I wonder who’ll be next week’s Prime Minister?
Politics and Current Affairs
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Have you ever noticed how there’s always just enough Democrats who vote with Republicans to either get their agenda through or to block anything too progressive from passing? Like in Biden’s term Chuck Manchin and Kristen Sinema voted no on a massive variety of bills, and now Schumer and a handful of Senators vote for the budget?
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Have you ever noticed how there’s always just enough Democrats who vote with Republicans to either get their agenda through or to block anything too progressive from passing? Like in Biden’s term Chuck Manchin and Kristen Sinema voted no on a massive variety of bills, and now Schumer and a handful of Senators vote for the budget?
Are you suggesting that there is collusion between the two Parties to maintain a status quo and screw the general public while providing the illusion of two separate positions and agendas? Because that would be….I mean….how could they get away with….hmmm.
Never mind.
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I mean, I didn’t use the word collusion…
I seem to remember or someone posting a graphic/meme showing a line with fascism on one end and socialism on the other and showing where the current political parties are now (Democrats were basically center right), or something to that effect.
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This one?
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Yeah, this should work out:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-admin-threatens-to-shut-down-social-security-over-doge-ruling/
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People are now being denied entry into the US and turned around at the border because they’ve privately criticised Trump.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/mar/19/trump-musk-french-scientist-detained
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Yep. Conclusion: Don’t travel to the US at all.
Meanwhile Reeves is invoking Truss as justification for cuts! It’s desperate stuff. Anyone else have Labour immolating itself this quickly on their 2025 bingo card?
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Yep. Conclusion: Don’t travel to the US at all.
Certainly rather that than not insult the rapist in chief.
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Yeah, this should work out:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-admin-threatens-to-shut-down-social-security-over-doge-ruling/
That will really sit well with a lot of his constituency.
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I’ll post the link, it’s a video story.
I think this is whatTrump says US ‘subsidizes’ its ’51st state,’ Canada – Fox News
So, when you’ve got a Fox News interviewer giving you those eyes and trying to get you off ‘crazy street’, well, you’re off on a tangent.
I know it’s just ‘Trump being Trump’ but come on.Has anyone thought to check Trump’s past (current?) drug use?
Cocaine Psychosis?
I admit someone more educated on the subject should make that call, but he is past the point of ‘just being an asshole’Look, I’ll meet lots of arguments half-way on Canadian subjects.
Same bullshit is here on things about money, real estate, a ton of shit.
We do need to fix a lot before we point at U.S. faults.We can argue (respectfully) and call each other out, but when it comes down to it we go shoulder to shoulder, build each other up, and face world challenges as friends and allies. Right?
Right?Well, it really feels like that’s gone.
And while I do support standing up the bullying, the retaliation hurts ourselves, and the American people, many of which are good.
It’s a no-win situation, but rolling over is not an option.Nearby there’s Point Roberts (a pene-enclave of Washington State, they would have to travel 25 KM’s through Canada).
They need our daily business. Same for the border towns, like Blaine, Wash.
Also Alaska. Putting a fee on trucks delivering goods harms those that live there.
Honestly any of those places have only been nice to me, made me feel welcome, and appreciate our business.
Sickens me we have to get down and dirty with tactics.But this 51st State bullshit talk has got to go.
Never believed he was serious, except he won’t let it go.
Still think there’s something else at play, but he’s also a nutjob.Ive spoken to many amd the quotes of “maybe the next attempt won’t miss” are more common.
But be careful what you wish for. Making a martyr and then advancing Vance could be end of the world bad.Let him burn out in his own stupidity and be a horrible memory.
Release the ‘pee-pee’ tapes!
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Bernie Sanders, AOC, Tim Walz and some other Democrats seem to be actually meeting the moment. I saw a few holding Town Hall meetings in Red areas.
I remain unconvinced that appeaking to Republican voters instead of going after disaffected ones is the right way to go, but the latter requires a lot more work and at least there are people out there fighting instead of capitulating like fucking Schumer.
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The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans
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Jesus, what a shitshow.
