US Politics Feedback Thread - Page 315

On March 18 2022 22:33 Biff The Understudy wrote:

Then again is there any time in your book where the US is not the bad guy.

On March 18 2022 23:43 Dangermousecatdog wrote:

Greenhorizon can debate by himself with his own arguments. He doesn't need you to come up with your own projections. If you want to make an argument, you don't need to hide behind another's name and use their name to make your own argument. And USA is very much not the "bad guy" during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. USA warned Ukraine and the rest of the world for 3 months that Russia was preparing to invade Ukraine. Many European countries are also sending arms and aid to Ukraine, just like USA is doing. This is the Ukraine thread, not USA thread. Go whataboutism in the dedicated USA thread instead. Besides this talk of "bad guys" is so naive it's beyond immature.

On July 08 2022 04:35 Dangermousecatdog wrote:

Lets go through the listed empires one by one. Portugal, small, one sole land neighbout greatly more populous than it is, first European maritime empire, powerful enough not be utterly dominated by the then Castille, though diplomatic marriage played a part.

Spain which you wierdly acknowledge greatly prospered with it's empire then dismisses this, an empire allowed it to press European claims it otherwise could not had with the great wealth allowing Spain to hold massive and sophisticated armies of the time, as well as a large navy, influencing European politics greatly, though most notably affecting by fighting the rest of Europe at the same time. Twice. They lost though.

Netherlands, the birth of Netherlands against the then immense armies and navy of the Spanish army is also the birth of the Dutch Empire, which allowed the nation to accrue enough wealth over the course of about 80 years to not only survive but prosper against the behemoth of the Spanish Empire at the time, with mercenaries and forts brought by control of trade by the Dutch through their empire. The lowland rebellion that would become Netherlands if not for the wealth of the Dutch Empire; they are one and the same intrinsically linked at the time, navy and army funded by the Ducth Empire.

Britain, a long history but mostly speaking the wealth of Empire allowed a navy and a trained professional army as opposed to conscript army which was able to greatly interfere on the continent almost at will. Most obvious would be both world wars, being able to afford a navy that would not had existed without funds from empire, which essentially blockaded or otherwise exert sea control over almost the entirety of the Atlantic, North and Mediterrean sea and bringing hundreds of thousands of overseas troops, which otherwise would not have existed if not for empire.

Lets not forget the more recent examples of that period of the land empires of the Russian Empire and Chinese Empire, which through lands conquered greatly increased the wealth and power of their nation. Throughout the dawn of history, land was power and conquering land and being an empire was immensely profitable for the nation. It's not really debateable, as it is empire which always prospered and those that could not be locally powerful became vassals or were conquered in turn.

Some places were a drain on a martime Empire, mostly inland Africa which was for the most part only conquered during the relatively late Scramble for Africa period (often suprisingly cheap in terms of manpower), but in terms of monetary power and in military power, the true and most important expression of wealth from the viewpoint of nation, conquering land very much paid for themselves.

Of course all this is all totally irrelevant in the modern world, where wealth is no longer so much a matter of agriculture and natural resources and unlikely to be worthwhile, at least without essentially genociding the local population. Russia isn't seeking to occupy Ukraine for a notion of wealth, but for political and idealogical grounds.
____________________
Still looks very much Russia has gained to me and very much so that Russia has gained far more important territory. Supposing that the area has remained the same ignores the importance of the occupied area, but makes for a nice story I guess. Great for morale boost, not useful for understand what has or is currently occuring. I'll note that the green areas are somewhat dubious as it seems especially for the region past Kherson to simply include any area that Russians have penetrated to, even if they never truly had control of the area, but I suppose such is the fog of war.

If as you say, Russian occupied areas gained is from withdrawing soldiers from other areas, that is an indication of Russia coordinating better rather than the early stages of the war. There's really isn't anything to gain by thinking Russians cannot learn. Afterall, Colonels ultimately do not want to die, and no commander, no matter how callous Russians seem, wants the men under their command to die and will be willing to adapt to acheive their objectives. Think I, like you, will leave those words and this topic at that.

___________


Saudi Arabia seem to be refusing to pump more oil, which is a remarkable contrast to the time when Iran was sanctioned, when Saudi Arabia opened their taps and almost bankrupted Russia and Venezuela as a side effect. Turns out Saudi Arabia does prefers to do as is beneficial to them, and in this case Saudi Arabia is enjoying the benefits of higher oil prices.

