421–430 of 536 posts
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He's not shutting down agencies to relinquish governmental power. He's shutting them down to strengthen his own power.
Explain how shutting down USAID due to documented fraudulent spending strengthens the president’s power. I can’t think of a single way myself, but maybe I’m overlooking something?
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Not to politicise this discussion, but the country is called 'The Republic of Ireland'. The phrase 'the Irish Republic' references the 1916 Easter proclamation, and has specific political and even colonial implications in Ireland. It's frequently used on BBC news, but never in Ireland where it would have a similar connotation to 'the free state' or other radical republican delegitimisations of the Irish state.
So, to confuse the issue, the country is officially called Ireland (it's in the constitution!), and that is the name normally used in Ireland and in Europe. The UK government officially referred to Ireland as the Republic of Ireland until 1998 (it now calls it Ireland) and as a result people in the UK often call it the Republic of Ireland. People calling it the Irish Republic usually have an agenda in doing so, yeah.…
How does one unambiguously refer to the country rather than the island without saying “republic”?
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No, that's a gross simplification, and leaves out all the violence and constant deception. This is a good primer on just how far off the pop culture understanding of the Nazis is: https://archive.org/details/TheOriginsOfTotalitarianism/ "Without subversion or trickery" is flat out wrong. And it's also wrong for the US today.
I really have no clue about history, and what you say sounds very reasonable. I guess it is true. But I think any person who wants to live in a democracy needs a bare minimum ability to detect trickery. Because there has not yet been invented a system where none of the politicians lie, and you can make good decisions based on taking them all at their word. Now, maybe the level of subversion and trickery in pre-WW2 Ge…
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It seems alarmist until you consider that Musk is a Nazi. He did the Hitler salute, live on national television. His followers tried to downplay it, but his own answer to the question "Are you a Nazi?" was "I bet you did Nazi that coming!" People joke that he went from being the Henry Ford of our generation to being the Henry Ford of our generation. I don't know whether I would say that Trump is a Nazi*, but the fact…
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Because it was the Hitler Salute. The Salute thar Hitler did. That Salute.
>If it was, why didn't he say so?
He did.
>What would be the point of doing it?
To demonstrate to other Nazis that he is also a Nazi (Virtue Signaling)
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Honestly, what would these protests do? Serious question. Let say you manage to achieve the unthinkable and bring a huge amount of people on the street, heck let say you are so successful that you also get a full on national strike going, what then? Do you think it would affect those in charge right now? He would not care. He is already ruining the US economy and alliances. Why would he care if some people he does no…
is your argument that protests do nothing, therefore people should stay home?
Or maybe something else that isn't a protest? Not sure what that would be, but protests are traditional but seem very performative and ineffectual.
Honestly, I think the real reaction should probably be re-organizing over a more reasonable and moderate form of populism.
"The Germans" is an absolutely jaw dropping read, a series of interviews with average German citizens and low-level nazi party members, conducted a decade or so after the war, by an American Jewish journalist. It shows, in first hand accounts, the banality of evil and how easily it can prevail if people do nothing. It is an account of modern tyranny and everyday collaboration. The parallels in the feeling of what's h…
Like the way that all of the Republicans in congress folded like a cheap suit and are now completely subservient to Trump - "Profiles in Cowardice" from top-to-bottom, with the exception of a few outliers who have now been ejected from the Republican party. My favorite current example is Bill Cassidy - what a total coward! I knew all of his "concerns" about RFK Jr. were a charade, and then even given his oath and knowledge as a doctor that he would eventually fold, and come out with some BS statement about how "After a really long conversation with RFK Jr. he assured me on some of my concerns blah blah blah..." And it happened like that to a T. Almost exactly like the Susan Collins/Brett Kavanaugh situation "I was shocked pikachu! I mean he assured me he wouldn't overturn Roe v. Wade!"
I'm just surprised at how it's all playing out exactly to script, and the "scripts" from previous history aren't even that old or forgotten...
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I'm curious if what is happening in the US and what has happened in Britain with Brexit actually ends up slowing some of these marches towards illiberalism in other places. Like when people are upset at the direction of a country or current policies, they may take a "throw the bums out" attitude even if the alternative is far worse. But perhaps they're looking at the complete shit show in the US and how unproductive…
In the UK, the political party (which is a actually a privately owned company) owned by the guy who drove the initial wave of Brexit is apparently topping the polls now. The only policy they talk about is getting rid of all the immigrants because that's what caused all the problems, not decades of right wing government culminating in Brexit. But underdeath that is the usual US-style Turbo capitalism stuff like destro…
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Yes. That is a common narrative from democrat leaning people. The same ones who called me a terrorist sympathesizer for not wanting to invade libya. The same ones that now think Trump/Musk are more evil than Bush who illegally invaded Iraq because that's what the narrative tells them. Forgive me if I laugh at your "full stops" and other absolutist statements. Cried wolf/nazi/evil too many times.
The article is exactly this sentiment: the experience of how how evil takes over isn’t sudden, it’s insidious and slow and happens by inches. Those around you are not crying wolf, they understand history.
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Yes. That is a common narrative from democrat leaning people. The same ones who called me a terrorist sympathesizer for not wanting to invade libya. The same ones that now think Trump/Musk are more evil than Bush who illegally invaded Iraq because that's what the narrative tells them. Forgive me if I laugh at your "full stops" and other absolutist statements. Cried wolf/nazi/evil too many times.
You’re wasting your breath. If people are going to claim democracy is being dismantled but only by republicans, then they’re a lost cause