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The US killed 30 and injured 40 more civilian farmers in Afghanistan. Further demonstrating why this 18 year long war should be over.
A U.S. drone strike intended to hit an Islamic State (IS) hideout in Afghanistan killed at least 30 civilians resting after a day’s labor in the fields, officials said on Thursday.
The exact number of IS fighters is difficult to calculate because they frequently switch allegiances, but the U.S. military estimates there are about 2,000.
The United Nations says nearly 4,000 civilians were killed or wounded in the first half of the year. That included a big increase in casualties inflicted by government and U.S.-led foreign forces.
“Such mistakes cannot be justified. American forces must realize (they) will never win the war by killing innocent civilians,” said Javed Mansur, a resident of Jalalabad city.
Scores of local men joined a protest against the attack on Thursday morning as they helped carry the victims’ bodies to Jalalabad city and then to the burial site.
www.reuters.com
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United States42643 Posts
I don’t get how this can happen. A group of 70 farmers doesn’t look anything like a school or hospital. It’s completely outside drone targeting parameters.
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Trump is the one in charge of the drones
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Air campaigns have always had problems like this extend it out to 18 years and make it a dystopian bureaucratic hell process of the trigger pullers staying in an air-conditioned base in the desert and this is inevitable.
It could be an extremely transparent and well-policed department with everyone having all the intel videos of the people doing the actions from recommending targets to the execution of the missions. Everyone is on the same base and locked down for everyone benefit. Just declare that yes we are prosecuting an air war against the Taliban and offer people the accused of making the mistakes.
No one at this point thinks playing dumb about the drone strikes isn't dumb. No one can really stop us from doing them anyway.
I mean it's hard to really say that trump is even responsible. It was a program Obama started and a program that I seriously doubt Trump understands the concepts involved.
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On September 20 2019 10:31 Sermokala wrote:
Air campaigns have always had problems like this extend it out to 18 years and make it a dystopian bureaucratic hell process of the trigger pullers staying in an air-conditioned base in the desert and this is inevitable.
It could be an extremely transparent and well-policed department with everyone having all the intel videos of the people doing the actions from recommending targets to the execution of the missions. Everyone is on the same base and locked down for everyone benefit. Just declare that yes we are prosecuting an air war against the Taliban and offer people the accused of making the mistakes.
No one at this point thinks playing dumb about the drone strikes isn't dumb. No one can really stop us from doing them anyway.
I mean it's hard to really say that trump is even responsible. It was a program Obama started and a program that I seriously doubt Trump understands the concepts involved.
Drone bombing preceded Obama but his numbers of civilian causalities from them are worse (or more honest?). Notoriously 9 out of 10 people Obama killed with drone bombings at one point were not the target.
I'd just add drone pilots are typically in the US nowadays so they go home at the end of their day slaughtering innocents halfway across the planet.
Someone here could have passed by the person who killed all those farmers at the grocery store this week.
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CNN Analysis (with the help of 538's Harry Enten) has determined it's not a 3 person race but a 2 person race and it's Biden and Warren.
(CNN)There are -- still! -- 20 candidates running for the Democratic presidential nomination. But, at the moment, it looks like a two-horse race.
Those two are former Vice President Joe Biden and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren
www.cnn.com
Sanders topped 1,000,000 unique donors faster than any candidate in history today
"With 1 million contributors, this is the only Democratic campaign that has more supporters than Donald Trump," said campaign manager Faiz Shakir. "Our strength is in numbers, and that is why Bernie Sanders is the only candidate who is able to say his campaign will rely only on grassroots funding in both the primary and against Donald Trump."
Sanders reached the milestone seven months after he announced his candidacy in February, faster than any candidate ever.
www.cbsnews.com
The newest polls have him winning or in the top 2 of all the early states including California (except SC EDIT: guess there's a poll putting him 2nd there too). Even Warren supporters have to see how this blatant media bias is bad. Warren still isn't even leading her home state...
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Norway28665 Posts
Hm, about that last picture, isn't it possible that it's ordered by difference, and that there's a decimal number not included that makes warren's differential bigger than sanders'? Like if it's 48.6 vs 48.4 that might reads as 49 vs 48 whereas the other one might be 48.4 vs 47.6 which would read as 48 vs 48?
although reading through the rest of that article makes that theory seem a bit generous :D
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I hadn't, but I have one of the cable outlets on in the background most of the time and noticed this a while ago. Can't find the quote but pretty sure I called it that at some point it was going to become undeniably obvious corporate media wasn't trying to inform people about the election, they were deliberately and clumsily trying to manipulate them.
