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The war on terror primed America for autocracy

economist.com

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Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#221

Post by amanaplanacanal »

bobjordan wrote: post #34

I subscribed to the economist from ~2008 for 10+ years before I cancelled. I'm mostly a centrist but admit to leaning libertarian these days, I think both sides do not represent "democracy" anymore, I do not trust the Democrats any more than Republicans in this regard. One only has to look at how the Democrats have turned California into a single party state to stop taking serious their tropes about anyone endangerin…

How did the Democrats turn California into a single party state? By giving the voters what they want? How do you think democracy works?

Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#222

Post by pas »

graemep wrote: post #159
rhubarbtree wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, a lot of people saw this coming. It was so obvious - new powers are always abused in the end. Same for the UK. Perhaps the politicians knew that and didn’t care. Not sure how deep their cynicism / malice goes. More power to us, they said.

In the UK there is a big element of sheer incompetence. Politicians who have not experience of life outside politics are really will-equipped to understand the consequences of what they do, and defer overly to expert opinion. Of course the police or intelligence services say they need more powers, it takes judgement to balance this against other considerations.

incompetence is everpresent in large hierarchical power structures.

just as the UK the US is also full of career politicians sitting in very powerful (sub)committees

Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#223

Post by amanaplanacanal »

inigyou wrote: post #65
jazzpush2 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's actually incredible that you can share that bottom paragraph with a straight face after we just went to war with Iran. Let's discuss it openly, as you prime: how do you contrast what you just shared with the war, and Israel's actions after the agreed to ceasefire and declaration of war's end?

In the last few DAYS the republican party has started putting on an anti-israel face to set up for the midterms, with JD Vance in particular giving a speech about how we need to separate from Israel. The democrat party, in its typical useless fashion, has not. So it looks at this point like the midterms will be another republican landslide.

If you expect a Republican landslide in November I suspect you are completely out of touch.

Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#224

Post by amanaplanacanal »

inigyou wrote: post #97
jazzpush2 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if you meant to respond to me, but nothing you've said has addressed what I asked, which was very direct.

It explains why republican voters now think they're anti-israel

I'm sure some do. Can you point to any polls? The evangelical right is completely pro-israel, and they are a huge part of the MAGA base.

Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#225

Post by rayiner »

constantius wrote: post #180
rayiner wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Failure to integrate” is one way to describe the Goths sacking Rome. But I agree the barbarians did them in at the end. My point was that the Iran fiasco is more like the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, where Rome backed off after taking a beating. That didn’t mark a transition away from Empire, simply a retreat after a military loss.

Teutoburg wasn't a battle but an ambush, and Rome killed almost everyone involved in the next years. This didn't represent a retreat: Germans weren't conquered because they had nothing to conquer. Rather, hopefully, Iran will be to the US what Turks were to Byzantium.

> Rather, hopefully, Iran will be to the US what Turks were to Byzantium

The Turks conquered Byzantium (and India, etc)?

Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#226

Post by pas »

like_any_other wrote: post #210
pjc50 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN will flag you for being stupidly confrontational or promoting known conspiracy theories; you can introduce facts provided you back them up with non-insane sources.

In two of these posts, people might take issue with some of the sources. The rest should all be considered trustworthy by anyone. All flagged: Posts flagged for showing how politics has meddled in science (unfortunately one of those facts was overstated, as a commenter kindly alerted me to. Including the correction did not prevent flagging): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48578344 https://news.ycombinator.com/i…

people flag things that are obvious and boring, or that are very incendiary, technically dense, and not easily argued (and thus it's not the place and time to discuss it) topics. eg. migration politics and economics (and crime and so on)

and some of those comments are just incorrect (like the last one about Loomer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_of_German_National... )

Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#227

Post by The-Old-Hacker »

NordStreamYacht wrote: post #68

FTA: "In 1776 the American colonists rebelled against what they saw as the arbitrary and tyrannical British monarchy." I like the sly use of "what they saw" - typical British snark.

Rosa Brooks, the author of the piece, is American.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Brooks

Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#228

Post by NordStreamYacht »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #214
JuniperMesos wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's plenty of American historiography that questions the motivations of the American revolution and how tyrannical the British monarchy was actually.

I would guess that average folks living under the "tyrannical British monarchy" had as much or more freedom than Americans do now.

Probably more. The digital world has made us unwitting prisoners.

Re: The war on terror primed America for autocracy

#229

Post by rvba »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #198
rvba wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The poster above seems to promote the secession of Texas and other states - what is the next step of the russian propaganda playbook to ruin USA

Would secession ruin the USA? Hard to know. Secession from the EU has certainly been bad for the UK, but the rest of the EU seems to be doing ok.

Of course seccession would be bad for USA. Worse for Texas than the states that remained.

Note that we heard before Brexit that it would not cause problems, yet it in fact bring benefits as expected by anyone with any idea how economy works.

UK has a 6% decline of the economy due to Brexit

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvg75npqkq4o

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