This is just tone policing, the comment doesn't contradict those guidelines. I should know them, I do break them all the time!
Readit Newstm-infringement commented on I'm the Canadian who was detained by ICE for two weeks theguardian.com/us-news/2... · Posted by u/n1b0m
What I find the most interesting is that to me at least it seems like there has been some strange inversion over the course of my adult life, where the same people that used to lament things like the COA VOA propaganda, warfare, instigating and stoking and orchestrating coups, subverting democratic elections, etc. are exactly the ones doing and supporting all those things they used to decry.
I get the sense that I’ve just remained consistent in my views, but it still does not expiration things like how the same “liberals” who decried the invasion and corruption of Iraq, cheer on and demand limitless warfare and corrupted spending today on the likes of the Ukraine, while the “conservatives” want to stop wars and limit profligate spending and corruption.
It’s upside down world, and terrifying to witness how quickly people can be manipulated to take directly contradictory positions.
As someone from a country that's been the target of things like the VoA and much much worse. Ukraine isn't Iraq, this wasn't some dubious justification to preemptively attack. The gringo spooks were sure it wasn't gonna happen and were caught off guard, they didn't even give them advanced weaponry for a good while because they expected them to actually in fall in 3 days. Supporting Ukraine and being against interventionism isn't hypocritical. One only would see it like this if you flatten all context, opposing the Iraq wasn't flower-on-rifle pacisfism. The reasons for invasion were absurd, even if they weren't false.
But to your greater point, there's two things happening here. First, the American liberal was never inherently anti-war, just not as enthusiastic for it when presented with flimsy justification (see post-WW2 history). To the amorphous gas of person who deeply identifies with the Democrat establishment, (i.e dreamed to be Hillary Clinton intern) the "tasteful" use of the intelligence apparatus is Good and Justified, simply stuff you Gotta Do, you know? Advancing freedom and all. The average D voter doesn't actually give a shit about foreign policy, they just are obligated to care when inevitably the weight of reality demonstrates that something impossibly stupid is happening.
Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan*. Anyone with two neurons will reactively want to stop it. Avoiding it is another matter, you have stop producing more Kissingers and change the environment and the people that give them power. A competent and independent leftist movement could do this, but any semblance of this was suppressed 'cuz dirty commies. So yeah, some liberals will genuinely shed a tear for the VoA for "freedom".
Second, even if you hate the spooks and state propaganda like me, they are still useful. Not at good things, but it's nonetheless baffling to see someone put themselves at a disadvantage for no reason. The critiques are about strategy, not the morality of the outcome. Don't be fooled, this isn't an anti-intervention move or limiting spending by conservatives (how are those tax cuts going?). It's a rejection of the subtle and move to mafia style negotiation. Panama is not a joke, it's a promise.
The leftists stayed small. The liberals are still apathetic. The conservatives metaphorically got rabies.
[] One of the only times I've been impressed by Trump, he managed stuff the hot potato of the withdrawal in the mouth Biden, winning the good press while avoiding the blowback.
My opinion regarding this is very simple. I like honesty. If a person or culture does not believe in human rights, then it has to right to complain if we decide to kill, oppress and torture them and raze them to create civilization there. Because what argument do they have for not being tortured if they don't believe in human rights?
And Afghanistan is prime pickings right now because they have little allies currently. A motivated and well planned operation can eliminate them right now. I see the Taliban as an issue much longer term than merely using them as temporary pawns. I believe in the complete elimination of Taliban, the Iranian regime and similar groups.
> Because what argument do they have against being tortured if they don't believe in human rights?
Obviously, it's against the most basic principles that the humanist worldview of human rights is based on. I mean, you clearly don't believe in them sincerely, maybe you lie to yourself but you don't. You are the type of self-righteous goon that would happily disappear people in the Stasi or Pinochet's DINA.
> Afghanistan is prime pickings.