On July 08 2022 04:35 Dangermousecatdog wrote:
+ Show Spoiler +
Saudi Arabia seem to be refusing to pump more oil, which is a remarkable contrast to the time when Iran was sanctioned, when Saudi Arabia opened their taps and almost bankrupted Russia and Venezuela as a side effect. Turns out Saudi Arabia does prefers to do as is beneficial to them, and in this case Saudi Arabia is enjoying the benefits of higher oil prices.

On March 18 2022 23:27 KwarK wrote:

He’s looking at the US outside of the lens of greater evil analysis and pointing out that the US brings an awful lot of evil into the world. Both domestically with its oligarchic capitalist exploitation of the people and resources of the United States and with the enforcement of a global world order designed to import resources and extract misery. God probably wouldn’t judge the US very favourably.

But sometimes the stars align and the US fucks over someone who actually deserves it. In those instances the US looks like a good guy, provided you ignore literally everything else it also does. When GH says the US is a bad guy he doesn’t mean the US is always the worst guy in any given room, he means that you can’t ignore the bigger picture.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to conclude that when the US supports the little guy in this conflict and the big autocratic guy bombing villages in Yemen it’s probably not because the US hates dictatorships, loves human rights, and supports the plucky underdog. The concerns are geopolitical, not moral, and it just happens that geopolitical concerns and moral concerns have aligned this time. But doing the right thing for the wrong reasons is still doing the right thing, I’ll take it.

On March 18 2022 23:45 KwarK wrote:

Read my post again. You clearly didn’t succeed the first time.

On July 08 2022 05:25 KwarK wrote:

No. Your argument essentially runs “Britain had an empire and also Britain could afford an empire therefore the empire paid for itself”. It just doesn’t follow. It never paid for itself.

On July 08 2022 10:49 r00ty wrote:


Exactly. And as if they don't have enough already. Billions upon billions of dollars are made on the backs of the Ukrainian people and by putting us all on the road to global recession. This could be ended without firing a bullet, but "the west" is too reliant on and toothless toward the autocrats in this world sitting on the oil and gas.

Belarus lol. If they send troops who is gonna control the people at home?

On April 12 2022 03:48 Dangermousecatdog wrote:
So again I will ask, can you vote in the French election Nebuchad?
Are you, or are you not, voting for Le Pen? If not, who and why?

Also...imagine describing France as a neoliberal system. At that point the word has no meaning, much like how some people throw "you all on the left" around. It's no longer a descriptor of a set of policies, but a tribal rallying call and identity against an "other". How would you define neoliberalism?

On April 26 2022 05:41 Nebuchad wrote:


Systems with a neoliberal electoral choice, where one of the main choices is a liberal and the other main choice is far right. We can observe that in politics the power tends to shift from one of the main sides to the other, as the person in power disappoints some people and they are drawn to the most normalized opposition. It is very rare that this balance doesn't occur. You can see it happening in the US right now, as most people agree that whichever ghoul is produced by the republican party will be a huge favourite next election.

On April 26 2022 07:08 Nebuchad wrote:


Well they voted for some far right dude and that dude got elected. In electoral politics this is usually referred to as winning, I don't know what you want from me.

He changed the system in that usually France had a leftist dude and a liberal dude squaring off in the playoffs. When Macron came in, people were dissatisfied with the previous left leader, Hollande, and as such it was time for the rightwing to have the presidency. But they picked Fillon as a candidate and Fillon fucked up by having his corruption exposed, which allowed for a center vs far right election instead of a left vs right election.

As a leader, Macron used a lot of the comm power available to him to legitimize the themes and ideas of the far right and delegitimize the left, which made it more likely that this election would have a second round of him vs the far right. It is most likely that he'll pursue that strategy again in the next five years, and due to the standard balance of disappointed voters that makes the far right a favourite to win, if not next time, at least eventually (but like I said, most likely next time in my opinion)

On April 26 2022 08:18 Nebuchad wrote:


A lot of the prevalent french political discourse in the last few years originated in the far right, and prominent members of Macron's government relayed it as true with no pushback. Islamoleftism, the idea that the left and academia are allied with islamists to overthrow France, was quoted positively by several ministers including the minister of Education. The idea is that the left is no longer "republican" and should be discarded, dangers of wokism were a common topic, as was insecurity. Islamophobia is normalized, with several non far right voices saying that the term should be abandoned but I guess a lot of people on this forum find that good so whatever.

Edit: forgot about a personal favourite, that one time Darmanin (interior minister I believe) debated Marine Le Pen and told her she was too weak on immigration and she should take some vitamins.