General News Thread

[AsGryffynn]

Not quite sure what this means.

Democracy and Authoritarianism are not inherently right or wrong. The term dictablanda was created for a reason. A dictator was the best leader we had so far despite being dead for over 40 years.

What's inherently wrong is forbidding stuff, not achieving things through the use of force. If Bernie Sanders was a dictator with unlimited powers and we assumed he wouldn't go power hungry like Fidel Castro did, it would be far better than a democratically elected centrist who doesn't believe healthcare is a human right.

The idea of democracy is to keep a sword of Damocles around those who govern. Minding our needs is their job. The federal government in the US should be ruled by experts and not someone who has been sitting in a bench yapping around 4 decades.

This also means democracy in China wouldn't fix the source of the issues: confucian hierarchical views on how society should be run and the East Asian affair with collectivism.

[LegalLoliLover]

Well, for better or worse, China and Korea have the habit of praising their conquerors, whilst vilifying their attempted conquerors. When engaging such countries, shamelessly plow ahead because should you reach the "goal", they'll thank you for it. Sprinkle in some Droit du seigneur (Mongolian style, rather than Mesopotamian style, obviously) for good measure. "Should you" being the operative words. Again, if you fail, they'll definitely hate you for it. Like I would literally find it hilarious if China convinced the US to stop interfering in any Asian business, and then Japan decides to invade almost instantly. The last pockets of Chinese resistance during WWII would have fallen had Japan not surrendered, due to the nukes.

[Ratman]

It's not so much my opinion getting filtered as much as you describing it as epic making me think something interesting happened somewhere in the 4:30 hour stream I found. All I could see in the succinct summaries was that there was a binder of possible violations, a handful of witnesses, and the Dems sniping at the committee chair (and Guilanni as well) because he wouldn't dismiss everything out of hand. And another hearing tomorrow for either more witnesses or another separate lawsuit?

Other than the length, I can't really see what makes that 'epic' so what was so stand out? Especially against the multiple other similar lawsuits that have been going on for the last few weeks?

It's different because it's not a lawsuit. So there is no judge that can go 'case closed, yes I definitely looked through the ten dossiers of evidence and I can tell this is a huge nothingburger yawn anybody else sleepy?'. These people have to listen to this by law even if they don't like hearing things they don't like hearing.

A pretty spicy point would be that time where one of the representatives goes:
- Wait, this lady was already a witness in a dismissed case. Why should we take this seriously if a judge already had her overturned?
the answer to which would be
- Because she didn't testify. The judge didn't talk to her. There was no hearing. Ask the judge, they denied talking to her.

Seems there will be one per contested state, anyway.

[Mattias]

Ah, I see.

Though isn't the final elector vote on the 15th? And there's what, six more contested states? That's a lot of running around assuming Rudy is going to be at each one.

[asterism42]

[LegalLoliLover]

How quickly you turn on each other. It's like those cannibals from Robinson Crusoe. So how about, instead of senseless caricatures, we have rational conversation, like this:

This is something that even I agree with.

[Tobias]

I have been saying it was a dumb ass slogan before we had an election in which multiple enemies of said slogan successfully weaponized it and proved me right.

don’t shoot the messenger

[rxrx]

But a good slogan is necessary to brainwash people. So 'Yes we can' and 'Make America Great Again' are good stuff.

[Tobias]

Hey, I have nothing against the power of something short and catchy. A good slogan has real power. But a bad slogan also has real power and defund the police is without a doubt the biggest unforced messaging error I have quite literally ever heard.

[rxrx]

Hey, I have nothing against the power of something short and catchy. A good slogan has real power. But a bad slogan also has real power and defund the police is without a doubt the biggest unforced messaging error I have quite literally ever heard.

I guess they are out of creative juices when trying to think of something catchy for that campaign.

[LegalLoliLover]

Leftists are already embracing Blue MAGA. It's gotten to the point where they are stealing slogans from each other.

[Pendant]

Democracy and Authoritarianism are not inherently right or wrong. The term dictablanda was created for a reason. A dictator was the best leader we had so far despite being dead for over 40 years.

What's inherently wrong is forbidding stuff, not achieving things through the use of force. If Bernie Sanders was a dictator with unlimited powers and we assumed he wouldn't go power hungry like Fidel Castro did, it would be far better than a democratically elected centrist who doesn't believe healthcare is a human right.

The idea of democracy is to keep a sword of Damocles around those who govern. Minding our needs is their job. The federal government in the US should be ruled by experts and not someone who has been sitting in a bench yapping around 4 decades.

This also means democracy in China wouldn't fix the source of the issues: confucian hierarchical views on how society should be run and the East Asian affair with collectivism.

Castro was not "power hungry"

Or, more to the point, significantly more power hungry than any other world leader.

[LegalLoliLover]

Well, most modern leaders are better than Mao Zedong, in that they're at least potty-trained.

[SpoonyViking]

[QUOTE=AsGryffynn;3097302]A dictator was the best leader we had so far despite being dead for over 40 years./QUOTE]

You're not seriously praising Franco.

[Twelveseal]

Anybody got any idea why Trump keeps purging national security officials and replacing them with his campaign crew? This is making me worry he's about to go to war with Iran or something as a parting shot.

[OverMaster]

Castro was not "power hungry"

Or, more to the point, significantly more power hungry than any other world leader.

Most power hungry leaders don't go quite as far as establishing themselves presidentes for life and then setting things so their brother inherits the throne after they die. At least not anymore, thank God.

Not power hungry my ass, Castro was a fucking creep.

[Pendant]

you're wrong

[Mattias]

Most power hungry leaders don't go quite as far as establishing themselves presidentes for life and then setting things so their brother inherits the throne after they die. At least not anymore, thank God.

The fact he went with his brother who was only a few years younger than him rather than make it one of his children (wikipedia says he has at least 9), makes it look more like he wanted to continue the thing he spent his life building, rather than hand it down to his bloodline like Kims do.

[rxrx]

Anybody got any idea why Trump keeps purging national security officials and replacing them with his campaign crew? This is making me worry he's about to go to war with Iran or something as a parting shot.

Best guess is either war or trying to use the military to deal with internal affairs.

[Trubo]

Hey, I have nothing against the power of something short and catchy. A good slogan has real power. But a bad slogan also has real power and defund the police is without a doubt the biggest unforced messaging error I have quite literally ever heard.

Like it or not, it gets right to the heart of the problem. Any other rephrasing allows for weaselly bullshit, cause "reform the police" sounds good but doesn't call out the problem that police budget is ridiculous enough as it is, letting people like Biden say that the true problem police face is that they don't have enough funding to reform themselves.

As for complaining about it being weaponized by Republicans, blame Democrats for their absolutely pathetic reactionary response to "defund the police" much like their whole approach to "black lives matter" since Obama.