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!
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Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source.
I'd expect MAD to become less effective and more subject to miscalculation when more players are involved. We've had near misses already with only a very small number of parties eyeing each other. If every country has strategic nuclear weapons on a hair trigger, it's only a matter of time before one of this misinterprets something from one of their rivals and kicks off a chain reaction, figuratively and literally.
On March 03 2025 00:11 micronesia wrote: I'd expect MAD to become less effective and more subject to miscalculation when more players are involved. We've had near misses already with only a very small number of parties eyeing each other. If every country has strategic nuclear weapons on a hair trigger, it's only a matter of time before one of this misinterprets something from one of their rivals and kicks off a chain reaction, figuratively and literally.
So I believe US perception now is it's better to throw some "shithole" countries under the bus than allow them to have their own arsenal. Am I right?
Those countries are all NNPT signatories. One of Trump's stated goals is trilateral nuclear stockpile and defense spending reduction. The more you proliferate nuclear weapons, the more risks you create, which is why the US deploys warheads in countries like Germany and Turkey and South Korea for NATO and other defense. You do not strictly need proliferation to member states of the EU or NATO to achieve the same effect substituting UK/French weapons instead.
On March 01 2025 16:15 oBlade wrote: The key dispute seems to be: -Zelensky says he wants to ensure security -The administration says Zelensky doesn't have a sincere interest in negotiated peace, which is a problem since the administration isn't interested in a forever war
Zelensky may see himself as being in an analogous position as the UK/USSR during the lend-lease period staving off Nazi Germany (in this case modern Russia) but the current administration doesn't seem to share that view, doesn't want escalation, and even Lindsey Graham has turned on Zelensky.
According to Rubio, going to the White House to make the mineral deal official was the Ukrainians' idea. Flipping the script was Zelensky challenging the concept of cease-fires because they can be broken, and demanding security guarantees up front while not committing to ending the war. Trump's opinion appears to be getting a cease-fire ASAP and then negotiating a full peace is preferable to waiting for an ideal peace - by Zelensky's unrealistic standards - that is never going to happen. Rubio correctly identified that the previous administration was using Ukraine as a meat grinder, and unfortunately for the Ukrainians, Russia has more meat.
Basically it looks like once the US are on board, Trump thinks Zelensky will be emboldened to continue indefinitely without peace. And it's not clear publicly what Zelensky's long-term endgame is, and there's no evidence that it's privately clear either. He seems to think he can get Russia to pay for all or part of the war, or that he can get some or all of the territory back. These goals are not necessarily consistent with reality. So if he's holding out for that forever, if he was to use the mineral deal just to drag the US deeper into the quagmire - he messed up because now he's flying back home with nothing, having overplayed his hand.
He should be feeling the pressure both domestically and internationally. Putin was trolling the other day saying he would welcome foreign cooperation in the "new territories" re:rare earth minerals, even from US partners. He is not in an enviable position, through no fault of his own Russia is a stronger country. But Trump used the word "embolden" multiple times meaning they're not trusting Zelensky's interest in peace while Zelensky got himself art of the dealed right out of the Oval Office, that's on him.
Here was Zelensky's scheduled interview after the WH summit:
EU and Biden using Ukraine as a proxy war and as a meatgrinder against Russia is so correct.
This has been a huge talking point in Asia for a while already. The fact that EU is just letting this happen, while saying "peace through strength" is just brutally inhumane. Even North Korea sent men to help Russia.
it takes something drastic to nudge the EU. Hopefully with European nation's troops deployed at Ukraine even as non combat role, the reality of things will hit.
Russia is completely free to stop throwing men into the meat grinder at any point. They are invading Ukraine and if they pack up and go home tomorrow, the war stops. Ukraine is NOT free to stop the war. If they surrender tomorrow (can't "go" home because they are fighting in their home), Russia rampages all over Ukraine committing atrocities as they go (see any town they occupied, such as Bucha).