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Big Orange wanted to lock Hillary up for her e-mail account; I wonder what he thinks should happen to Hegseth?
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Promotion?
Wait, there’s nowhere left to promote him to, is there? Bugger.
Raise?
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School / mass shootings at a daily rate? Thoughts and prayers.
Tesla cars getting vandalised and set on fire? Deploy a full taskforce and death penalties on the perps!
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School / mass shootings at a daily rate? Thoughts and prayers.
Tesla cars getting vandalised and set on fire? Deploy a full taskforce and death penalties on the perps!
The US isn’t always as overt about valuing property over people, but here we are.
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Trump’s Aggression Sours Europe on US Cloud Giants
There are early signs that some European companies and governments are souring on their use of American cloud services provided by the three so-called hyperscalers. Between them, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure, and Amazon Web Services (AWS) host vast swathes of the internet and keep thousands of businesses running. However, some organizations appear to be reconsidering their use of these companies’ cloud services—including servers, storage, and databases—citing uncertainties around privacy and data access fears under the Trump administration.
“There’s a huge appetite in Europe to de-risk or decouple the over-dependence on US tech companies, because there is a concern that they could be weaponized against European interests,” says Marietje Schaake, a nonresident fellow at Stanford’s Cyber Policy Center and a former, decade-long member of the European Parliament.So there’s a limit to how much I can openly say about this, but I know people involved with UK government infrastructure and even before all this with Trump 2, I asked why we kept renting American cloud services rather than building/using our own, and that surely it’s a security risk. Not even from the stuff posited here, of the Trump administration strong-arming access to US tech firms’ data, but just from N.E. Megacorp suddenly deciding that they can get away with vastly hiking up the cost of cloud storage for vital systems etc because they’ve got the government over a barrel. The answer, to the degree I got one, was that it essentially comes down to cost and convenience. But I wonder if that’s being reassessed lately.
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Yeah. Chances are Heathrow could have been better prepared, but at a higher cost, thus rejected. Then it all happens for real….
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The Post reports today that the IRS’ internal projections estimate that the DOGE-driven disruptions to the IRS since the inauguration are on track to have reduced tax receipts by more than $500 billion by April 15th. This, to be clear, is not a final tally. It’s not April 15th yet. It’s a projection based on historical data, the number of people who’ve filed, paid owed amounts of tax, etc. It’s worth taking a moment to put this number into some context in case half a trillion dollars doesn’t do it for you. Non-defense discretionary spending is the cost to fund the U.S. government once you take out mandatory spending (mostly Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid) and the cost of the U.S. military. For 2023 that number was $917 billion. So that’s most of the stuff we think of as the government, apart from those payment programs and the military. In other words, in about eight weeks DOGE managed to lose the U.S. government — more or less light on fire — more than half of what goes to all non-defense discretionary spending.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/irs-predicts-doge-lost-half-a-trillion-dollars-for-the-usa
This is absolutely hilarious.
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Big Orange wanted to lock Hillary up for her e-mail account; I wonder what he thinks should happen to Hegseth?
Well this is coming from someone who calls vandalism to Tesla dealerships domestic terrorism but Jan 6th…
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It’s make or break time in Turkey.
In a way, it’s encouraging that Erdoghan had to go to the length of actually arresting his rival; apparently he still isn’t able to manipulate elections to the extent he would need to in order to be sure he’s holding on to power. On the other hand, well he has arrested him and if he gets away with it, that’s probably it for what’s left of democracy in Turkey. On the other hand, it doesn’t look like he necessarily will get away with it, with the protest ongoing and building steam.
Orhan Pamuk in the Guardian:
I’ve never seen such clampdowns in Istanbul. Turkey’s democracy is fighting for its life
Orhan PamukThe jailing of President Erdoğan’s main political rival is the low point of a decade-long march towards autocracy – but the protesters aren’t done yet either
Since the arrest earlier this month of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s main political rival, Istanbul mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, on what are clearly trumped-up charges of corruption and terrorism, Taksim Square, the city’s biggest tourist site and hub of political protest, has been lying empty, cordoned off by police. In my 50 years living in Istanbul, I have not seen as many so-called security measures on the streets as I have over the past few days.
