mozz

every day the war goes on, and every bomb we send there, is a bad day for someone, statistically mostly women and children

not invading meant a hostile state being used to launch hostile actions within PRC, I'd have to support it

Fascinating

There were Americans who opposed the nazis before 1941. During the mccarthy era, they were smeared as "preeminent anti-fascists" meaning "these people weren't opposed to the nazis when we thought they were the answer to communism, that must mean they're secret communists".

Very fascinating. Can you give me some examples of some of these people? I know people in my family who were against the Nazis have all these stories about how they were shunned by their neighbors, harassed, all these bad things had happened to them, because they were against the Nazis too early. Anyone with a native understanding of US history is real familiar with it.

But at the same time, it has helped radicalize and inform so many in the ranks of Gen Z, amongst other generations.

I know when I think of people I know who get most of their news from TikTok, I'm like "damn that person is super well informed and I'm always happy when I talk to them about politics and world events"

Out of all the platforms, every single other one of which including the one you're on right now and the elephant one and Usenet and ZMag and Hackernews and all the rest

I do not know which reality you inhabit where TikTok invented people knowing about Gaza, but I promise you that there are better platforms, where you're allowed to talk about drugs or alcohol or use the word "blood", or "Uyghur"

There was someone who worked in Washington who made a proposal that the nuclear launch codes should be printed on a little capsule that was surgically implanted inside a man who would travel around with the president, in kind of the same way that the briefcase or whatever-it-is travels around with him under the current system.

The deal was, if the president wanted to launch a nuclear strike, he had to take a big knife and kill the man to cut him open to get to the capsule. Kind of come to grips on an individual level with what he was dealing with, and what it meant on at least some level, instead of just pushing some buttons in an air conditioned office.

I don't think this was ever meant as a serious proposal. The person who invented it was just trying to make a point. But it did get relayed to at least one person who worked in the Pentagon who got very upset at the idea and started arguing against it. What if, he said, the president looks at what's in front of him and can't do it. That would be terrible.

I didn't, the "oppose the US and you'll be on the right side" heuristic only describes the end result, the core is still anti-imperialism

Interesting

Who do you support in the Ukraine war? Who would you support if the Chinese military invaded Taiwan?

Same with the US opposition to Nazi Germany after they supplied them with materials and weapons to crush the communist at home and in hope they'd go after the USSR.

The US government is made of many, many parts and conflicting goals and interests. The actions on student loan forgiveness are one small example, but the same applies even to big actions like what to do with Nazi Germany.

If there was a faction of the US government that was opposing Nazi Germany the whole time, and a faction of it that was supporting the Nazis even during part of the shooting war, is it fair to say you'd support the faction that was fighting the Nazis and oppose the faction that was supporting the Nazis? Or would you assert that the faction that was opposing the Nazis the whole time didn't exist or things didn't happen that way?

He restarted loan repayments

No he didn't. The relevant quote is, "But this time is different. The debt ceiling bill’s statutory language will tie Biden’s hands. Barring a new national emergency, he will no longer have the statutory authority to extend the current student loan pause."

The thing that actually was in his power to do -- forgive balances -- he did. And, when other parts of the federal government cancelled his order to do a massive forgiveness, he did smaller forgiveness packages that added up to around $150 billion so far.

No no no, I'd have to support the US against Israel. My fault, "I'd have to support it" was ambiguous, it could have been referring to the US's opposition to Israel or Israel.

Got it. Makes sense. So what made you change your mind? What's different about Israel if they were an enemy of the US that would make you not support them (in a way that you would some other small middle-eastern country that was an enemy of the US)?

• Biden attempted to forgive half a trillion dollars in student loans, and the Supreme Court told him no. He's still managed to do about $150 billion on his own. In what sense are you saying he's driving the knife in?
• Biden is holding up military aid for Israel right now. Too little too fucking late, in my opinion, but you are aware that that's happening, right? That the leader who is actively killing Palestinians is a whole different world leader on a whole different side of the planet?
• There's a whole conversation to be had about 40% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2030; that may be opening up a significant additional topic. But you brought up oil production.