North Korea isn't "sympathising" with Russia and sending troops to stop the poor Russians being thrown into the meat grinder. That was purely transactional, although it's doubtful we'll ever 100% know what NK got in exchange, it'll almost certainly include ICBM technology. Such altruism.
But who am I kidding, you're balls deep in the RT koolaid.
Precisely, even North Korea got a deal to send troops. That's how uncommitted EU is, they can't even send arms reliably on time. Or it's unreliable because it's not a deal?
And no, I don't read RT. EU hypocrisy in many policies and fall off in global politics like disastrous africa policy are well covered in Asia. Crying about tariff when EU is established precisely for protectionism.
I don't see how extending the war means less atrocities than a ceasefire.
Yeah and I wish China would stop funding Russia. How do you think Russia would just stop attacking? Again, once Europe sent their troops and recapture lands, then it is committed.
Would you be able to share where you get your news from? Social media maybe? Your take is very similar to RT, just because you are not reading it directly does not mean it does not influence the places you are taking your news from.
On March 01 2025 05:41 Hat Trick of Today wrote:
On March 01 2025 05:33 Simberto wrote:
On March 01 2025 05:11 Uldridge wrote: Zelensky's blood must be boiling there holy shit. His facial expressions said it all when Trump & Vance were talking.
Who can look at this shit and think "Yeah, this is what i want out of a leader for my country". Zelensky is 50 times the president that Trump could ever hope to be.
Because they’re not actually looking for actual leadership. Look at Asmongold, who is currently the biggest political influencer on social media. He approaches politics like it’s Keeping Up With The Kardashians. It’s solely about the drama and nothing else.
Look at the type of people who would reference Asmongold in a forum debate and read how they casually and jovially they talk about Trump’s desire to annex Canada. None of this is serious to them because it isn’t.
You know how 90% of NBA fans don’t even watch the games and just talk about streamable lowlights, trade rumours, wild comments from players, and off-field drama? Change ‘NBA’ with ‘politic’ and that’s your typical viewer base of your typical new age right wing influencer. Its like a huge chunk of the world is gripped by some sort of sociopathic nihilism.
On February 28 2025 17:45 oBlade wrote: Yep right on the money, every time a Democratic Congress votes for a budget, and that budget spends more than tax revenues bring in - that was George W. Bush's fault. I learned about it on the Daily Show.
My dude. Do you really not recognize that decisions now can influence costs in the future?
Lets say Obama sets the White House on fire, and just lives in a burned out husk for the remainder of his term. Then Trump has to spend money to rebuild and renovate the burned down White House. Is that Trumps spending or Obamas spending?
I am leaning more an more towards the Colin Robinson theory.
Is your position that Congress has had no choice but to spend more federal money than revenues for 25 years in a row because of 1-2 wars that Congress never voted to stop or defund? Because my question is simply again - even if that hypothesis goes 100% your way - what about the other $25 trillion?
I do not live in the world where every Republican is a MIC-captured crooked Cheney clone and every Democrat is... an angel. Because it's not true.
Decisions do affect the future. For example, if you cut taxes, then encourage growth, then you hopefully end up with a wider base of tax revenue.
I wrote a lengthy response to this. Then i deleted it. Because i thought: "Nevermind. I should take my own advice and stop replying to you. You are simply not worth talking to."
Debatelord conservatives are fucking exhausting. If anyone else wants to talk about anything else but this constant idiotic fight with oBlade, i am open for it.
LibHorizons: I have a standing invitation to discuss how libs/Dems/Ilk like myself and others can work together towards opposing the Trump administration's agenda. Developing a deliberate and executable plan to gain power and use it. As well as something people can organize around accomplishing over the coming months and years.
It's notable that no one is doing it. Especially those that insist they want a better Democratic party but are doing nothing to bring that about besides "hoping", "wishing", and maybe voting in a primary ~year from now .
Instead everyone prefers to incessantly do the "Republicans are so stupid and bad, look at how stupid and bad they are" thing while interspersing pointless bad faith arguments with the oBlades of the world.