Question is whether all the people who constantly make fun of Republicans are going to really reconcile what this, in combination with the blatant manipulation and distractions of the last few years means, or are they going to hunker down in "vote blue no matter who/Trump is working for the Russians" mode feigning obliviousness to the political realities around them.
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On September 20 2019 19:27 GreenHorizons wrote:I hadn't, but I have one of the cable outlets on in the background most of the time and noticed this a while ago. Can't find the quote but pretty sure I called it that at some point it was going to become undeniably obvious corporate media wasn't trying to inform people about the election, they were deliberately and clumsily trying to manipulate them. Question is whether all the people who constantly make fun of Republicans are going to really reconcile what this, in combination with the blatant manipulation and distractions of the last few years means, or are they going to hunker down in "vote blue no matter who/Trump is working for the Russians" mode feigning obliviousness to the political realities around them. Or, and this is a real shocker, they disapprove of this and think the Media shouldn't be trying to manipulate the facts. But realise that not voting for a Democrat in a 2 party system is a worse choice then every other option.
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On September 20 2019 19:29 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2019 19:27 GreenHorizons wrote:I hadn't, but I have one of the cable outlets on in the background most of the time and noticed this a while ago. Can't find the quote but pretty sure I called it that at some point it was going to become undeniably obvious corporate media wasn't trying to inform people about the election, they were deliberately and clumsily trying to manipulate them. Question is whether all the people who constantly make fun of Republicans are going to really reconcile what this, in combination with the blatant manipulation and distractions of the last few years means, or are they going to hunker down in "vote blue no matter who/Trump is working for the Russians" mode feigning obliviousness to the political realities around them. Or, and this is a real shocker, they disapprove of this and think the Media shouldn't be trying to manipulate the facts. But realise that not voting for a Democrat in a 2 party system is a worse choice then every other option.
Here's the thing. It's the primary still. The whole doing nothing to call out what is clearly a corrupt media and playing along pretending the manipulation to push their Warren isn't a red flag for how compromised she must already be and then telling the people who did they have to suck it up and vote for the corrupt manipulators else they get worse corrupt manipulators is a huge part of why Democrats lost to Trump last time we did this dance.
As Carlin put it "[Trump] might be full of shit, but he lets you know it"
EDIT: Posts like aqua's below are the kind of "plausible deniability" and minimization arguments we're going to see A LOT of this cycle like we did in 2016. That's how you end up losing to Trump again.
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The central argument in that CNN article with respect to Sanders appears to be that while he has had clearly top-2 to top-3 polling numbers for a long time...
- Sanders' numbers haven't increased substantially in a long time either
- One cannot win the nomination without significantly more than 20%-30% of national support
- On the basis of current polling and trajectory, Biden and Warren look more likely to achieve and/or sustain significantly more than 20%-30% of national support than Sanders (or anybody else)
which on the face of it doesn't seem like an outrageously unreasonable argument.
Essentially if Sanders is going to climb into the high 30s and beyond (which seems like the bare minimum to win the nomination) that either has to come from overwhelming preference from the supporters of candidates who drop out or by taking support directly from Biden/Warren/anybody else who remains relevant. As far as I know, Sanders' 2020 campaign to date has not performed in a way which makes it obvious either of those things is going to happen.
I will emphasise that none of this excuses any degree of media bias that exists.
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On September 20 2019 19:37 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2019 19:29 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:27 GreenHorizons wrote:I hadn't, but I have one of the cable outlets on in the background most of the time and noticed this a while ago. Can't find the quote but pretty sure I called it that at some point it was going to become undeniably obvious corporate media wasn't trying to inform people about the election, they were deliberately and clumsily trying to manipulate them. Question is whether all the people who constantly make fun of Republicans are going to really reconcile what this, in combination with the blatant manipulation and distractions of the last few years means, or are they going to hunker down in "vote blue no matter who/Trump is working for the Russians" mode feigning obliviousness to the political realities around them. Or, and this is a real shocker, they disapprove of this and think the Media shouldn't be trying to manipulate the facts. But realise that not voting for a Democrat in a 2 party system is a worse choice then every other option. Here's the thing. It's the primary still. The whole doing nothing to call out what is clearly a corrupt media and playing along pretending the manipulation to push their Warren isn't a red flag for how compromised she must already be and then telling the people who did they have to suck it up and vote for the corrupt manipulators else they get worse corrupt manipulators is a huge part of why Democrats lost to Trump last time we did this dance. As Carlin put it "[Trump] might be full of shit, but he lets you know it" EDIT: Posts like aqua's below are the kind of "plausible deniability" arguments we're going to see A LOT of this cycle like we did in 2016. Yeah, the game is rigged. Welcome to life, shit aint fair.
