201–210 of 218 posts
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Nice revisionism you got there. It wasn't Americans that discovered it. It was mostly German scientists working in the US after they fled their own more oppressive state.
People that flee their own, more oppressive state to build a better life in America are Americans. That's the whole point.
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In software terms, there has been a vulnerability in the constitution all along, it just had not been exploited until now. The three branches of government are supposed to be checks and balances against each other. But turns out two of the three don't have any actual power to enforce their mandates. This has worked as long as the three branches grudgingly respected each others role. But now that the executive branch…
The GOP has majority in the Supreme Court and in Congress. It's not like there's a conflict of power. There's no disagreement going on.
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The GOP has majority in the Supreme Court and in Congress. It's not like there's a conflict of power. There's no disagreement going on.
Indeed. Congress has tons of hard checks on executive power. (The Supreme Court, less so if it comes to enforcement and all norms are ignored) That a Republican Congress isn't checking a Republican President isn't evidence of a lack of checks and balances. And points to why the President is pushing so hard for Texas to gerrymander additional Republican seats into the House...
If an executive order can put grants under political control, they were already under political control. We just didn't know it. That is the case with so much of what is happening now. If these things are possible, the system was already broken.
You can’t make an unbreakable system, or, at least, it’s very difficult. The problem is that a big percentage of the population is ok with this, and in that case it doesn’t matter if it’s illegal or not. There is a reason why, even if allowed, governments didn’t do these kind of things: population didn’t want it.
If an executive order can put grants under political control, they were already under political control. We just didn't know it. That is the case with so much of what is happening now. If these things are possible, the system was already broken.
In software terms, there has been a vulnerability in the constitution all along, it just had not been exploited until now. The three branches of government are supposed to be checks and balances against each other. But turns out two of the three don't have any actual power to enforce their mandates. This has worked as long as the three branches grudgingly respected each others role. But now that the executive branch…
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> "...would drastically shift power." What exactly do you think will change? The administration is already ignoring the law with impunity. Unless there's a big enough swing so that impeachment and conviction is a reality, Congress will have essentially zero impact. Around 40% of the country still supports the president unconditionally . They are truly ecstatic with what's happened so far. The other 60% are being gerr…
I know it's vogue to construct a view in which depression and inaction are the only logical conclusions, but that ain't our reality. > The administration is already ignoring the law with impunity Can you provide an example where they've ignored a Supreme Court ruling? And the histrionics around this are uniquely relative to modern norms. Look up the shenanigans around Marbury v Madison https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki…
How about the case where the Supreme Court told the administration to obey a lower court's order and facilitate Kilmar Abrego Garcia's return to the US [1]? The Trump administration openly defied the Supreme Court's order for nearly 2 months (April 11 to June 6) [2][3]. Setting aside whether the "temporary" violation of a Supreme Court order has been legally resolved, the administration brought Garcia back to press (hypocritical and doubtful) human smuggling charges to justify deporting Garcia again, and a judge let Garcia stay in jail for longer otherwise necessary because the judge thought the administration would deport Garcia before he could have his trial [4].
[1] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/04/11/even-the-supreme-court-s...
[2] https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mdd.578...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deportation_of_Kilmar_Abrego_G...
[4] https://apnews.com/article/abrego-garcia-deportation-immigra...
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You're asking for sea shipping to stop working because naval piracy is going to come back. The "military industrial complex" isn't real and isn't a significant part of the economy (military spending as % US GDP has continually fallen over time), but the Navy patrolling the entire world's oceans for free has been real until now.
> You're asking for sea shipping to stop working because naval piracy is going to come back. That's a huge exaggeration. Who would commit naval piracy in the current age? Somalia, with their little boats and AK-47s? China already has a bigger fleet than the US and can easily take on the burden of securing trade routes, since they are the biggest beneficiary.
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You're asking for sea shipping to stop working because naval piracy is going to come back. The "military industrial complex" isn't real and isn't a significant part of the economy (military spending as % US GDP has continually fallen over time), but the Navy patrolling the entire world's oceans for free has been real until now.
Nonsense. I'm asking for other nations to pay for their own defense. You seem to believe, without any evidence, that if the US Navy can't patrol the oceans, then no one can. Which is such an insane position to take I can't believe you're being anything but flippant or perhaps that you work for the Navy itself. The "military industrial complex" is absolutely real. You just don't seem to realize that the MIC is into bu…
> Bought and paid for by the MIC itself.
One thing you can always use to spot low-trust conspiratorial types is they insist that all bad things are caused by "corporations" and involve money in some vague way, but then they never believe any actual specific information if it conflicts with their vague ideas of evil corporations doing things out there, vaguely.
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.GD.ZS?locat...
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> You're asking for sea shipping to stop working because naval piracy is going to come back. That's a huge exaggeration. Who would commit naval piracy in the current age? Somalia, with their little boats and AK-47s? China already has a bigger fleet than the US and can easily take on the burden of securing trade routes, since they are the biggest beneficiary.
China isn't going to secure anyone /else's/ trade routes, only theirs. They only protect their own ships in those routes too.
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China isn't going to secure anyone /else's/ trade routes, only theirs. They only protect their own ships in those routes too.
You are mistaken. If the US decided to give up its role, there would be a void, a void that anyone who filled it would gain soft power from. China would be very interested in taking the place of the US in securing global trade routes, because doing so would not only provide soft power but also signal that China had replaced the US as the world’s hegemon.
We already have piracy coming back with the Houthis; China didn't join the alliance with other countries, defended their own ships and ignored everyone else.