There’s just as much disagreement and engagement between everyone else, it’s not like people lurk and don’t contribute unless there’s some conservative for everyone to dunk on. I don’t think that’s an especially fair categorisation.
I also think more broadly, most posters here tick the following two boxes: 1. We can collectively do better, the Democratic Party sure as fuck can. 2. That aside, we should keep Trump out of office, or politics of this kind in Europe etc. If we can’t even collectively do that, pushing the status quo towards the left is a bloody tall order.
I’m not an expert political strategist, but I don’t think a ‘hey the election is done now, let’s not mention all the stuff we did to let Trump in, what are you going to do now?’ is particularly effective.
LibHorizons: There really isn't much engagement or disagreement that isn't in some capacity about how bad and stupid Republicans/their supporters are. My point wasn't that though. It was that people claiming to want Democrats to do/be better and/or to oppose Trump aren't actually doing the bare minimum work required in a democracy for that to happen. Therefore, they can't be taken as being sincere in that expression.
2. Trump taking office required decades of bipartisan collaboration in empowering people like Trump. How to avoid it in Europe and what we can all do about it now is what I think we should be discussing. That it'll be hard is a given.
We can and should mention all the stuff done to let Trump in, but that's decades of bipartisan empowerment of people like Trump through third way neoliberalism (and literally helping to make him the nominee). If we do that, we can actually advance our understanding of the issues at hand and develop our plans to address them effectively.
On February 28 2025 17:45 oBlade wrote: Yep right on the money, every time a Democratic Congress votes for a budget, and that budget spends more than tax revenues bring in - that was George W. Bush's fault. I learned about it on the Daily Show.
My dude. Do you really not recognize that decisions now can influence costs in the future?
Lets say Obama sets the White House on fire, and just lives in a burned out husk for the remainder of his term. Then Trump has to spend money to rebuild and renovate the burned down White House. Is that Trumps spending or Obamas spending?
I am leaning more an more towards the Colin Robinson theory.
Is your position that Congress has had no choice but to spend more federal money than revenues for 25 years in a row because of 1-2 wars that Congress never voted to stop or defund? Because my question is simply again - even if that hypothesis goes 100% your way - what about the other $25 trillion?
I do not live in the world where every Republican is a MIC-captured crooked Cheney clone and every Democrat is... an angel. Because it's not true.
Decisions do affect the future. For example, if you cut taxes, then encourage growth, then you hopefully end up with a wider base of tax revenue.
I wrote a lengthy response to this. Then i deleted it. Because i thought: "Nevermind. I should take my own advice and stop replying to you. You are simply not worth talking to."
Debatelord conservatives are fucking exhausting. If anyone else wants to talk about anything else but this constant idiotic fight with oBlade, i am open for it.
LibHorizons: I have a standing invitation to discuss how libs/Dems/Ilk like myself and others can work together towards opposing the Trump administration's agenda. Developing a deliberate and executable plan to gain power and use it. As well as something people can organize around accomplishing over the coming months and years.
It's notable that no one is doing it. Especially those that insist they want a better Democratic party but are doing nothing to bring that about besides "hoping", "wishing", and maybe voting in a primary ~year from now .
Instead everyone prefers to incessantly do the "Republicans are so stupid and bad, look at how stupid and bad they are" thing while interspersing pointless bad faith arguments with the oBlades of the world.
There’s just as much disagreement and engagement between everyone else, it’s not like people lurk and don’t contribute unless there’s some conservative for everyone to dunk on. I don’t think that’s an especially fair categorisation.
I also think more broadly, most posters here tick the following two boxes: 1. We can collectively do better, the Democratic Party sure as fuck can. 2. That aside, we should keep Trump out of office, or politics of this kind in Europe etc. If we can’t even collectively do that, pushing the status quo towards the left is a bloody tall order.
I’m not an expert political strategist, but I don’t think a ‘hey the election is done now, let’s not mention all the stuff we did to let Trump in, what are you going to do now?’ is particularly effective.