Taksim’s metro station and many of the city’s other busiest stations have been closed. The regional government has restricted car and intercity bus access to Istanbul. The police are checking incoming vehicles, and anyone suspected of travelling to the city to protest is turned away. Here and all over the country, televisions are permanently switched on so people can follow the latest distressing political developments. For the past week, the Istanbul governor’s office has banned public protests and political demonstrations – rights enshrined in the constitution. Yet spontaneous unauthorised protests and clashes with the police have continued unabated, even though internet access has been restricted in an attempt to prevent gatherings. The police use teargas ruthlessly and have arrested countless people.
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İmamoğlu has won more votes than Erdoğan’s own party, the Justice and Development party, in Istanbul’s last three mayoral elections. When İmamoğlu defeated the party’s candidate in the April 2019 election, Erdoğan had the result annulled, citing technical irregularities. The elections were repeated two months later. İmamoğlu won again. Even more, he increased his margin. At the next round of local elections in 2024, after five years in office, İmamoğlu once again defeated Erdoğan’s party candidate and was elected mayor of Istanbul for the third time. İmamoğlu’s electoral track record and his growing popularity have made him the main opposition candidate who could successfully challenge Erdoğan at the next presidential election.
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This is not a surprise for anybody who’s following Turkish politics closely. For the past decade, Turkey hasn’t been a real democracy – merely an electoral democracy, one where you can vote for your preferred candidate but have no freedom of speech or thought. Indeed, the Turkish state has strived to coerce its people into uniformity. Nobody is even talking about the many journalists and civil servants who have been arbitrarily jailed over the past few days, either in an attempt to add heft and credibility to the corruption charges against İmamoğlu or on the assumption that no one will pay attention with everything else going on.
Now, with the arrest of the country’s most popular politician – the candidate who would have won a majority of votes at the next round of national elections – even this limited form of democracy is coming to an end. This is unacceptable and distressing, and that’s why more and more people are joining the latest protests. For the time being, no one can foresee what will happen next.2 users thanked author for this post.
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There has been news about the US wanting to get Greenland:
This pic gives a breakdown of the minerals and natural resources:
So he really wants “colonize” it. Like part of his offer to Zelenskyy.
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Fucking hell, there’s no reasoning with some Putin asskissers. They really see Ukraine as the aggressor and Russia as the poor victim. Incredible.
(I know I’ve been a bit critical of some things Ukraine and the West did, but I always recognized Putin was the aggressor here. At least since 2014)
On another note, fuck Wilders and the way he generalizes all Muslims. I’m critical of some Muslim groups and I think there is a problem with intolerance against groups like LGBT people in some parts of the Muslim community, but I’ll protect Muslims against his shit.
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With all the crap politics going on, this is good:
Marine Le Pen, found guilty of embezzeling EU funds and banned from running for public office for five years. Which torpedoes – or better, exocets – her presidential ambitions for 2027.
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This seems like good news, but I’m also concerned that it could add fuel to the National Rally movement. It’ll inevitably be spun as a politically-motivated attack, Trump-style, which could rally her supporters.
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Yeah, but that would have happened anyway as it’s a cult.
Edit – And quatre years in Le Slammer.
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This seems like good news, but I’m also concerned that it could add fuel to the National Rally movement. It’ll inevitably be spun as a politically-motivated attack, Trump-style, which could rally her supporters.
Yeah, that’s a real danger.
On the other hand, she embezzled money (for her party) and she’s going to jail*, which is both how it’s supposed to work and kinda fucking awesome.
*not really, but kinda.
