Irrelevant to the content of the article, but worth pointing out that this project is funded by the proceeds of crimes committed at Drexel Burnham in the 80s. Michael Milken and his brother Lowell undoubtedly do good through their philanthrophy, but the cynic in me suspects that it is primarily an attempt to rehabilate their image and is treated as a business expense. Maybe it doesn't matter if you do good for the wrong reasons though.
The Incredibly Stupid One
11–20 of 86 posts
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#12No post body was provided.
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#13A brave soldier, doing right by his country, which was led into fighting villagers half way around the world in incredibly tough scenarios by asshole politicians.
The Vietnam war (or the American war as I was corrected in a bar in Hanoi) was the epitome of unintended escalation. One of the early escalators was JFK, who was simultaneously extremely wary of escalation, and is not someone who most people think of as an asshole politician. Your point has some heft but it's a simplistic take.
isn't it also a bit of a simplistic take to think that American Presidents truly have the "Commander-in-Chief" power w.r.t. war decisions that they have on paper?
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#14Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Vietnam war (or the American war as I was corrected in a bar in Hanoi) was the epitome of unintended escalation. One of the early escalators was JFK, who was simultaneously extremely wary of escalation, and is not someone who most people think of as an asshole politician. Your point has some heft but it's a simplistic take.
isn't it also a bit of a simplistic take to think that American Presidents truly have the "Commander-in-Chief" power w.r.t. war decisions that they have on paper?
From memory JFK was the prime mover in decisions on the number of Americans on the ground, their roles and even their uniforms.
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#15Irrelevant to the content of the article, but worth pointing out that this project is funded by the proceeds of crimes committed at Drexel Burnham in the 80s. Michael Milken and his brother Lowell undoubtedly do good through their philanthrophy, but the cynic in me suspects that it is primarily an attempt to rehabilate their image and is treated as a business expense. Maybe it doesn't matter if you do good for the wr…
> Maybe it doesn't matter if you do good for the wrong reasons though.
There was an interesting discussion around this yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32094798 (TikTok'er doing random acts of kindness for clout upset someone he used for his videos)
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#16A brave soldier, doing right by his country, which was led into fighting villagers half way around the world in incredibly tough scenarios by asshole politicians.
The Vietnam war (or the American war as I was corrected in a bar in Hanoi) was the epitome of unintended escalation. One of the early escalators was JFK, who was simultaneously extremely wary of escalation, and is not someone who most people think of as an asshole politician. Your point has some heft but it's a simplistic take.
I have often wondered if, had the Watergate break-in not been discovered or reported, South Vietnam might yet exist, and if they would rival South Korea in their technological accomplishments.
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#17Quoted post unavailable.
> And half of the stuff we read further is probably just his legend, i.e. not true.
Do you have any evidence of this, or are you just saying this? And what stuff are you saying is untrue? None of this sounded unbelievable to me. This man is someone who helped save the lives of several other soldiers who were being tortured at the time. If you're insinuating that his efforts are all fabricated based on no evidence, then it just seems like a weird thing to insinuate imo.
And here's something from 2005 with all the same details[0]. Everything else I've found seems to tell the same story, so I'm not sure why they would all be wrong (unless you're trying to say this is all some weird conspiracy or propaganda, which doesn't seem likely).
[0]: https://web.archive.org/web/20050825035929/http://www.usni.o...
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#18Irrelevant to the content of the article, but worth pointing out that this project is funded by the proceeds of crimes committed at Drexel Burnham in the 80s. Michael Milken and his brother Lowell undoubtedly do good through their philanthrophy, but the cynic in me suspects that it is primarily an attempt to rehabilate their image and is treated as a business expense. Maybe it doesn't matter if you do good for the wr…
> Maybe it doesn't matter if you do good for the wrong reasons though. There was an interesting discussion around this yesterday: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32094798 (TikTok'er doing random acts of kindness for clout upset someone he used for his videos)
[deleted]
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#19A brave soldier, doing right by his country, which was led into fighting villagers half way around the world in incredibly tough scenarios by asshole politicians.
The Vietnam war (or the American war as I was corrected in a bar in Hanoi) was the epitome of unintended escalation. One of the early escalators was JFK, who was simultaneously extremely wary of escalation, and is not someone who most people think of as an asshole politician. Your point has some heft but it's a simplistic take.
As a history nerd I’ve read a ton of books on the Vietnam war and pretty much this.
There is a great book on LBJ’s decision to escalate - I can’t remember the title, but it’s 300 pages long and only covers a few months in ‘65 when the decision to escalate was made.
People like to think the decision was made in a vacuum but it was influenced by everything going on at the time and geopolitical risk going forward.
LBJ made a decision (there were members of the inner circle who wanted to pull out) based on what he knew at the time. It turned out to be the wrong one.
Re: The Incredibly Stupid One
#20Irrelevant to the content of the article, but worth pointing out that this project is funded by the proceeds of crimes committed at Drexel Burnham in the 80s. Michael Milken and his brother Lowell undoubtedly do good through their philanthrophy, but the cynic in me suspects that it is primarily an attempt to rehabilate their image and is treated as a business expense. Maybe it doesn't matter if you do good for the wr…
I'm not religious, but a particular legend has stuck with me:
> A philanthropist once came to Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi to complain that he felt he was giving charity without sincerity. “Without sincerity? Nonsense!” replied the Rebbe. “There is plenty of sincerity. Perhaps you are not sincere in giving charity, but the poor are very sincere in receiving your charity. Even if you don't mean it, they do!”
[source](https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/1885183/jewis...)