More Trump isn't going to make it better.
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Sticking one's head in the sand vis-a-vis the substantial obstacles standing between Sanders and winning the nomination does not make the argument about media bias any more compelling.
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On September 20 2019 19:44 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2019 19:37 GreenHorizons wrote:On September 20 2019 19:29 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:27 GreenHorizons wrote:I hadn't, but I have one of the cable outlets on in the background most of the time and noticed this a while ago. Can't find the quote but pretty sure I called it that at some point it was going to become undeniably obvious corporate media wasn't trying to inform people about the election, they were deliberately and clumsily trying to manipulate them. Question is whether all the people who constantly make fun of Republicans are going to really reconcile what this, in combination with the blatant manipulation and distractions of the last few years means, or are they going to hunker down in "vote blue no matter who/Trump is working for the Russians" mode feigning obliviousness to the political realities around them. Or, and this is a real shocker, they disapprove of this and think the Media shouldn't be trying to manipulate the facts. But realise that not voting for a Democrat in a 2 party system is a worse choice then every other option. Here's the thing. It's the primary still. The whole doing nothing to call out what is clearly a corrupt media and playing along pretending the manipulation to push their Warren isn't a red flag for how compromised she must already be and then telling the people who did they have to suck it up and vote for the corrupt manipulators else they get worse corrupt manipulators is a huge part of why Democrats lost to Trump last time we did this dance. As Carlin put it "[Trump] might be full of shit, but he lets you know it" EDIT: Posts like aqua's below are the kind of "plausible deniability" arguments we're going to see A LOT of this cycle like we did in 2016. Yeah, the game is rigged. Welcome to life, shit aint fair. More Trump isn't going to make it better.
This is just sad and the type of attitude that leads to the situation we're in now.
Arguments like this will lead to Republicans just nominating a Nazi and the pundit class arguing Democrats have to court reasonable white supremacists like the KKK or risk another Holocaust.
On September 20 2019 19:47 Aquanim wrote:
Sticking one's head in the sand vis-a-vis the substantial obstacles standing between Sanders and winning the nomination does not make the argument about media bias any more compelling.
Clearly not sticking my head in the sand. The corporate media actively and intentionally undermining a candidacy while supporting another is both a major obstacle and emblematic of the others. People (though not nearly the share as the most wealthy) have a vested interest in not personally (or society at large) reconciling how they benefit from the exploitation and manipulation they are witnessing.
Rachel Maddow is smart enough to know the reason she's paid $7,000,000 isn't because she relentlessly informs the public about the most pressing issues of our day. Probably had a lot more to do with her being willing to sacrifice her dignity to give credibility to the non-stop Trump-Russia conspiracies instead.
EDIT: And share airtime with Kristol and Nicolle Wallace after largely making her career off of exposing them as liars that manipulated people into a war costing hundreds of thousands of lives and trillions of dollars.
