US Politics Mega-thread - Page 663

On August 31 2018 23:50 JimmiC wrote:
I think it is time(has been for a long time) for the UK and US to put their foot down in regards to Saudi Arabia. How much BS and human rights violations is it going to take for the price being paid to have a strategic ally be worth it. The issue with supporting SA vs Iran, is they are no better than Iran. They should be under the same international pressure as Iran and not immune to sanctions, hell they don't even get public criticisms.

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/world/opinion-the-sheer-despicable-hypocrisy-of-saudi-arabia/ar-BBMHAfZ?li=AAggNb9

On August 31 2018 23:50 JimmiC wrote:
I think it is time(has been for a long time) for the UK and US to put their foot down in regards to Saudi Arabia. How much BS and human rights violations is it going to take for the price being paid to have a strategic ally be worth it. The issue with supporting SA vs Iran, is they are no better than Iran. They should be under the same international pressure as Iran and not immune to sanctions, hell they don't even get public criticisms.

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/world/opinion-the-sheer-despicable-hypocrisy-of-saudi-arabia/ar-BBMHAfZ?li=AAggNb9

On September 01 2018 00:02 Plansix wrote:
Saudi Arabia is a tough nut to crack. There is no real solution to their human rights abuses and general theocratic government. The US and EU have zero ability to force change and no one is willing to take any military action against that country, because Mecca is in Saudi Arabia. And its not like China or Russia are unwilling to sell them weapons.

And it isn’t like folks have a lot of options in that region. For regional powers, it is Saudi Arabia or Iran and not much else.

On September 01 2018 00:09 Jockmcplop wrote:


I've often heard the argument (from a UK perspective) that if we didn't sell them weapons then someone else would. For me, I would like my government to avoid being responsible for the atrocities in Yemen (similar to the US and Israel - but to a greater degree).
Having to choose a side so siding with some form of lesser evil is not really a productive thing to do. We tried that in Syria.

Not to mention the fact that the money given to SA for oil goes directly towards funding the growth of extremist ideology in Europe (as a report that the UK government tried to hide showed).

I don't really have a solution to the oil problem though.

On September 01 2018 00:11 JimmiC wrote:


Yes, some one needs to take a long hard look. And value innocent human life a lot higher than strategic intel. It is a high level hypocrisy to put major sanctions on Iran for crimes SA is committing at the same rate. Hard to maintain any level of credibility.




I'm not saying it will be easy, or cheap. But Canada has lots of oil, we will sell it to you! Sure price will go up but much like avoiding blood diamonds you will pay more but be ding something much less shitty. As for the selling of weapons, I have trouble supporting that industry regardless of economic benefit. There would probably be economic benefit to selling AR-15s and hand guns and so on within the UK I'm thinking you wouldn't want it so don't sell much more powerful shit to people who are willing to use it to create humanitarian disasters.


Another possible Oil solution would be propping up Venezuela, they has as much oil as SA. And despite Maduro being a corrupt asshole, masquerading as a socialist while lining his pockets and pockets of his friends, he is not bombing civilians. Perhaps a deal could be made that cleans up some of the corruption to bring up oil production above the 1940's levels they are doing now that can benefit the people their and ease the need for Saudi oil.

Venezuelan security forces, together with armed pro-government groups called “colectivos,” have violently attacked anti-government protests—some of them attended by tens of thousands of Venezuelans—between April and July 2017. Security force personnel have shot demonstrators at point-blank range with riot-control munitions, run over demonstrators with an armored vehicle, brutally beaten people who offered no resistance, and staged violent raids on apartment buildings.

On August 31 2018 23:51 Dangermousecatdog wrote:
That may or may not prevent him from entering more power, but it does absolutely nothing to the gradual normalisation of rascist language. In any case how often does anybody actually feel the need to call anybody articulate? Even on TL, a forum where one can only speak in words, does rarely people feel the need to praise the eloquence of another and when they do they just wish to have the ability to communicate in the same style, rather than just to praise someone. When does someone ever feel the need to call someone articulate? Normally you would express it as that you wish you could speak as well as that person can as opposed to passing praise or judgement on their oratory capabilities. Likewise, when does someone feel the need to commentate on how well behaved somebodies' children are, as the normal expectation is to expect good behaviour and to praise children and thank them for tasks, as you would adults. That said we may be entering a period of time where a substantial number of people in the political adult lives can only remember Obama as the only US president who has a wide vocabulary and can join sentences together in a line of thought.

On September 01 2018 00:29 mahrgell wrote:


Especially in the political context, praising your opponents eloquence/articulateness feels really common to me.
It isn't a rare tactic to basically say "I don't agree with his points, but I admit he is selling those very well". As a political strategy this has quite a number of advantages. Firstly, praising something of your opponent makes you seem less like a blind zealot. And often more importantly you can now use the concept of "What he says sounds nice, but that is just because he is such a good speaker and not because it is actually good".

And even outside of campaign tactics, it isn't rare for me to hear that kind of praise in the political context.
E.g. during German elections I considered Wagenknecht (front woman of our far left) and Lindner (front man of our Liberals) both eloquent/articulate and enjoyed their verbal duels. And that while I disagreed with them on most of the things they said. And I didn't consider them eloquent "for a lefti/liberal/woman/whatever" or because I desired to speak like them, but simply because I enjoyed them approaching arguments, countering attacks and dodging their weak spots. In fact I found those debates more enjoyable than the ones containing speakers way closer to my opinions
And similar feedback wasn't rare in all kind of conversations irl and online about the election.

On September 01 2018 00:00 Liquid`Drone wrote:
I've been called eloquent on several occasions on this forum actually. Also on other forums, and also in other contexts. Maybe there's a 'surprisingly so for a non-native speaker' element there but I never perceived it as such.

Honestly your attitude towards compliments comes off as a bit weird. If I call someone beautiful, it's not because I expected them to be ugly. If I call someone nice, it's not because I'm surprised they're not a jerk. It's just a compliment. It's nice.

On September 01 2018 00:17 Plansix wrote:

I agree that Yemen is a huge problem and I really wish that conflict would end or we would pull support for it. But the sad alternative is that the US and UK never sold them weapons, someone else does and the people in Yemen die anyways. But in that version, the US and UK have even less ability to stop the violence beyond direct intervention. Ending the relationship with SA is a big risk for both the US and UK. But it may have to at some point.

On September 01 2018 01:37 JimmiC wrote:


I don't think people are saying Houthis are good and SA is bad. Just that both are awful and should get similar treatment from the world at large.

Right now the west is using the Russians and the Chinese are doing it so we have to. Pehaps they are using the same logic. It is too bad we can't truly all be on the same side when it comes to basic human rights.