull the plug, as opposed to making an orderly extrication. I don't think it's necessary to "not abandon the Kurds" as per ReditusSum's post but the US telling them to go f*** themselves as it walks out the door seems pretty unnecessary. PS: Your expiration date is so vague, we'll likely be there 100 years like John McCain wanted. Good for you guys to defend the honorable John McCain after his death. You sure are trying super duper hard to drag McCain's name into this conversation for some reason. It's like you think if you repeat his name enough times it will somehow become relevant to what anybody else is saying. Got bad news for you on that one. | ||
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ReditusSum
79 Posts
On December 21 2018 17:06 WolfintheSheep wrote: I await the next NATO summit where Trump and the usual crowd of his worshippers puff out their chests and talk about military obligations, after bailing on your allies without any warning... I admit that will probably happen to some degree. However, I am in the camp of "NATO has outlived it's usefulness" so I don't particularly care about the talking point that Germany needs to spend a couple billion more on pretending to have a realistic defense strategy that doesn't include pax-Americana. I understand why Trump pushes that point, but I've always thought it was stupid and will continue to think it is stupid. | ||
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