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Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

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Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#81

Post by jasomill »

jauntywundrkind wrote: post #14
user3939382 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They passed a bill saying in 60 days stop without further approval. Admin said days we don’t attack dont count toward the 60…

Congress voted to stop counting days to allow the tariffs to keep going without having to actually act on it! Congress overruled time passing . These people are fundamentally breakers of reality, aren't just unserious: they are anti serious. RFK and all of this is a perpetrated act to be grossly anti reality, to defy all reason. No reality supports any of what's happening, there's no reality where any of that GOP age…

“Reality has a well-known liberal bias.”

— Stephen Colbert, 2006

https://www.c-span.org/clip/white-house-event/user-clip-step...

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#82

Post by nerdsniper »

ilogik wrote: post #47
tick_tock_tick wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? The police aren't at his door and he's not been arrested it's not a good thing but we are still miles away from Europe.

Where is there a problem in Europe? I if want to go to the US on the other hand, I need to give them my social media accounts. That doesn't sound like free speech to me

Chat Control is also at the door, and almost being invited in.

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#83

Post by GJim »

amelius wrote: post #29
jimnotgym wrote: post #26

Favouriting this for the next time someone on here tells me we don't have free speech in Europe, only in the US

See if you can find the US in these rankings: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Press_Freedom_Index

More evidence, if it's needed.

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

The USA's score has taken rather a tumble since 2016 (I wonder why?).

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#84

Post by pyrale »

rswail wrote: post #52
voidfunc wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Germans owned the holocaust because they lost WW2 and afterwards became a vassal state of the Allies and later just the US. History is written by the victors.

The Germans "owned" the holocaust because the Nazis (German) started, conducted, and maintained the systematic collection, extermination, and destruction of certain classes of the population under their control. Who else should have "owned" it?

I assume the point is that what make them acknowledge and repent from what they did is that they lost the war.

Many massacres and genocides are "owner-less" and obscured by history. To give a few exemple, you might find, but the trail of tears is not as front-and-center in US' history teaching as the holocaust is in German history teaching.

You'll find similar situations for all colonial powers who didn't get dismantled and forced to accept their wrongs after losing a war. You may even go as far as to say that Germany is the outlier here.

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#85

Post by riffraff »

amelius wrote: post #29
jimnotgym wrote: post #26

Favouriting this for the next time someone on here tells me we don't have free speech in Europe, only in the US

See if you can find the US in these rankings: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Press_Freedom_Index

just a note: the RSF World Press Freedom Index is not based on hard data or sound statistics, it's based on a few questionnaires sent to journalists picked by RSF itself.

How many it's unclear, but it was ~150[0] some years ago, of which 50 in France[1] to monitor 180 countries.

It's worth as a generic "are we doing better than last year?" but I wouldn't consider ranking to be particularly meaningful.

[0] https://web.archive.org/web/20130819031406/http://en.rsf.org...

[1] https://akademie.dw.com/en/the-press-freedom-index-by-report...

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#86

Post by tdeck »

benterix wrote: post #55
tdeck wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democratic leadership are also all Zionists who not-so-secretly approved of the war, which is why they stalled the war powers vote until after he attacked. https://capitalandempire.com/p/top-democrats-try-to-stop-vot...

But if Republicans are Zionists, and Democrats are too, what hope is there for peace in the Middle East? I can understand that Israel's long-time strategy is to keep all their neighborhood in a state of permanent mess so that nobody is strong enough to be an existential threat. But after almost a century, it's clear this is not working.

The strategy is to do what the US did to native Americans.

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#87

Post by riffraff »

Terr_ wrote: post #30
system7rocks wrote: post #3

This is deeply disturbing. The terrible, incoherent messaging and strategy around the Iran war (unapproved by Congress) is connected. This is an administration that is seeking less freedom, not more. What entity would sue on behalf of the ombudsman?

> What entity would sue on behalf of the ombudsman? What entity could ? Most of the unprecedented madness of the last few years boils down to: 1. The President does something flagrantly illegal. 2. The remedy is Congress impeaching and removing the President from office. 3. Republicans legislators are completely complicit, and have enough votes that #2 doesn't even start to happen. The crimes will continue until some…

> until #47 finally succumbs to dementia

how would that look like? I mean, more than what it looks like now. The man is spouting nonsense every single day.

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#88

Post by myrmidon »

tokai wrote: post #56
benterix wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who say there is no free speech in Europe have never lived in an authoritarian country.

But its mainly Americans saying it here on HN.

I think you can turn this into a proper, nuanced position by contrasting how the US typically values protection of free speech higher than protection from libel/slander/defamation.

Just consider prominent recent examples, like the german student protester that was investigated by police and had his sign confiscated (it just said "Merz (current cancellor) suck balls"). This seems ridiculous and draconian by US standards.

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#89

Post by raisedbyninjas »

pjc50 wrote: post #69
kakacik wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One would expect that system would learn and change, and we wouldn't have trump fucking up half of global economy so beautifully on his morning whims just to get rich as a side business of being potus (or reverse, probably). Something tells me that after this dark period is over, there won't be many lessons learned and things changed for the better in the system. 'Great system' not being so great after all (which it…

> One would expect that system would learn and change The system did learn and change: they got a lot better at exploiting it. The effort to stack the Supreme Court with Republican partisans took decades.

The system also learned to stop pressuring Republicans to resign in shame. Roger Ailes was a media consultant and advisor to Nixon. Ailes vision of a TV network that pushed a pro-GOP administration message under the banner of unbiased journalism manifested in Television News Incorporated and later Fox News. He viewed television as a useful tool to reach the lazy masses who preferred not to read the news or perform their own critical thinking.

Re: Ombudsman column: The Pentagon is trying to silence me

#90

Post by giraffe_lady »

ethagnawl wrote: post #23
vrganj wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're at the point of history where your grandchildren will ask you "Where were you when...?"

This and also, "Wait, so you didn't do anything when ... ?" It gives you a new found level of empathy or, at least, understanding for the people throughout history who "should have done something". We all (well, most of us) grew up thinking that if we were a workaday German (fill in the conflict) with Jewish neighbors that we'd have obviously hidden them in our attic or whatever. It turns out the reality of taking th…

> It turns out the reality of taking that class of action is actually a lot more fraught that your 4th grade self thought it was.

It's funny my entire adult life has been me slowly realizing that no, it is not. It is easy to do what is right, it is easy to see what is right to do. Stop making excuses and do it.

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