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Radish posted:This is why the Democrats trying to help rebrand Bush are really distressing. If they (Michelle Obama, Biden, etc) are willing to pal around and say George Bush is good despite the awful damage he did how are we supposed to address these institutional problems accurately or trust that Trump and his cohorts will be held accountable? I should have included this in my post about McKay's comment, but Vice is a real good film that explains a lot of how Cheney got into power, but also how we got here. And it's got terrific moments like the movie "ending" half way through between the end of the H.W. Bush administration and the run-up to W. Bush's campaign and, after being told that there's no Shakespearean dialogue about Cheney choosing to sign on as VP, it gives us just that
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Dec 27, 2018 17:31
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Raenir Salazar posted:Why isn't it a law to make it illegal to evict (or cut off utilities) a federal employee or contractor for lack of rent during a shutdown? That feels like a stopgap solution. Because we live in a country that absolutely despises its workers.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:31
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Ate My Balls Redux posted:okay but who cares, he's a war criminal He is! which is independent of if he's real nice or super mean! And you shouldn't confuse the two things. Don't fall for the idea that if someone is super personable that means they are good and if someone is rude that means they are bad. AOC is hopefully going to be very very rude lots of times but seems good, bush is a big old aw shucks teddy bear who hasn't yelled at anyone in 50 years and also murdered people indiscriminately.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:32
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:wait, you don't think trump calls ben carson the n-word? He absolutely definitely does that. I shouldn't be surprised that you don't know how interpersonal racism works, but here we go, here's my attempt at explaining that you got this all hosed up. Racists don't think the black people they know personally are bad. Those are the good ones. That's how they justify hating all the people they don't know. Ben Carson isn't like those other black people, is what Trump tells himself. Hell, it's what Ben Carson tells himself; it's how racism can get past the cognitive dissonance of "Black people are lazy!" vs. "But I have a successful black person working for me". It's why white racists absofuckinglutely loved Chris Rock's Black People vs. N****** bit. So no, I'm gonna bet Trump doesn't call Ben Carson slurs, definitely not to his face, and probably not even behind his back. He's a pretty basic rear end bitch, and that's how basic rear end racism works
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Dec 27, 2018 17:32
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Mineaiki posted:I think people mix up "nice" and "charming." There are things even Trump does that I find oddly charming. That is not the same as him being nice, good, or even acceptable. "nice" is such a grey, listless descriptor, that I think everyone might have their own definition. It's ambiguity is only confusing stuff in this argument. Fuckin' semantics.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:34
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:He is! which is independent of if he's real nice or super mean! And you shouldn't confuse the two things. Don't fall for the idea that if someone is super personable that means they are good and if someone is rude that means they are bad. AOC is hopefully going to be very very rude lots of times but seems good, bush is a big old aw shucks teddy bear who hasn't yelled at anyone in 50 years and also murdered people indiscriminately. Seriously, how do you not get that "ordering the deaths of hundreds of thousands" is in fact "super mean"? Or mocking a woman pleading for a stay of execution? What is even going on in your brain man.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:35
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selec posted:So no, I'm gonna bet Trump doesn't call Ben Carson slurs, definitely not to his face, and probably not even behind his bac ????
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Dec 27, 2018 17:35
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I take back my weak spirited defense of McCaskill the day after election night. Even though Hawley is no doubt going to be poo poo and it means I probably won't have a senator even worth calling for the next 4 years. Good god. Talk about learning all the wrong lessons.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:36
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Young Freud posted:The U.S. military already does, largely due to integration with NATO forces, such as the klick for kilometer. As well, yard is somewhat analogous to meter under distances less than a kilometer that you can almost use it as a replacement (3 feet versus 3 and a third feet). For extra fun consider that the army uses miliradians to measure bearings, except instead of the actual 6283 miliradians in a circle it's approximated to 6400. If you're directing airstrikes obviously you use bearings in conventional degrees because that's what planes (including army ones) use. Come to think about it I have no idea what measurement to use for naval gunfire support direction, I assume mils but think ships steer in degrees. The Russians use a different number of miliradians in a circle and also possibly the Swedes from what I remember.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:37
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No one cares if Bush was/is nice, why are you even bothering having this argument. Bush is going to have a glowing hagiography when he dies. If they could do it for the man responsible for raping nuns and the man responsible for unleashing a plague on our own citizens, they'll do it for that bastard too. Michelle Obama sharing candy with him isn't going to be what pushed him over the line.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:37
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Raenir Salazar posted:Why isn't it a law to make it illegal to evict (or cut off utilities) a federal employee or contractor for lack of rent during a shutdown? That feels like a stopgap solution. Because in our loving hellscape of a country private companies, landlords, and corporations have extra rights where they are treated as double citizens, and telling any buisiness what they can and cannot do is anti-Randian and "you hate freedom" Our country has terminal brainworms, and the diagnosis is 
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Dec 27, 2018 17:38
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You see, he smiles a lot and you might enjoy a beer with him so he's ~*nice*~ this is a very important distinction from when he bombs civilians and invades countries under false pretenses. Furthermore
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Dec 27, 2018 17:38
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Ate My Balls Redux posted:You see, he smiles a lot and you might enjoy a beer with him so he's ~*nice*~ this is a very important distinction from when he bombs civilians and invades countries under false pretenses. Furthermore Nice. 