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With Vance telling the people of Greenland (Greenlandians?) how much better they’d have it as US citizens, here’s a fun little comparison from a pretty good Guardian article on the whole visit (that makes very clear just how incredibly dumb this all is):
So consider. The US is 24th in the world in the happiness rankings. Not bad. But Denmark is No 2 (after Finland). On a scale of 1 to 100, Freedom House ranks Denmark 97 and the US 84 on freedom – and the US will drop a great deal this year. An American is about 10 times more likely to be incarcerated than a Dane. Danes have access to universal and essentially free healthcare; Americans spend a huge amount of money to be sick more often and to be treated worse when they are. Danes on average live four years longer than Americans. In Denmark, university education is free; the average balance owed by the tens of millions of Americans who hold student debt in the US is about $40,000. Danish parents share a year of paid parental leave. In the US, one parent might get 12 weeks of unpaid leave. Denmark has children’s story writer Hans Christian Andersen. The US has children’s story writer JD Vance. American children are about twice as likely as Danish children to die before the age of five.
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Yeah, Timothy Snyder’s always a good read.
Apparently he recently gave Marjorie Greene a rather sharp and very public history lesson too.
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Interesting, given that Vance at first called 47 “America’s Hitler”. Then he flipped over like that Stepford wife movie and fell in line. The same with Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham and on and on.
About Greenland, Bernie had this message:
I always got Bernie’s politics along the socialist side of “free this, free that, more afforable…”. He wanted to take some of the European policies as a template in the US. Means well, but the US and culture is not Europe, and his message might have been accepted if he was younger. I heard of some of these policies before and they work with smaller populations, but it’s a shame that none of this is even tried and implemented on a small scale like a US state. Hell, as it is now, most of the US don’t even like the Dem stimulus plans and national healthcare plans that would have made them better off.
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Interesting, given that Vance at first called 47 “America’s Hitler”. Then he flipped over like that Stepford wife movie and fell in line. The same with Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham and on and on.
Typical of disingenuous sycophants.
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Marie Le Conte on the Le Pen conviction (paywalled). https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk/marie-le-conte-stop-worrying-about-a-le-pen-backlash/
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I love that the two busiest threads in the Loveland Arms are “Politics and Current Affairs” and “Funny pictures…”, especially since sometimes both threads seem the same.
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I always got Bernie’s politics along the socialist side of “free this, free that, more afforable…”. He wanted to take some of the European policies as a template in the US. Means well, but the US and culture is not Europe, and his message might have been accepted if he was younger. I heard of some of these policies before and they work with smaller populations, but it’s a shame that none of this is even tried and implemented on a small scale like a US state. Hell, as it is now, most of the US don’t even like the Dem stimulus plans and national healthcare plans that would have made them better off.
Well, I think you could say that in some ways the New Deal was a template for the kind of policies that some European countries have now, and have developed further.
And I don’t know about Bernie being younger. I think there’s an argument to be made that Bernie would’ve beat Trump in 2016 (and in 2024) and the problem isn’t with the general electorate, but rather with the fucking wimp-ass Democrats.
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So Booker’s 25 not-a-filibuster-filibuster: what was the point? I mean don’t get me wrong, impressive he did it for 25 hours or whatever, but it wasn’t actually filibustering anything and as soon as he was done the Senate went right back to business (unanimous consent for a Trump nominee).
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On the bright side of things, the republicans lost the Wisconsin supreme court election musk was trying to buy, and if anything hits interference send to have boosted the democrat vote
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Well, I think you could say that in some ways the New Deal was a template for the kind of policies that some European countries have now, and have developed further. And I don’t know about Bernie being younger. I think there’s an argument to be made that Bernie would’ve beat Trump in 2016 (and in 2024) and the problem isn’t with the general electorate, but rather with the fucking wimp-ass Democrats.
FDR: The original socialist. Wouldn’t that be something if it came to America’s attention that European programs were patterned after FDR’s New Deal.🤣
I saw this the other day:
That explains why Bernie had younger voters at the time, especially the college relief parts, and healthcare.
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The judge said he wasn’t opining on the merits of the case, but that courts can’t force prosecutors to move forward. Still, he expressed qualms about the government’s move, saying “there are many reasons to be troubled” by its reasoning.
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“Everything here smacks of a bargain: dismissal of the indictment in exchange for immigration policy concessions,” Ho wrote. He said he found it “disturbing” that public officials might get special treatment from prosecutors by complying with policy goals.