Agreed on both boxes. I must also say that i apparently missed whenever GH started doing the LibHorizons thing, so i don't really get what that is about and mostly ignored it. Is it GH roleplaying as a Democrat?
I'd argue LibHorizons since inception is demonstrably a better Democrat than anyone here despite being on the periphery of the party and an informal demonstration of my capacity to behave like Democrats should.
Wait, you think you are the best? Who could have possibly seen this turn of events.
It’s well-established that the EU and states within that benefit from subsidies via the Common Agricultural Policy do end up with big surpluses, and some of that is dumped into places like Africa in a manner which does suppress local producers and markets.
ETisME is entirely correct in pointing that out, while I think their overall framing is wrong, in areas while internally extremely free market, in others the EU is protectionist, albeit in a multi-state continent wide sense rather than state by state.
Of course rather than actually engage with aspects of that, or investigate yourself, or interrogate further, you’re just assuming they’re getting bad information and don’t know what they’re talking about it with your usual smug disdain
Plus a little dig at GH to tick off the bingo card, quel fucking surprise!
So many big words, I like everyone else am very impressed. How could I respond to something so well articulated. Well played!
If you find a post like this too difficult already you should probably educate yourself and in any case stop shitposting in response to it. As someone whose first language is not English I found it quite clear.
Completely agree, thanks for contributing!
On March 02 2025 07:40 baal wrote:
On March 01 2025 16:53 Jockmcplop wrote: Free market monopolies don't exist, because there is no such thing as the free market.
It's not a binary thing, markets have state interference in very diferent degrees, less intervention less monopolies.
Can you expand on this? I have always thought its barriers to entry that create situation of monopolies. Like it does not matter how big Subway gets, I can make a sandwich shop and compete. That is not the same for competing with Amazon on cloud computing.
When I think past times, the robber barons like rockefellers, carnegie, and vanderbilts it is not state interference that created the monopolies and all the awful that went with them but rather intervention that stopped them.
Sure you can open a sandwich shop. But aside from just being bigger to force better deals from their suppliers Subway can afford to sell their sandwiches at a loss for a time, and you can not. They can simply wait for you to go out of business and then jack up the prices again.
Modern history is full of examples like this. Wallmart is famous for destroying local economies
Walmart is famous for that, Subway is not. There is tons of local sub shops and some that have even gone on to become big competitors. The pizza space is another place where competition is possible.
Putting aside that your dreamed stockpile and military spending reduction will be only on your side - if you keep insisting on being on your appeasement course - wonder how you see working deterence if one party is ready to use nukes on non-nuclear party to "de-escalate" conflict (pretier name for enforcing complete capitulation by giving nuclear possesing countries an "example").
On March 03 2025 01:01 oBlade wrote: Those countries are all NNPT signatories. One of Trump's stated goals is trilateral nuclear stockpile and defense spending reduction. The more you proliferate nuclear weapons, the more risks you create, which is why the US deploys warheads in countries like Germany and Turkey and South Korea for NATO and other defense. You do not strictly need proliferation to member states of the EU or NATO to achieve the same effect substituting UK/French weapons instead.
NNPT has an out clause. If you trigger it you only have wait 90 days. It's 100% correct proliferation will increase risks drastically.
However since the US seems extremely unintrested in providing security guarantees you can actually trust (Elon also wants to leave NATO now) we have to solve it ourselves. And French/UK systems are all sub based. So either they need new weapons that can be deployed or the rest of Europe needs to buy into their arsenal. Either way NNPT is dead.
This also ignores the fact that for a country like Ukraine (after a peace) nukes make a ton of sense since you can't trust others to even help you fight and you are not in an alliance with nukes. Which could of course be extremely dangerous later on. Russia have a habit of leaving their borders basically unguarded. If they are busy with something else, Ukraine has a nationalistic goverment and little blue men suddenly take Donetsk there is no telling what would happen
Hopes of nuclear non-proliferation died the moment Russia broke the Budapest Memorandum back in 2014. The US no longer being a reliable ally is just the final nail in the coffin.