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Dec 27, 2018 17:39
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I doubt anyone would argue that the USA armed forces aren't incredibly effective in the field, but I feel that they're strategically bankrupt and haven't had an effective long-term plan since before Vietnam. Every war they've been involved in since Vietnam has basically been "go here and kill everything you see", which is a strategy that only works if you're up against an opponent dumb enough to take you on directly. That kind of fighting is terrible against insurgency conflicts because the enemies don't run away in one direction, they scatter and then start shooting you from every direction, and then move back into the region after you leave.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:40
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Arcsquad12 posted:I doubt anyone would argue that the USA armed forces aren't incredibly effective in the field, but I feel that they're strategically bankrupt and haven't had an effective long-term plan since before Vietnam. Every war they've been involved in since Vietnam has basically been "go here and kill everything you see", which is a strategy that only works if you're up against an opponent dumb enough to take you on directly. That kind of fighting is terrible against insurgency conflicts because the enemies don't run away in one direction, they scatter and then start shooting you from every direction, and then move back into the region after you leave. When you realize that the CIA and DOD upper echelons are largely welfare for affluent folks, it makes a lot more sense.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:41
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KickerOfMice posted:Nice. Why yes, I did in fact just pleasantly murder thousands of civilians, thank you
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Dec 27, 2018 17:44
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Arcsquad12 posted:I doubt anyone would argue that the USA armed forces aren't incredibly effective in the field, but I feel that they're strategically bankrupt and haven't had an effective long-term plan since before Vietnam. Every war they've been involved in since Vietnam has basically been "go here and kill everything you see", which is a strategy that only works if you're up against an opponent dumb enough to take you on directly. That kind of fighting is terrible against insurgency conflicts because the enemies don't run away in one direction, they scatter and then start shooting you from every direction, and then move back into the region after you leave. Someone from goons in platoons will probably correct me, or one of you history buffs: I thought the real might of the USA warmachine sprang from WWII, and was tuned to fighting an extended ground war, by form. I mean, I don't "gotta hand it to " anyone, but an insurgent army that hides itself among the populace is a fairly effective counter right? Why meet your enemy upfront on the battlefield if you know they can crush you nearly instantly?
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Dec 27, 2018 17:45
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Shifty Pony posted:The reason physics equations with imperial units has such a bad reputation is that the people who want to use imperial units are invariably engineers, and engineers have a horrific habit of plugging in numbers right away before simplifying things down. They end up with paper that looks like a calculator vomited on it while the physicist next to them will keep a clean equation up until the final step, leading to snide comments about how inferior imperial units are. Natural units are cheating
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Dec 27, 2018 17:45
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KickerOfMice posted:Someone from goons in platoons will probably correct me, or one of you history buffs: I thought the real might of the USA warmachine sprang from WWII, and was tuned to fighting an extended ground war, by form. I mean, I don't "gotta hand it to " anyone, but an insurgent army that hides itself among the populace is a fairly effective counter right? Why meet your enemy upfront on the battlefield if you know they can crush you nearly instantly? Guerilla warfare is a time-tested strategy to win against an overwhelming force, or at the very least, make them reconsider the cost of their involvement.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:47
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CommieGIR posted:When you realize that the CIA and DOD upper echelons are largely welfare for affluent folks, it makes a lot more sense. And that the military itself is just a demand-generating machine for certain industrialists.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:48
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Arcsquad12 posted:I doubt anyone would argue that the USA armed forces aren't incredibly effective in the field, but I feel that they're strategically bankrupt and haven't had an effective long-term plan since before Vietnam. Every war they've been involved in since Vietnam has basically been "go here and kill everything you see", which is a strategy that only works if you're up against an opponent dumb enough to take you on directly. That kind of fighting is terrible against insurgency conflicts because the enemies don't run away in one direction, they scatter and then start shooting you from every direction, and then move back into the region after you leave. The thing is, no one has a solution to that problem that I've seen that isn't literally "kill every last one of them so you know you got them all", and that poo poo wasn't working back in like the spanish-american war either. Check out history, turns out no one has been good at fighting insurgency conflicts and we still haven't figured out a way to do so. Not saying that we shouldn't be trying to do a better job, just that it isn't in any way a new problem.