So basically he’s saying, this should go to trial but this corruption case can’t be prosecuted because, uh, there’s been corruption preventing that.
Sounds like a broken system.
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I noticed online some of the people especially f the libertarian type who were pro-Trump actually realize now that he might be terrible for the economy, but they’re saying “Let it collapse! It will be good!” That’s some mega level of copium, where you start saying the collapse will bring positive benefits. Optimal delusion.
Come to think of it, this is also what Bezmenov warned about. Hating your own system so much, that you applaud its collapse and takeover by another ideology or another country, even to the extent that you start working for its collapse.
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Okay, fuck this asshole:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/jd-vance-tells-paycheck-to-paycheck-americans-to-suck-up-tariffs-pain/1 user thanked author for this post.
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Interesting, given that Vance at first called 47 “America’s Hitler”. Then he flipped over like that Stepford wife movie and fell in line. The same with Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham and on and on.
Typical of disingenuous sycophants.
I can remember the GOP candidates debate in 2016 with 47 at the time. Cruz called him a narcissist, pathological liar, and so did Lindsey Graham and a host of others. There is online footage of all of them in the 2016 GOP debate talking about how ridiculous his tariff ideas were. But then somewhere along the line, they just looked so compromised and conceded to him as if he was their lord and savior. Just like Vance. Seeing the 180 stance from them all is so creepy.
Now this Saturday will be this huge nationwide “Hands Off” protest…
I miss that day when it was confirmed that Georgia went to Biden and it was a nationwide party in the streets.
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Arjan’s post (that was accidentally in the funny pictures thread):
It’s interesting that the US stays staunchly behind Israel, bombing Yemen and threatening Iran, even as it is moving away from Europe. I think in the Trump era it is very much about personal sympathies and connections.
Personal sympathies, and he’s also looking towards other authoritarians. It’s the axis of (would-be-)dictators, basically. He has declared human rights, liberal values and empathy in general as the enemy and is supporting anybody who reprents his favourite thing, which is grinding the poor’s faces into the dirt with a heavy boot. Basically, fascists will always find each other*.
*Well, except for Hitler and Stalin, I guess.
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Holy cow, the guy just doesn’t understand basic economics. He totally doesn’t get what terms of trade are and that a trade deficit isn’t in and of itself a bad thing.
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If Europe is distancing itself from Trump’s America, maybe we can also be more critical of Israel. My own givernment is way too friendly towards them.
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Holy cow, the guy just doesn’t understand basic economics.
That guy understands nothing. Except for how to manipulate crowds and bully people. He’s pretty good at that.
With Trump v 2.0 I’m not quite sure. They seem to be stepping out of that routine, scaling back their presence in Europe, whereas on the other hand you could say they just want to get a tighter grip on Europe – Musk has been promoting the AfD and palling around with Farage for instance, and it seems like now they are also supporting Le Pen. Although they may just be doing what Putin wants them to. Christian said Trump is just looking around for other authoritarian leaders to befriend. That could be true.
Well, there’s also a re-alignment based on the rejection of liberal values. Trump has decided that “wokeness” is the enemy, which makes Putin – and other authoriatarians and fascists – an ally.
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Kamala Harris gave a speech at a women summit in California. She had a theme that courage is contagious, and regarding the current administration, she didn’t want to say it but she did: “I told you so” and there was a small laugh in the audience
Then later on Waltz chimed in and called her out on that saying Dems should take responsibility and take action instead of pointing fingers.
Perhaps both should be done. Some voters who ended up screwing themselves need to be given back their shame. But that is already being done on social media. Walz is right that the Dems need to regroup and work out a strategy. But they should have done that YEARS ago during Obama’s terms on succeeding him.
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I saw an interview with him back in the late 80s when all you heard about him was his new casinos, new hi-rise in Manhattan, and gossip about his wives. In the interview, he talked about other countries like in the Middle East that he felt were living too lavishly in luxury and they depended on US involvement there. He was saying they should pay the US more. So back then, he had in mind an international “shakedown/protection money” arrangement, like its a schoolyard or what organized crime did with neighborhood businesses.
