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Didn't we just read how this same country prevents other countries from enjoying these societal achievements?. What exactly are we praising here?.
A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
41–50 of 260 posts
Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even in democratic countries you have a milder version of this: the most successful politicians are usually those that can get the backing of the political class. Acting against the interests of the political class means you're without the bureaucratic apparatus that would have allowed you to make meaningful and lasting change. There really does seem to be an "optimal amount of corruption" in absolutely any sufficien…
That there is optimal corruption, in a static system, makes sense to me. Changing the system for the better (I.e. start requiring US Supreme Court justices to actually avoid conflicts of interest, or forbid coordinated out of state money for state’s senate races) could incrementally reduce the corruption stable point. — What strikes me as a missed opportunity, is that democracies haven’t institutionalized a response…
What would that look like?
Citizen assemblies (juries)? Sortition? Modest, obvious reforms like passing For The People Act (HB1)?
(I'm very interested in the idea that there might be an optimum level of corruption. Counter intuitive and makes me uncomfortable; so it's probably meritorious.)
Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
> People get silenced in the US every day because they have a different opinions on current events, for example the US proxy war with Russia. Uh, sorry what? It was Russia that decided to invade a sovereign country for annexation. Not the other way around. And of course everyone is free to disagree with your take. You are not being "silenced" or "canceled", you are being told your opinion is completely contrary to fa…
More propaganda, listen to the other side... oh well it's banned everywhere.
Can you please provide some examples of “the other side” that have been banned? I’m not in the US, but a country tightly aligned with the US, and I am able to access rt.com just fine.
Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#44[flagged]
This is propaganda and you don't even know it... People get silenced in the US every day because they have a different opinions on current events, for example the US proxy war with Russia. I always noticed when certain amount of decades pass it's okay to say certain things, like "Allende was assassinated by the CIA", but back then you'd get persecuted to even mention that. Yes, when it doesn't matter you can say what…
> for example the US proxy war with Russia.
Yeah, as a Ukrainian, this triggers me well, good job.
I think that it is good that you feel being silenced.
The world in which a person who have absolutely zero idea what he is talking about will feel cheered, is a very scary to me. Until then, there is hope.
Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
Here you are tacitly expressing your opinion about “the proxy war”. Hope you don’t get persecuted too hard.
That's what it is, but okay, I'll probably get banned here for saying that anyways :), the free world woo!
No, you're more likely to simply be downvoted into grey, as the aggregate of HN is not a conspiracist crackpot.
Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
> People get silenced in the US every day because they have a different opinions on current events, for example the US proxy war with Russia. Uh, sorry what? It was Russia that decided to invade a sovereign country for annexation. Not the other way around. And of course everyone is free to disagree with your take. You are not being "silenced" or "canceled", you are being told your opinion is completely contrary to fa…
Both things can be true. Yes, Russia is 100% responsible for this war, and yes, the US (and others) are fighting a proxy war through Ukraine in good old cold war style.
Are the allies of Ukraine supposed to look away at the first time since the OG 1933-45 Nazis that someone tries to re-draw borders and annex countries using war?!
What Russia did was a complete and utter shart on the international rule of law.
Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's my main argument when people say: "What they are doing is exactly the same what we did in Iraq/Afghanistan" etc. Yes, it might be true. The big difference: In the West you can actually go out on the street and protest against the acts of your government.
There's a lot of differences. For example, NATO doesn't force countries to join, and doesn't invade countries if they want to leave or join another alliance. See France. In fact - previous instance of russian CIS - Warsaw Pact - was unique among military alliances in the fact that it only invaded its members (Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Afghanistan). It was a prison not a military alliance. And in current CIS Russia sen…
> For example, NATO doesn't force countries to join, and doesn't invade countries if they want to leave or join another alliance. See France.
France never actually left NATO the organisation – they just withdrew from NATO's military command structure (1966), only to later rejoin it (2009). No country has ever sought to leave NATO the organisation. There is a clear procedure for doing so (Article 13), but no member has ever invoked it.
Interestingly, Article 13 actually says that prior to 1969, none of the members are allowed to leave. I doubt the US would have invaded any of them if they'd broken that clause though.
Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
> People get silenced in the US every day because they have a different opinions on current events, for example the US proxy war with Russia. Uh, sorry what? It was Russia that decided to invade a sovereign country for annexation. Not the other way around. And of course everyone is free to disagree with your take. You are not being "silenced" or "canceled", you are being told your opinion is completely contrary to fa…
Both things can be true. Yes, Russia is 100% responsible for this war, and yes, the US (and others) are fighting a proxy war through Ukraine in good old cold war style.
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Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even in democratic countries you have a milder version of this: the most successful politicians are usually those that can get the backing of the political class. Acting against the interests of the political class means you're without the bureaucratic apparatus that would have allowed you to make meaningful and lasting change. There really does seem to be an "optimal amount of corruption" in absolutely any sufficien…
That there is optimal corruption, in a static system, makes sense to me. Changing the system for the better (I.e. start requiring US Supreme Court justices to actually avoid conflicts of interest, or forbid coordinated out of state money for state’s senate races) could incrementally reduce the corruption stable point. — What strikes me as a missed opportunity, is that democracies haven’t institutionalized a response…
Corruption is a pretty fuzzy concept, and most people aren't very good to handle gray areas. I think it's an issue of there not being incentives for any successful group to keep corruption as primary topic in the Overton window, since it's equivalent to marking yourself as an outsider to the political class.
From time to time you'd have waves of populism that can be ridden, and outsiders can get in power, but those never really last.
In my Eastern-European backwards nation that's affected by endemic corruption I was actually thinking of founding at one point a suicide-party, that is basically unelectable but who's main purpose would be to bring the necessary ideas in the Overton window, so that the successful parties at least have to address them.
It's definitely not an easy problem, as most of those that actually understand social processes and can do something have mostly become wealthy and indifferent to the greater good.
Re: A novel the CIA spent a fortune to suppress
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
More propaganda, listen to the other side... oh well it's banned everywhere.
Can you please provide some examples of “the other side” that have been banned? I’m not in the US, but a country tightly aligned with the US, and I am able to access rt.com just fine.
I also don't live in the west, rather the global south, in a not so allied country.
When in Europe and in the US. You'll get something like this on twitter, and obviously you cannot access the site either:
@ActualidadRT's account has been withheld in Portugal, Finland, Sweden, Ireland, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Italy, Malta, Germany, Greece, Romania, Netherlands, Bulgaria, Austria, Luxembourg, Latvia, United Kingdom, Denmark, Lithuania, Croatia, Estonia, Cyprus, France, Spain, Belgium in response to a legal demand. https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/tweet-withhel...