On March 03 2025 01:27 Gorsameth wrote: Hopes of nuclear non-proliferation died the moment Russia broke the Budapest Memorandum back in 2014. The US no longer being a reliable ally is just the final nail in the coffin.
No I'd argue that non-proliferation died the minute that North Korea became a nuclear power.
It's impossible to argue about the merits of non-proliferation when the most insane pariah regime on the planet has nukes.
Not only does it rip apart the argument that we should keep nuclear weapons only in the hands of trusted governments that we know won't sell them off to terrorists, but we've also seen just how much having nuclear weapons has done to secure the global position of N. Korea. Forceful regime change is now not something anyone considers a viable option when we know they can respond this way.
Every other fragile regime on the planet sees how that plays out and knows that now no matter what anyone else says getting Nukes is worth it for them.
THEN you add in the Russians breaking the Budapest Memorandum, and you've got all the benefits for being a nuclear power on display with N. Korea vs all of the consequences of trusting other nations for your security guarantee on the other.
Non-proliferation is also impossible if we want more countries to have nuclear power plants. For example, only Egypt and South Africa currently have them in Africa. Very few countries want to buy nuclear power as a service from other countries. They will want to build, maintain, and operate their own plants, not pay French, etc., to run them. Europe does not want to depend on Russia, but others will not want to depend on EU> This will also decrease the need to export uranium further away when you can use it locally. All of this relies on sharing technology with more countries; afterwards, we can't control what they develop independently.
On March 03 2025 02:46 Legan wrote: Non-proliferation is also impossible if we want more countries to have nuclear power plants. For example, only Egypt and South Africa currently have them in Africa. Very few countries want to buy nuclear power as a service from other countries. They will want to build, maintain, and operate their own plants, not pay French, etc., to run them. Europe does not want to depend on Russia, but others will not want to depend on EU> This will also decrease the need to export uranium further away when you can use it locally. All of this relies on sharing technology with more countries; afterwards, we can't control what they develop independently.
Not only that but we can't control what technology a country shares with other countries once they have it.
The commonly held theory is that the French secretly helped the Israelis develop their nuclear program, the Israelis secretly helped the South Africans develop theirs, the South Africans secretly helped the Pakistanis develop theirs and the Pakistanis helped the North Koreans develop theirs.
Even if these were rogue actors acting independently of state agencies (and let's be honest, maybe only one or two of these examples were), the fact remains that the technology and information spreads like a virus whether we want it to or not and at this point we need to just accept that it does.
On March 03 2025 02:46 Legan wrote: Non-proliferation is also impossible if we want more countries to have nuclear power plants.
This isn't necessarily true. While it's indeed easier to hide/develop a nuclear weapons program if you already have a nuclear power industry, it's quite possible to demonstrate to the IAEA and others that you aren't dealing with bomb-grade nuclear material.
After some wrangling with OPM and their internal HR and command leadership the people I know in the US Navy and FDIC will be answering Elon's emails about what they did at work for the week.
Some lazy employees who never were afraid of losing their jobs are now working harder. Funny how that works.
On March 03 2025 03:29 JimmyJRaynor wrote: After some wrangling with OPM and their internal HR and command leadership the people I know in the US Navy and FDIC will be answering Elon's emails about what they did at work for the week.
Some lazy employees who never were afraid of losing their jobs are now working harder. Funny how that works.
The fur is flyin'
If any of such measures to improve performance at work were put in act before you didn‘t see them posted on the media for publicity effect. You‘re praising the publicity while we don‘t know what was done before with less actionism.
Yeah threatening people works who‘d have thought. That‘s the type of boss everyone wants.
On March 03 2025 03:29 JimmyJRaynor wrote: After some wrangling with OPM and their internal HR and command leadership the people I know in the US Navy and FDIC will be answering Elon's emails about what they did at work for the week.