Anyone who studies business and economics can tell you that additional costs to provide a product will be passed in one way or another to the consumer. They won’t take on the cost but will pass it on. And to expect factories and manufacturing jobs to come back to the country…
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Eh woke is stupid,
Agree to disagree on that.
it’s not the biggest enemy, that’s Putinism
The point being, Putin – just like Trump and other right-wing extremists – are using people’s fear of “woke”* to push for fascism.
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Eh woke is stupid
What is woke?
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Eh woke is stupid,
Agree to disagree on that.
it’s not the biggest enemy, that’s Putinism
The point being, Putin – just like Trump and other right-wing extremists – are using people’s fear of “woke”* to push for fascism.
And here’s the thing: The use of the term Woke the way they do is a shibboleth, it’s just replaced SJW and PC and a pile of other buzzwords, and just like each of those prior buzzwords it’s a real term with specific meanings that gets trampled over in favour of their arguments. As soon as you accept their framing of the term you’ve ceded the idological battle because you’re not arging they’re full of shit, you’re arguing that woke as they define it is a thing but it’s good, actually.
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All “woke” really boils down to is: Don’t be an arsehole to people.
But lots of people want to be that, but only when it’s one-way and the target doesn’t fight back. Then they’re the first to decry the lack of civility and manners.
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No Ben, treating trans people with dignity is tantamount to rounding up people who need to wear glasses and shooting them.
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Of course “woke” is different things to different people, but what I call woke is basically I think a sort of rotting of the liberal system.
All woke really means though is calling out racism, sexism and other forms of bullying minorities. People mostly hate that because they want to bully minorities.
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The left has always been the Popular Front of Judea fighting the Judean People’s Army, Lorcan’s got the scars to prove it.
None of that is reason to decide want to be an arsehole and get away with it. Or decide that it’s all the fault of the immigrants, or those that claim benefits, or the other spectres the right-wing like to invoke.
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Honestly if you really believe that, that that is all woke is, you’re just very naive, but I am starting to think many here are just disingenuous and arguing in bad faith.
I will start by reminding you that in all our discussions, I have never been anything but polite and respectful towards you, Arjan. I would ask you to do the same.
And where the matter is concerned, I think we just have a very different view of the world. In pretty much all cases of people raging against “woke”, what I found out it actually was was either fake news (and a completely false representation of the actual facts) or exactly what I just described it as. I am sure there are also examples of crazy people; there always are. But that’s almost never the case from what I can see.
Come on, present an example for the insanity you see as woke and let’s look at it together. Go ahead.
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I think I’m pretty much with Christian here – I think that usually what the whole “woke” argument boils down to is how each person is defining the word personally.
I think that the more negative definition comes down to a sense of either cynicism or mindlessness/lack of thoughtfulness in paying superficial lipservice to supposedly progressive ideas, rather than actually doing something that embodies those ideas in a sincere or meaningful way.
I think we all get frustrated with that sometimes. None of us is against diversity in and of itself, none of us is against other lifestyles or races or religions or anything like that really. But when these ideas are hijacked and used insincerely, cynically, superficially or – especially – as a crutch in place of genuine progress and equality, that’s when the notion of “woke” ideas doesn’t ring true.
But the more positive interpretation – of “woke” simply meaning socially aware and progressive, embodying ideas of equality and acceptance – is pretty hard to argue against, and I think that’s what people mean when they say they are in favour of “woke” ideas.
As someone said once about the phrase “political correctness”, if you replace the word “woke” in conversations with the phrase “treating people with dignity and respect”, then it becomes pretty clear that you’re on the wrong side of the argument if you’re against it.
(And somewhere in the middle, I guess, are those people who think that “woke” means progress going “too far” – in the “political correctness gone mad” mould, which usually ends up coming back to some personal issue or grievance with progressive thought in some specific area.)
Anyway, I think the arguments over “woke” tend to come when one person is using the word to mean one thing and one person is using it to mean another.
I think it’s quite helpful in those discussions to remove the word “woke” entirely and actually talk about the substance of what is being discussed, rather than reduce it to an ambiguous and easily-misinterpreted buzzword.
