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US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

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421–430 of 453 posts

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you go that route Nebraska will lag ever more behind other states given they don't get to have any political power. Look, I'm just someone from the other side of the pond. This is what happens: when you have no substantial representation for the country side your political system rewards centralisation, rural areas will stagnate, leading to less people there. A cycle that fuels itself. As someone that has had to l…

With all due respect, being "from the other side of the pond", I don't think you understand the U.S. well enough to be commenting. For example, California is both the largest producer of food in the U.S., and the state being most significantly under-represented in all three branches of government. The U.S. is also, easily, the most volatile (extreme partisanship) country of comparable rich, democratic nations. The sy…

I fear you misunderstood me.

I am but stating the dark side of equal voting power when you elect representatives per "region" dictated by the population they have. It is meant to be a warning, something to bear in mind when you do attempt to change the system you have.

I am not arguing in favour of what you have right now, hence the middle ground point at the end.

Regardless, my understanding of the US is not important. What is important in my comment is my understanding of what you don't do, and potential footguns.

A good middle ground would be to still have it entirely dictated by population (I understand this seems contradictory but hang on). But, in order to prevent votes from low population regions from being useless, your system uses "preferential voting". Most other countries do not do this, hence my previous comment. The key here is that at a national level, politicians still need to value less populated regions, because at least a percentage of their votes came from someone who voted in an order that still got them a seat (even though they weren't the top pick). Given rural regions have less seats to vote for, this vote would likely come from someone from the country side.

This solution however is only important when you do have more than 2 parties. If you don't do this, having more than 2 parties would be moot in these regions, because they need to vote strategically if they want representation. And 90% of the time that means your vote is limited to only one of the top 2 parties (as perceived by national polls before voting day). This is yet another dark side of the system my country does have, it incentivizes the status quo to prevail, even when your current leaders are a bunch of corrupt fellas.

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue it is working. The democratically elected congress just agrees with what he is doing. Whether they agree due to genuine belief or fear of him calling them out, doesn't really matter. We should be electing people that have a spine, if we don't then that is still democracy working. Checks and balances are there. Many people just don't like the choices they are making

Say a prosecutor is elected and literally never prosecutes crimes. Any crime. Ever. Despite laws on the books stating they are, in some cases that have in-fact come up, required to. But this prosecutor keeps getting re-elected, and nobody enforces the laws about their having to bring certain cases. Both of the following may be true: 1) The prosecutor is doing what a plurality of voters want. 2) The office of prosecut…

This is actually a good thought experiment. In your example, democracy is actually fully working. The people though are voting to override the law (essentially something akin to jury nullification on a massive scale) and the prosecutor is breaking the system. So what is the solution?

Optimal solution is a check and balance where a higher level prosecutor, perhaps a federal or state level steps in and takes charge. Another optimal is courts rule that the prosecutor has to do their job.

But lets say that neither of these happen and there is no way to impeach the prosecutor.

You have a couple of scenarios.

1. Uprising. The people rise up and kill the prosecutor.

2. Dictatorship. A higher power even though they don't have the legal authority steps in and removes the prosecutor.

Now the real question is was this a good result? Democracy failed but you got rapists and murderers off the street.

I think we are very far away from this with Trump, he is still following the checks and balances, those checks and balances are just either

A: refusing to act or

B: acting in a way that some people don't like but I would add that many people do indeed like.

So I guess you could add civil war to the potential outcome as a portion of the population does not like the existing checks and balances and the results of the democratic election.

Now what is interesting is your scenario actually explains partially the rise of MAGA and Trump. For them, the law lead to open borders, what they saw as the promotion of LGBTQ amongst children (drag queen reading hour, etc) and DEI (discrimination against themselves and their children). All things they perceive as a grave threat to the future of the nation. So if they have to vote for someone that works outside the law in order to preserve their desired future they are willing to do so. They are willing to flirt with the dictator option if it means putting off what they view as a cataclysm.

I am not sure which is the best solution in your prosecutor scenario, what are your thoughts?

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#423

Lots of people seem to think Trump is some sort of king or going outside the law. Fact is he was democratically elected and working within the system of checks and balances established by our founders. Congress can stop him from doing things but the democratically elected congress allows him to continue. So they agree with his actions and are doing their job. Checked and balanced. The courts can stop him and indeed h…

You are mostly correct in my opinion. The fundamental problem is, there is really no "free market" of countries. A US citizen who hates what the country has become cannot go off and set up a new one, they have a choice of a few styles of government (and it is very expensive to go and try living under another government!) Perhaps a benefit of space exploration will be experimentation with style of government. My only…

I think you have hit on the fundamental reason for the rise of Trump and MAGA. There is no where else to go. I am going to try and present this in a way that is politically neutral but still captures the reason. I will probably fail.

For a large subset of those voters, the wide open borders, promotion of LGBTQ (particularly TQ) and DEI represented the end of the current state of the country. As you stated, there is no "free market" of countries. If the US fundamentally changes then for those people and their view of life, its over.

This has led to the massive backlash on immigration, ICE, rejection of DEI and push back on transgender promotion / acceptance.

For them, this is the end of all things and that is why they are so motivated and also so willing to overlook the obvious moral failures / grift of Trump and his manner of working. They care about preserving their way of life and if the cost is some grey legal situations and open grift then so be it. Trump is the hard man willing to do the socially distasteful things that they believe are necessary.

This particular post is not supposed to be an endorsement of those views whatever my particular opinion is but only a way to explain how we got here and the determination of Trump voters to see it through to the end.

When faced with the devil you know or what you view as the end of all things, you support the devil you know.

For the people reading this I am not trying to attack any particular people or ideology. Just presenting why people that you may disagree with act and vote in a certain way.