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Dec 27, 2018 17:48
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Yeah, so there are cell phone records putting Michael Cohen outside Prague around the time of the purported meeting with Russians, as the Dossier has long claimed. At least according to Rawstory. https://www.rawstory.com/2018/12/cell-phone-signal-suggests-michael-cohen-prague-2016-trump-dossier-claimed/#.XCUBvWUwozQ.twitter Also here's the story from McClatchy: https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/investigations/article219016820.html
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Dec 27, 2018 17:49
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sexpig by night posted:I also had this dumb baby thought so you're not alone. When I heard like five of them died in poo poo like crashes I was all 'so there's just one dude left?' He was so heartbroken he left the special ops life to live by himself in a cabin in the forest. A new SEAL Team 6 was created but they came across a new dastardly villain too powerful for them and went to bring get the last original member of SEAL Team 6 back. And although he swore he would never return he couldn't turn his back on his country. They became... SEAL Team 7! Young Freud posted:I should have included this in my post about McKay's comment, but Vice is a real good film that explains a lot of how Cheney got into power, but also how we got here. And it's got terrific moments like the movie "ending" half way through between the end of the H.W. Bush administration and the run-up to W. Bush's campaign and, after being told that there's no Shakespearean dialogue about Cheney choosing to sign on as VP, it gives us just that I'm somewhat interested in the movie but I spent 8 years living with those assholes in the WH and I don't know if it'd be a pleasant 2 hours of my life to return to them. Especially if Cheney is portrayed as a cartoon or "misunderstood". Which I don't know if it does, but the trailer didn't look super promising. 1glitch0 fucked around with this message at 18:04 on Dec 27, 2018 |
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Dec 27, 2018 17:59
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ZypherIM posted:Not saying that we shouldn't be trying to do a better job, just that it isn't in any way a new problem.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:05
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https://twitter.com/MollyJongFast/status/1078320943724822528
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Dec 27, 2018 18:07
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Ate My Balls Redux posted:You see, he smiles a lot and you might enjoy a beer with him so he's ~*nice*~ this is a very important distinction from when he bombs civilians and invades countries under false pretenses. Furthermore It is an important distinction and you should be more careful to realize it's not like a cartoon where everyone bad is gonna be personally mean to you and everyone good is gonna be personally nice to you. Bush being friendly to the obamas is exactly the image he's always had. As opposed to trump where just calls people names and yells at people and stuff. Both things are things that exist and modes under which people can operate.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:08
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KickerOfMice posted:Someone from goons in platoons will probably correct me, or one of you history buffs: I thought the real might of the USA warmachine sprang from WWII, and was tuned to fighting an extended ground war, by form. I mean, I don't "gotta hand it to " anyone, but an insurgent army that hides itself among the populace is a fairly effective counter right? Why meet your enemy upfront on the battlefield if you know they can crush you nearly instantly? While I hardy ever post in GIP, there's this thing called asymmetric warfare doctrine that we use a lot. The theory is that it takes something like 10 regular line Soldiers to effectively counter the threat posed by one guerilla combatant. It breaks down to a game of sheer numbers and effective rolls, basically. This is not my critique of either effectiveness of our forces or the moral standards used or any of the huge amount of issues that come with The Forever Wars, this is just me explaining what I can from what I was taught about the doctrine: Couple this with our overriding moral requirement to protect non-combatant populations (as ridiculous as that seems with the various war crimes from the past 2 decades), preserve the functioning of the local governments, and keep life as regular for the people not in the fight as possible to various degrees, they combatants have a tremendous advantage. They flatly don't care who they kill or what they destroy as long as it takes out the invaders. We give a gently caress about the locals. That's their edge. E:Let me add that it is my firm belief that we are an Imperial power. Actual definitions aside this is my personal feeling.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:08
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president huge
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Dec 27, 2018 18:09
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KickerOfMice posted:Someone from goons in platoons will probably correct me, or one of you history buffs: I thought the real might of the USA warmachine sprang from WWII, and was tuned to fighting an extended ground war, by form. I mean, I don't "gotta hand it to " anyone, but an insurgent army that hides itself among the populace is a fairly effective counter right? Why meet your enemy upfront on the battlefield if you know they can crush you nearly instantly? pretty much. the big problem with vietnam(outside the obvious, we shouldn't have been there and didn't understand the nature of the conflict/etc) was that we had no strategy for it outside vague defensive strategy and moving towns around and vague hearts and minds while propping up a lovely government that didnt give a poo poo about most of the people. also the NVA and Viet cong used guerrilla tactics which is effective against big armies/empires/etc but also even effective when empire bounds it self in strategies like not taking and holding areas and the only strategy being "well if we kill enough of them they will stop coming".