What aspect or interpretation of “woke” do you think is stupid, Arjan?
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Here’s an example of “regulation gone mad”:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2d5xez419o
Except, when you read it, and remember how hard cricket balls are, and how much speed they can acquire, Sport England might have a point here.
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None of us is against diversity in and of itself, none of us is against other lifestyles or races or religions or anything like that really.
I agree with pretty much everything in your post, but I don’t agree with this part – well, depending on who you mean by “us”. I think the current rise of the right shows just how many people are against diversity in and of itself. The AfD very much represents a “völkisch” idea of Germany and they have a quarter of the votes, and there are many people who aren’t only afraid of immigration but reject the notion of queerness, and even more who reject the notion of trans. They just want all of it to go away and to go back to what Germany was like, uh, in the fifties I guess. After the nazis, but before the guest workers.
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None of us is against diversity in and of itself, none of us is against other lifestyles or races or religions or anything like that really.
I agree with pretty much everything in your post, but I don’t agree with this part – well, depending on who you mean by “us”. I think the current rise of the right shows just how many people are against diversity in and of itself. The AfD very much represents a “völkisch” idea of Germany and they have a quarter of the votes, and there are many people who aren’t only afraid of immigration but reject the notion of queerness, and even more who reject the notion of trans. They just want all of it to go away and to go back to what Germany was like, uh, in the fifties I guess. After the nazis, but before the guest workers.
Oh yes, I meant “us” as in us here on this forum. The world still has a load of shitheads in it, unfortunately.
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Yeah, it’s a telling indicator of how bad things that we have to be explicit that nazis are bad and no-one is going to disagree about that. But it has to be said.
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FOX NEWS still has a load of shitheads in it, unfortunately.
Fixed that for you, Dave.
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Mass murder, rape and human trafficking are not to be dismissed as bad things. How is this not deliberately minimising one side’s crimes to form a moral equivalency.
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For instance you had a while back in Canada the revelation that bad things were done in Catholic schools to native peoples, and now some lefties are cheering when churches get burnt down
Who specifically has cheered which church being burned down?
Maybe the term is a bit unfortunate, since woke is also used by certain right wingers to point to anything that is slightly left wing.
That’s kind of my point. On the one side you have like a few thousand people on twitter who, yes, sometimes fall into a mob mentality and hound someone who doesn’t deserve it. Sure, that’s happened. But on the other side you have a right-wing media machinery – FOX news in the US, newspapers and tabloids like the Bildzeitung in Germany – who rile up the conservatives with fake news about whatever “woke madness” it is this week, trans athletes or whatever, and you have bloody millions of people foaming at the mouth. Leading to a continual rise in right-wing criminal violence. All because people get riled up about trans athletes.
And make no mistake, trans athletes or – in Germany – using gender inclusive language is what people get violently angry about. That, and people telling them that maybe it’s not a great idea to make jokes about disabled people or minorities, and that maybe “negro”* isn’t a word that should be used anymore. That’s the woke that people hate, and it is very, very clear that they do.
*I realise that there is a discussion about reproducing this language at all, even if used as a quote and in a critical context (and to discern it from the other n-word). That still doesn’t make a lot of sense to me, sorry, I’m not quite as woke as that, I’m afraid.
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Who specifically has cheered which church being burned down?
To be fair, a quick google shows there does indeed seem to have been some instances where a church has burned down and people have literally cheered about it. In Santiago. Five years ago. When the churches were set on fire as a reaction to the covering up of sexual abuse by Chilean priests.
And there was a spate of arson attacks among other valdalism incidents involving churches of various Christian denominations in Canada when they started finding the mass graves under residential homes four years ago. And nobody cheered but the attacks were tacitly defended by some pundits.
So you know, who’s to say if the left is good or bad.
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Yeah. I can understand that as a Christian you feel attacked when you see people cheering for churches being burned down, even if it’s happening in the context of crimes of said church. What I’m wondering is where Arjan saw people cheering for it because right now, it’s the only example he’s given for the insane woke mob and looking for it, I’m finding it hard to find examples of people (presumably online) cheering. So it’s not quite the kind of specific example I was looking for.