Some lazy employees who never were afraid of losing their jobs are now working harder. Funny how that works.
The fur is flyin'
In the real world when ridiculous reporting requirements come out, the hard workers who are good at their job ignore it because they know their superiors know their importance and if not they will find a new job easy. The shit employees do an amazing job at the reporting because they know their job hangs in the balance.
Hopefully Musk is not dumb enough to fire based on a weekly email that is super easy to bullshit and everyone knows can not be followed up on in any real way. He might be though, on a weekly basis he is doing a great job at proving that billionaires are not spectacular!
On March 03 2025 02:46 Legan wrote: Non-proliferation is also impossible if we want more countries to have nuclear power plants.
This isn't necessarily true. While it's indeed easier to hide/develop a nuclear weapons program if you already have a nuclear power industry, it's quite possible to demonstrate to the IAEA and others that you aren't dealing with bomb-grade nuclear material.
Sure, but afaik that still means that you are only about a year away from nuclear bombs if you ever choose you want them.
Jimmy I hope your job starts to require that and you see how you like it. Funny to see you cheering on people dealing with the fickleness and stupidity of a tech bro CEO.
On March 03 2025 03:29 JimmyJRaynor wrote: After some wrangling with OPM and their internal HR and command leadership the people I know in the US Navy and FDIC will be answering Elon's emails about what they did at work for the week.
Some lazy employees who never were afraid of losing their jobs are now working harder. Funny how that works.
The fur is flyin'
Having to write 5 bullet points doesn't actually equate to "now working harder". They could just be bullshitting their 5 bullet points or having AI write some nonsense for them. People lie about their work accomplishments all the time; it's not like lazy employees are suddenly going to go from doing zero things at work to now doing five things, all because of Elon Musk. (Plus, even lazy employees might already have a total of five things they could report anyway.)
On March 03 2025 04:10 Sadist wrote: Jimmy I hope your job starts to require that and you see how you like it. Funny to see you cheering on people dealing with the fickleness and stupidity of a tech bro CEO.
It's funny. Every Friday one of our slack bots pings me to fill in the weekly activity tracker and every week I ignore it.
I don't ignore it because I didn't do anything, I ignore it because everyone who needs to know what is being done and how long it takes, already knows without me filling in the activity tracker.
On March 03 2025 03:29 JimmyJRaynor wrote: After some wrangling with OPM and their internal HR and command leadership the people I know in the US Navy and FDIC will be answering Elon's emails about what they did at work for the week.
Hegseth sent a note out either last night or this morning providing guidance for how to comply. The guidance is actually much more sensible than the original requests from OPM. It addresses things like what to do if you aren't able to reply to the requested e-mails for some reason, or what to do if you don't normally access work e-mail in your job.
Some lazy employees who never were afraid of losing their jobs are now working harder.
Citation needed. Preferably not lies from DoGE about this.
On March 03 2025 02:46 Legan wrote: Non-proliferation is also impossible if we want more countries to have nuclear power plants.
This isn't necessarily true. While it's indeed easier to hide/develop a nuclear weapons program if you already have a nuclear power industry, it's quite possible to demonstrate to the IAEA and others that you aren't dealing with bomb-grade nuclear material.
Sure, but afaik that still means that you are only about a year away from nuclear bombs if you ever choose you want them.
People are also capable of using the same chemical and biological technology to make WMDs. But the idea for all 3 is the same, if anyone crosses that line a hegemonic power can bomb the shit out of them. In the DPRK's case Bush and China dropped the ball.
In the case of European proliferation, it's paradoxically futile. If Russia is a threat to NATO neighbors who only have paper protection, is the thesis, if a bunch of weak little states next to Russia started leaving the NNPT to nuclearize, how do we suppose, in a simplified way, Russia would react? Attack. During that period, they would obviously be vulnerable and have to rely on the nuclear umbrella of the US/UK/France. Yet it's the supposed unreliability of that which was the whole pretext.
EPT