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Dec 27, 2018 18:11
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How long until he tries the dictator outfit of fake uniform and fake medals?
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Dec 27, 2018 18:12
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ZypherIM posted:The thing is, no one has a solution to that problem that I've seen that isn't literally "kill every last one of them so you know you got them all", and that poo poo wasn't working back in like the spanish-american war either. Check out history, turns out no one has been good at fighting insurgency conflicts and we still haven't figured out a way to do so. Also the military (properly!) don't get to decide what wars they fight in, and are rarely given a free hand in terms of strategy either. Aside from the vast stupidity of even getting into Iraq in the first place, the Bush administration also made a huge number of strategic blunders, often against the advice of their generals. The book Cobra II spells it out in rage-inducing detail, but the tl,dr is that however much you hate the Bush administration, you are probably underestimating in your head how assholishly incompetent it was in every conceivable way. People poo poo on Carter for how dumb Operation Eagle Claw/Desert One was, but lol Bush and his cronies (especially Rumsfeld) were just so much worse at everything, constantly, down to even trying to micromanage Army logistics and breaking them in the process. Rumsfeld thought he was loving George Marshall while being stupider than George Custer. sean10mm fucked around with this message at 18:17 on Dec 27, 2018 |
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Dec 27, 2018 18:14
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ZypherIM posted:The thing is, no one has a solution to that problem that I've seen that isn't literally "kill every last one of them so you know you got them all", and that poo poo wasn't working back in like the spanish-american war either. Check out history, turns out no one has been good at fighting insurgency conflicts and we still haven't figured out a way to do so. Which, I mean... imagine the US doing that with ISIS, or Russia doing that with Chechnya.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:15
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:It is an important distinction and you should be more careful to realize it's not like a cartoon where everyone bad is gonna be personally mean to you and everyone good is gonna be personally nice to you. Bush being friendly to the obamas is exactly the image he's always had. As opposed to trump where just calls people names and yells at people and stuff. Both things are things that exist and modes under which people can operate. The "furthermore" was a joke, in retrospect it was irresponsible of me to ask you to continue
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Dec 27, 2018 18:15
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https://twitter.com/bmaz/status/1078320147843051520?s=21 Is this BS? I thought it wasn't supposed to affect them? (Think that's MSNBC)
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Dec 27, 2018 18:16
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Tibalt posted:Which, I mean... imagine the US doing that with ISIS, or Russia doing that with Chechnya. Russia actually did do that with Chechnya; that's why Kadyrov has had such a solid hold on power there. That said, it took 'em a LONG-rear end time to do it.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:18
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https://twitter.com/CNN/status/1078338745349353474
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Dec 27, 2018 18:18
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sean10mm posted:Also the military (properly!) don't get to decide what wars they fight in, and are rarely given a free hand in terms of strategy either. Aside from the vast stupidity of even getting into Iraq in the first place, the Bush administration also made a huge number of strategic blunders, often against the advice of their generals. The book Cobra II spells it out in rage-inducing detail, but the tl,dr is that however much you hate the Bush administration, you are probably underestimating in your head how assholishly incompetent it was in every conceivable way. People poo poo on Carter for how dumb Operation Eagle Claw/Desert One was, but lol Bush and his cronies (especially Rumsfeld) were just so much worse at everything, constantly, down to even trying to micromanage Army logistics and breaking them in the process. yeah, the dollop did a big episode on the iraq war/occupation talked about how it could have worked well enough but Bush put moron after moron in charge and their big idea was staffing the US diplomats with liberty U interns and having a loving former gynocologist/ free market rear end in a top hat try to remake the economy.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:18
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Rinkles posted:https://twitter.com/bmaz/status/1078320147843051520?s=21 The special counsel continues, as it is appropriated separately, but DoJ in general goes on pause. That includes civil suits and investigations into Trump and his properties that are outside Mueller’s office.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:18
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Tibalt posted:I mean... the Irish Problem. The solution is to work with the terrorist and political groups to reach as equitable solution as possible for everyone, get some buy in from the faction leaders, and hope those leaders win the inevitable internal power struggles. Well we kind of did that, expect that we often picked faction leaders not based on how good they'd be for the region or long-term stability or benefit to that country, but what we could get out of them. For fucks sake we're the people who put Saddam into power in the first place. When your policy is basically driven by corporations to feast on vulnerable countries there really isn't a way for the military to win a conflict like that, or even get it to acceptable ending truce.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:19
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Teddybear posted:The special counsel continues, as it is appropriated separately, but DoJ in general goes on pause. That includes civil suits and investigations into Trump and his properties that are outside Mueller’s office. Trump's only leverage.
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Dec 27, 2018 18:20
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