Whereas I would find it very easy to give examples for actually insane reactions to so-called wokeism in the right-wing, or even mainstream, media.
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Yeah, it’s likely that at best some isolated instances are being blown out of proportion somewhere. I prefer not to link to YouTube vidoes in general but here’s a good example of how a minor complaint can be blown out of all proportion by people who have an axe to grind. Shaun’s done a good few videos like this, generally about manafactured controversies in gaming:
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It won’t be tariffs they retaliate with…
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The wrong man was rounded up for deportation to the El Salvador center, and still the US government is not making an effort to get him back
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About the woke stuff, in the end it’s not such a big deal I guess. Yes there are some very shitty people on the left, but I still think good politics is left wing.
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Yes there are some very shitty people on the left, but I still think good politics is left wing.
Yeah, and I mean, nobody knows better how exhausting people on the left can be than the other people on the left. Like Lorcan posted in the pic thread:
But it’s usually going over the top from a place of wanting to make the world a better place. Whereas right-wing politics is mostly about me, me, me in the first place. (Even in those countries where there is supposedly a big Christian influence on conservative parties, which is why e.g. the German conservative CDU has been clashing with our churches over the issue of migration.)
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The ongoing furore around Labour’s disability cuts has highlighted the ability of left of centre people to be arrogant arseholes, while the right behave to type. But online arseholery is pretty much a plague unto itself and one social has an interest in spreading, in the worst ways, with the worst material.
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The wrong man was rounded up for deportation to the El Salvador center, and still the US government is not making an effort to get him back
This case is very disturbing. Those Salvadorian prisons are terrible. I think you could describe them as concentration camps.
Also, it is ominous of course that Trump is defying the courts. Very very bad.
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Yes there are some very shitty people on the left, but I still think good politics is left wing.
Yeah, and I mean, nobody knows better how exhausting people on the left can be than the other people on the left. Like Lorcan posted in the pic thread:
But it’s usually going over the top from a place of wanting to make the world a better place. Whereas right-wing politics is mostly about me, me, me in the first place. (Even in those countries where there is supposedly a big Christian influence on conservative parties, which is why e.g. the German conservative CDU has been clashing with our churches over the issue of migration.)
I believe the CDU in Germany is quite a bit worse than the CDA (Christen-Democratisch Appèl) in the Netherlands, at least under Merz. I kinda like the CDA in certain respects.
We also have a party called Christen Unie in the Netherlands. They’re obviously Christian, but more from a left wing angle. Lots of emphasis on helping people, social welfare etc. but with some traditional twist.
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The wrong man was rounded up for deportation to the El Salvador center, and still the US government is not making an effort to get him back
This case is very disturbing. Those Salvadorian prisons are terrible. I think you could describe them as concentration camps.
Also, it is ominous of course that Trump is defying the courts. Very very bad.
Yeah, it is… but who gave Trump the blank cheque to do so? The US Supreme Court.
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The wrong man was rounded up for deportation to the El Salvador center, and still the US government is not making an effort to get him back
This case is very disturbing. Those Salvadorian prisons are terrible. I think you could describe them as concentration camps.
Also, it is ominous of course that Trump is defying the courts. Very very bad.
Yeah, it is… but who gave Trump the blank cheque to do so? The US Supreme Court.
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And… Guess what the SC would look like now had the Dems won in 2016? Guess some of the things that would not have been overturned?As for El Salvador, there are pictures online of the El Salvador penitentiary. Not indecent but … Any objections on me posting just two?
Almost like a gulag. If innocent citizens can be rounded up and deported like that with no due process at all. And it is going to court that natural born citizens can “disappear” too. Historical parallels are being made and none of it pleasing. Don’t want to know how it’s going to end.
The Senator traveled there and El Salvador would not let him see Garcia at first, but there is a picture of the two at a table.
This case will be crucial. It challenges constitutional law. If the regime gets away with this deportation…
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Now the regime wants to shakedown Harvard…
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