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They absolutely ARE NOT allowed to just say “I’m not enforcing this because I disagree with the law.” Prosecutors are allowed to do that and do so all the time: https://www.aei.org/articles/viewpoint-on-not-enforcing-the-... (“Indeed, the ability of prosecutors to pick and choose among offenses is part of the constitutional structure of our government, as the Supreme Court has held too many times to recount. Presid…

Did you read the article you posted? The entire thing is about allocation of finite resources. You can read the original Antitrust enforcement policy and see that it lays out a system of prioritization which (surprise surprise), prioritizes larger monopolization efforts over smaller ones. It does not say "we don't think small companies can behave monopolistically so we aren't enforcing the law on them." President Jef…

> President Jefferson did not come out and say he's not enforcing ASA because he disagreed with them. Instead, he (secretly) wrote a memo against them as VP, then as President let them expire and pardoned everyone convicted under them.

He didn’t enforce the ASA because he disagreed with it, just like Jimmy Carter didn’t prosecute people for selective service violations because he disagreed with it. It wasn’t because the resources weren’t available to enforce those laws.

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Trump truly has no vision for anything we do on the world stage It confuses me how anyone could look at what's happening in the world and see a lack of a plan. Trump administration seems to actually be unusually focused on foreign policy in this term and using geopolitical statecraft to upend the arrangements that were not working in favor of the US. The tariffs to force countries to choose US or China, putting the…

He's got a very comprehensive plan and he knows exactly what he's doing. He's also consolidated his base so he has people who are as committed as he is to carrying out his vision. He's doing everything he said he would do successfully. All his opponents are desperate for him to fail but that simply is not happening, i wonder why? This website runs opposite to his vision of MAGA, it's basically make america criminals,…

> He's doing everything he said he would do successfully.

He said he would not touch the existing Whitehouse when building his new gilded $300m ballroom. I could go on and on and on...

The dude thinks like a toddler. Unfortunately a large part of this country also thinks this way.

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you mitigate when 2/3rd of voters support, at least tacitly, the lawlessness?

The next time someone says "the other guy's not much better!" I am going to strangle and choke them.

Same. No leader will be perfect. We always have to pick between the lesser of two evils. Trump is at level 10. And people were like Oh but Kamala has faults too.

MAGA have screwed the country and themselves. Farmers who voted for Trump are realizing this now. The rest will find out soon when the shit hits the fan in a big way.

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read the article you posted? The entire thing is about allocation of finite resources. You can read the original Antitrust enforcement policy and see that it lays out a system of prioritization which (surprise surprise), prioritizes larger monopolization efforts over smaller ones. It does not say "we don't think small companies can behave monopolistically so we aren't enforcing the law on them." President Jef…

> President Jefferson did not come out and say he's not enforcing ASA because he disagreed with them. Instead, he (secretly) wrote a memo against them as VP, then as President let them expire and pardoned everyone convicted under them. He didn’t enforce the ASA because he disagreed with it, just like Jimmy Carter didn’t prosecute people for selective service violations because he disagreed with it. It wasn’t because…

You actually can’t know what their motivations were — which is the point.

For example, if Congress had appropriated funds specifically for doing those things, the executive would be obligated to do them, because it’d be unambiguous as to whether resources existed to do them.

This is again an absolutely unambiguous consequence of Congress’s Constitutional control of spending and of the Take Care Clause.

What you are describing is effectively a line-item veto, which doesn’t exist in the US.

So far all the evidence you’ve posted is actually evidence of my argument, not yours.

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We love to blame the common clay, don't we. You can win a majority of voters and lose an election. There are systemic problems, starting with money in politics, two senators per state, the electoral college and gerrymandering.

We already bastardized the senate by electing senators by popular vote. Senators are supposed to represent each states government, not the people of the state. As a single member of the union a state doesn't need more senators. Making ingredients the proportional to population just makes the senate another house. The people have the house. The cap of representatives has also been harmful to the voice of the people be…

Well, yes, the senate is useless. It was useful to check the South’s power in the Great Conpromise, but now the most deliberative body is not needed when the House can slow things down all by itself. Unicameral works for me.

Representatives would be more representative if not for gerrymandering.

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As another someone from the outside looking in, the difference is in the reporting in the old media. Biden had the support of the media and his lawfare and misdeeds were glossed over. One example was the Hunter Biden laptop. Nord Stream pipeline sabotage was another. Trump's shenanigans are just getting more attention. But to be fair, his shenanigans are dialled up to 11 while Biden was at a more modest 8.

We're talking specifically about lawfare - so no idea why you're talking about the Nord Stream pipeline? These banal observations about 'both sides' are so shallow. Name Biden's lawfare. What exactly did he abuse the Justice Department to do?

You might be talking about lawfare, I'm pointing out how your media carries water for one side covering up petty vendettas against Trump by the Biden regime, all the way to suppressing blatant acts of terrorism against an ally - sorry vassal state - Germany.

Read something other than NYT.

Re: US axes website for reporting human rights abuses by US-armed foreign forces

#430

> Tim Rieser, former senior aide to Senator Leahy who wrote the 2011 amendment mandating information gathering, told the BBC the gateway's removal meant the State Department was "clearly ignoring the law". We're in a really bad place... with a servile congress, it turns out there aren't really any laws constraining the executive branch. When everything relies on "independent IGs" for law enforcement inside executive…

Your comment reflects a common, but fundamentally mistaken, understanding of the constitution. You're thinking of the government like an operating system with a microkernel that is trusted to neutrally enforce the "law," with the three branches of government running in userspace. That's not the system the founders created! They understood that everyone is political, and no one can be trusted. The founders understood…

Turns out that separation of powers was incorrect. Each branch needs its own enforcement arm and our plan of having the Executive carry out the law instead of just enforcing the law was a bad idea.
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