That's not even the main point. You said elsewhere:

• You'd "have to" support Israel, even if they were genociding Palestinians just like they are today, if they weren't on the same side as the US, because you support all enemies of the US uncritically.
• "There is a discrepancy" between you wanting to drive the US as quickly as possible to its destruction, and being deeply concerned about Biden's strategy and offering critique to what he's doing (supposedly, ultimately, to help him win the election.)

I don't know man. I think you wanna think through that discrepancy at some length. I'm pretty doubtful that you're sincere about what you're saying. Sorry.

If you actually are an American and this is actually what you believe, then you should know that I carry the same absurd hope that you're talking about that the US can do better things. If you want better outcomes for the people inside the United States and less evil done in its name on the world stage, I think there are actually some good ways you can work towards that outcome.

My take on any enemies of the US is uncritical support

Also, I want to circle back to this for a second. Doesn't this mean that we maybe shouldn't take your advice on how as voters to approach the presidential election?

Or does your "enemies of the US get uncritical support" stance come in conjunction with a "the US election is very important to me and I have some criticisms of the Democrats but they're purely meant from a constructive helping-the-country-get-better point of view" viewpoint on electoral politics?

Yeah. I was around in the games industry way back when the big publishers had a total stranglehold on the whole arena, and Steam was this magic thing that enabled non-AAA games to actually break in in a big way and achieve sales above the double digits, and on top of that I generally like Valve's games. I was sort of wondering if this is a "live long enough to see yourself become the villain" type of thing, where my good feelings towards Valve aren't warranted anymore in the present day.

But, judging by what I saw when I grabbed one of this person's assertions at random and held it up to the light to examine in it detail for objective truth, I don't think it's based on a reasoned and objective basis. What it is based on, I have no idea.

But yes, I would support the US decolonizing its own puppets.

That wasn't the question.

Would you uncritically support Israel, if they had a falling out with the US and started criticizing the US? Getting no military funding from us anymore, and getting up at the UN and calling out the US and giving criticism and making friends with countries that were avowed enemies of the US (while still killing Palestinians exactly like at present)?

I feel like you're saying you would, but I want to make sure I'm hearing you right.

No, no, if they were still the core of imperialism. I don't think that's likely to change any time soon. But if voter sentiment in the US turned so aggressively and permanently against Israel that cutting off military aid to Israel became a huge campaign issue, and then it happened, and Israel went absolutely on a tear of anti-US realignment and made an alliance of survival with the governments of Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Or something like that. It's a lot more plausible than other things that people are talking about, like legalizing weed or abolishing the FBI and DOJ.

If that happened and the US still had a mostly-unchanged-otherwise foreign policy, would you uncritically support Israel because they'd become an avowed enemy of the US?

I just got done shitting on this article and The New York Times in general after someone on Masto pointed out that it didn't say a word about abortion, which seems like an odd omission for someone casting about for successful strategies for Biden to use.

I didn't realize until reading this headline that yes, the political genius the New York Times has found was an advisor to the famously successful and media-savvy Hillary Clinton campaign which used this exact strategy to drive its historic victory oh wait hang on.

He's also so well-known in politics that he's not in Wikipedia. Not that that automatically means he's wrong, but I'm not real convinced.

I hadn't heard of most of this, and it's sort of an avalanche, so I picked out one particular part to check out in a lot of detail and see if it held up.

The controller was stolen IP

Looks to me like they had buttons on the back of the controller in some way which infringed on one of 105 patents that SCUF holds on specific parts of controller design, and they sued Valve a year after Valve had stopped using the design anyway.

I'm not qualified to say whether SCUF actually invented something no one else would have thought of, and then Valve deliberately copied them on it, but I'm skeptical. I lean a little more towards the side of "SCUF patented something somewhat obvious, and then wanted Valve to pay them rent in order to set their buttons up in a sensible fashion."

But at the very least, saying that it's demonstrated that it was "stolen" is, to me, not accurate.

and is still currently fighting the lawsuit

This part is objectively not true, unless there's some glacially slow appeals process I'm not aware of. It looks like the whole thing finished in 2021. Am I wrong?