That's delusional. You cannot forcibly "reform" a culture in the short term (i.e., decades) that is not simply just near-total genocide. The Taliban cannot be weakened by overwhelming force. When invaders with absurd justifications (first Soviet, later American) commit "collateral damage," they create a sprawling network of causality that strengthens them. Kill the mother, justify the Taliban in the eyes of the son, and so on until the 7th generation.
The US never understood Afghanistan; they didn't want to either. You cannot outplan something that you don't inherently wish to understand, and Bin Laden knew that. Unlike the US, he comprehended both Afghanistan and America. It would have been so simple to send some spooks to snatch him after a couple of months, but that was never going to happen. Osama Bin Laden baited the United States of America, and it fell for it line, hook, and sinker. You lost trillions, thousands of lives, and more importantly, the last sliver of soul your country had.
The terrorists won on October 7, 2001.
Oh it's Putin fault? and not decades of short sighed policies to decommission nuclear plants and then decide we need them again.
Please don't make strawmen.
Prove it. What you are asking for is certain economic ruin at the expense of a nebulous climate goal. Can you guarantee that humans will be better off? Because I can guarantee setious, perhaps permanent, economic hardship in trying.
That sounds dystopian to me - people are unwilling to keep living due to the costs?
The monetary cost stings, but the calculus they are talking about really is about quality of life / expectancy. You are a relatively healthy 85 year old but you are still an octogenarian, you get a gnarly stroke.
Do you want to?
A: Get resuscitated and get "lucky". You are completely dependent on 24/7 care draining little Timmy's college fund or worse putting your adult kids in to debt. If a family member takes cares of you personally you will mentally break them. Also you cannot do anything fulfilling ever again.
B: Get resuscitated, die after 3 weeks with broken ribs. Yay morphine.
C: Get resuscitated and "just" get a little brain damage, maybe you become asshole or forget someone. Also, broken ribs and will probably happen again.
D: Quit while you are ahead.
So yeah, I'll get a DNR when a broken hip becomes inevitable.
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tm-infringement commented on The good times in tech are over seangoedecke.com/good-tim... · Posted by u/swah
In my first job at a fancy tech company in the Bay Area, I saw more free food and drinks than I've ever seen outside of a grocery store. It was crazy. 30 different kinds of beers. Free drinks, snacks, lunch.
I jokingly said out loud, "what did we do to deserve this?". A coworkers overheard and replied, "speak for yourself".
The entitlement was and probably still is crazy.
I've always felt that the moral panic about food perks in Tech was weird. That's not free, it's part of your salary. Sure, you can't buy index funds with Pineapples but at the end of the day it's still remuneration.
The market TC is crazy high, do you add a minor bump in $$$ to attract some candidates that will go to Sweetgreen? Or you add flashy food while taking advantage of economies of scale? Bonus, the very expensive people stay more in the office.
tm-infringement commented on GPT 4.5 level for 1% of the price twitter.com/Baidu_Inc/sta... · Posted by u/decide1000
We can agree to disagree on hegemonic power being a bigger deal than dictators. But regardless, saying China is insular is ridiculous. They have a very public plan to expand their hegemony by taking over the infrastructure of other nations by way of “developmental loans”.
The BRI is just the Temu version of the IMF with Chinese industry upsell.
If someone appears with invalid paperwork to a border crossing you simply turn them away, or in the case of international flights you keep them in a room for a couple of hours and send them back next flight home. You ban her for X years.
She was in some kind of kafkaesque simulacrum of a legal system with "constitutional free zones" and for-profit "detention" centers. Nobody knew anything inside or outside, only with a considerable amount of resources and luck they we are able to find her in the system. This is closer to the stories of my family during a dictatorship, moving earth and heaven to find close ones in jail when initially the police "didn't know anything about that". They were lucky, a lot of people never found their loved ones.
Sure, the US is not there (yet), but even then she could've been there 10 months or more there if she wasn't Canadian or wealthy.
So no, it's not a "snarky ideological barb" it's a good point that doesn't meet your aesthetic standards, at most the "skeptics like you" part makes it a bit too personal. Your strawman about his point seems worse imo.