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On September 20 2019 19:48 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2019 19:44 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:37 GreenHorizons wrote:On September 20 2019 19:29 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:27 GreenHorizons wrote:I hadn't, but I have one of the cable outlets on in the background most of the time and noticed this a while ago. Can't find the quote but pretty sure I called it that at some point it was going to become undeniably obvious corporate media wasn't trying to inform people about the election, they were deliberately and clumsily trying to manipulate them. Question is whether all the people who constantly make fun of Republicans are going to really reconcile what this, in combination with the blatant manipulation and distractions of the last few years means, or are they going to hunker down in "vote blue no matter who/Trump is working for the Russians" mode feigning obliviousness to the political realities around them. Or, and this is a real shocker, they disapprove of this and think the Media shouldn't be trying to manipulate the facts. But realise that not voting for a Democrat in a 2 party system is a worse choice then every other option. Here's the thing. It's the primary still. The whole doing nothing to call out what is clearly a corrupt media and playing along pretending the manipulation to push their Warren isn't a red flag for how compromised she must already be and then telling the people who did they have to suck it up and vote for the corrupt manipulators else they get worse corrupt manipulators is a huge part of why Democrats lost to Trump last time we did this dance. As Carlin put it "[Trump] might be full of shit, but he lets you know it" EDIT: Posts like aqua's below are the kind of "plausible deniability" arguments we're going to see A LOT of this cycle like we did in 2016. Yeah, the game is rigged. Welcome to life, shit aint fair. More Trump isn't going to make it better. This is just sad and the type of attitude that leads to the situation we're in now. Arguments like this will lead to Republicans just nominating a Nazi and the pundit class arguing Democrats have to court reasonable white supremacists like the KKK or risk another Holocaust. Correct, that's one of the problems of a 2 party system.
Tho there is presumably a break point at which enough people say 'fuck that' that a 3e party becomes viable. America doesn't seem to have reached that break point tho.
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On September 20 2019 20:07 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2019 19:48 GreenHorizons wrote:On September 20 2019 19:44 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:37 GreenHorizons wrote:On September 20 2019 19:29 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:27 GreenHorizons wrote:I hadn't, but I have one of the cable outlets on in the background most of the time and noticed this a while ago. Can't find the quote but pretty sure I called it that at some point it was going to become undeniably obvious corporate media wasn't trying to inform people about the election, they were deliberately and clumsily trying to manipulate them. Question is whether all the people who constantly make fun of Republicans are going to really reconcile what this, in combination with the blatant manipulation and distractions of the last few years means, or are they going to hunker down in "vote blue no matter who/Trump is working for the Russians" mode feigning obliviousness to the political realities around them. Or, and this is a real shocker, they disapprove of this and think the Media shouldn't be trying to manipulate the facts. But realise that not voting for a Democrat in a 2 party system is a worse choice then every other option. Here's the thing. It's the primary still. The whole doing nothing to call out what is clearly a corrupt media and playing along pretending the manipulation to push their Warren isn't a red flag for how compromised she must already be and then telling the people who did they have to suck it up and vote for the corrupt manipulators else they get worse corrupt manipulators is a huge part of why Democrats lost to Trump last time we did this dance. As Carlin put it "[Trump] might be full of shit, but he lets you know it" EDIT: Posts like aqua's below are the kind of "plausible deniability" arguments we're going to see A LOT of this cycle like we did in 2016. Yeah, the game is rigged. Welcome to life, shit aint fair. More Trump isn't going to make it better. This is just sad and the type of attitude that leads to the situation we're in now. Arguments like this will lead to Republicans just nominating a Nazi and the pundit class arguing Democrats have to court reasonable white supremacists like the KKK or risk another Holocaust. Correct, that's one of the problems of a 2 party system. Tho there is presumably a break point at which enough people say 'fuck that' that a 3e party becomes viable. America doesn't seem to have reached that break point tho.
Or it's never viable through the political system because there's always someone making the arguments you are, even when Republicans already elected a budding fascist like Trump and the parties control 3rd party access to the ballot.
To break it down a bit. Things getting worse means less viability for a 3rd party regardless of their support among the population. We're already at 90% support can't pass gun legislation because of the domination of corporate influences on our politicians.
I'd also just point out if it's got to get worse to get better then "vote blue no matter who makes even less sense". It means it'll just always suck but slightly less than it could, but also never have any hope or even ambition to get good.
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On September 20 2019 19:38 Aquanim wrote:The central argument in that CNN article with respect to Sanders appears to be that while he has had clearly top-2 to top-3 polling numbers for a long time... - Sanders' numbers haven't increased substantially in a long time either
- One cannot win the nomination without significantly more than 20%-30% of national support
- On the basis of current polling and trajectory, Biden and Warren look more likely to achieve and/or sustain significantly more than 20%-30% of national support than Sanders (or anybody else)
which on the face of it doesn't seem like an outrageously unreasonable argument. Essentially if Sanders is going to climb into the high 30s and beyond (which seems like the bare minimum to win the nomination) that either has to come from overwhelming preference from the supporters of candidates who drop out or by taking support directly from Biden/Warren/anybody else who remains relevant. As far as I know, Sanders' 2020 campaign to date has not performed in a way which makes it obvious either of those things is going to happen. I will emphasise that none of this excuses any degree of media bias that exists.
This is the important bit. The non-Sanders/Warren/Biden share is 36.4%, larger than any of their current shares. All that matters if you're forced to pick two frontrunners is where the votes are going as people drop out and who the undecided people break for. This is why you should only really care about a) when poll numbers are poor enough candidates quit, b) whether the voters from candidates who are dropping out are likely to remain in the pool, and c) ranked preference polls (head to heads of the candidates vs each other are quite poor for this, I think). We have pretty scant information on all of those.
The big question is whether Sanders' is a popular "second choice" right now. At least in one poll, Harris dropping out will be worse for him than the other candidates and Buttigieg dropping out will be worse for him than the other candidates. The main people he stands to gain from dropping out are Biden and Warren, which ain't happening. There are still plenty of little people he could stand to benefit from, but the fact that he'd lose ground in that 10% from Buttigieg/Harris means he has to make up more and more.
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On September 20 2019 20:11 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2019 20:07 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:48 GreenHorizons wrote:On September 20 2019 19:44 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:37 GreenHorizons wrote:On September 20 2019 19:29 Gorsameth wrote:On September 20 2019 19:27 GreenHorizons wrote:I hadn't, but I have one of the cable outlets on in the background most of the time and noticed this a while ago. Can't find the quote but pretty sure I called it that at some point it was going to become undeniably obvious corporate media wasn't trying to inform people about the election, they were deliberately and clumsily trying to manipulate them. Question is whether all the people who constantly make fun of Republicans are going to really reconcile what this, in combination with the blatant manipulation and distractions of the last few years means, or are they going to hunker down in "vote blue no matter who/Trump is working for the Russians" mode feigning obliviousness to the political realities around them. Or, and this is a real shocker, they disapprove of this and think the Media shouldn't be trying to manipulate the facts. But realise that not voting for a Democrat in a 2 party system is a worse choice then every other option. Here's the thing. It's the primary still. The whole doing nothing to call out what is clearly a corrupt media and playing along pretending the manipulation to push their Warren isn't a red flag for how compromised she must already be and then telling the people who did they have to suck it up and vote for the corrupt manipulators else they get worse corrupt manipulators is a huge part of why Democrats lost to Trump last time we did this dance. As Carlin put it "[Trump] might be full of shit, but he lets you know it" EDIT: Posts like aqua's below are the kind of "plausible deniability" arguments we're going to see A LOT of this cycle like we did in 2016. Yeah, the game is rigged. Welcome to life, shit aint fair. More Trump isn't going to make it better. This is just sad and the type of attitude that leads to the situation we're in now. Arguments like this will lead to Republicans just nominating a Nazi and the pundit class arguing Democrats have to court reasonable white supremacists like the KKK or risk another Holocaust. Correct, that's one of the problems of a 2 party system. Tho there is presumably a break point at which enough people say 'fuck that' that a 3e party becomes viable. America doesn't seem to have reached that break point tho. Or it's never viable through the political system because there's always someone making the arguments you are, even when Republicans already elected a budding fascist like Trump and the parties control 3rd party access to the ballot. To break it down a bit. Things getting worse means less viability for a 3rd party regardless of their support among the population. We're already at 90% support can't pass gun legislation because of the domination of corporate influences on our politicians. I'd also just point out if it's got to get worse to get better then "vote blue no matter who makes even less sense". It means it'll just always suck but slightly less than it could, but also never have any hope or even ambition to get good. Because people don't really care about gun legislation. Most of America apparently doesn't mind the mass shootings because when a school full of toddlers got shot up.... nothing happened.
Its horrid but that's the reality.
And 'vote blue no matter what' indeed can mean no hope of things getting better and everything sucking but a little less then it would under a Republican. But guess what? Most people prefer that over letting the country burn down and hoping that maybe on the other end there is a ray of sunshine and not just a bottomless pit of misery.
I understand your frustration and anger, I would probably feel the same way if I lived in America but that's the way things are. Your better of looking for a different country to live in that closer aligns to your views then trying to get America to change what it is.
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EPT![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/thU3LEm.jpg)
![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/0LeQyWg.jpg)
