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FlamingLiberal posted:Biden doesn't actually care about forgiving student debt and the admin clearly places a higher priority on 'the economy is perfectly fine! don't look behind you!' -type messaging over actually doing something to help his voters Haven't you heard, we're in the Biden boom! (Please don't compare the number of created jobs to the COVID death count)
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 00:57 |
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# ? Jun 8, 2024 18:49 |
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Fatuous lords will always find a reason they're going to lose and can't even fight, in fact not fighting is actually the smart and brave option! We need Liu Bei and instead we have 535 Yuan brothers. Half of them dilettante cowards and half of them hoping to just hold on until everyone else has magically died and they win by default. Look I know the Empire is collapsing but... what about my treasures and position? BTW we're at the part of the story now where we're just waiting to see what group of bandits seizes the Mandate of Heaven after the Empire collapses. Which is why I'm currently reading up on how to become a Taoist wizard. Get yourself a strip of yellow cloth and let's get ready to surprise everyone.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 01:08 |
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Mellow Seas posted:If you simply reject the premise that Democrats winning elections is better than Republicans winning elections, then no, there’s no reason for you to care. I'm only concerned with Dems winning elections as a means to an end, not as an end unto itself. If they refuse to do good things because they're worried about losing elections, then they're being entirely self-serving. I'm not going to get into the millionth rehash of the "but the Republicans are worse!!!" argument.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 01:12 |
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JonathonSpectre posted:Which is why I'm currently reading up on how to become a Taoist wizard. Get yourself a strip of yellow cloth and let's get ready to surprise everyone. One does not become a Taoist wizard, one simply ceases to believe they are not. You can also be a Pope but you have to fill out a web form. e: strictly speaking the form only creates a card acknowledging your popeishness.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 01:34 |
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JonathonSpectre posted:Fatuous lords will always find a reason they're going to lose and can't even fight, in fact not fighting is actually the smart and brave option! I guess forming China 2 isn't too bad of an outcome here
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 01:45 |
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Fister Roboto posted:I'm only concerned with Dems winning elections as a means to an end, not as an end unto itself. If they refuse to do good things because they're worried about losing elections, then they're being entirely self-serving. I'm not going to get into the millionth rehash of the "but the Republicans are worse!!!" argument. So instead we get the millionth rehash of "but the Dems are bad!!!" argument? I mean, I don't imagine more than 1 or 2 people total in this thread disagree with that. If even that.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 02:06 |
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JonathonSpectre posted:Fatuous lords will always find a reason they're going to lose and can't even fight, in fact not fighting is actually the smart and brave option! So the true winner of this tumultuous time isn't even on anybodies radar yet?
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 02:16 |
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BIG FLUFFY DOG posted:it's also correct in the spirit if not the letter as the plot of the movie is Rambo going to afghanistan to join the mujaheideen Well, he went there to rescue COL Trautman who was being held by the Soviets. The Mujahedeen assisting him was happenstance. Kinda like Rambo fighting the evil Burmese government forces in Rambo IV with the assistance of the Karen rebels. He was more interested in saving the missionaries than involving himself with Burma's internal conflict. Anyway, people should read the original novel, First Blood. Rambo hunts and kills a bunch of sheriff's deputies like he's the Predator, and Trautman is not seen as a kindly mentor in any way.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 02:34 |
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PeterCat posted:Anyway, people should read the original novel, First Blood. Rambo hunts and kills a bunch of sheriff's deputies like he's the Predator, and Trautman is not seen as a kindly mentor in any way. The original cut of First Blood had Trautman blowing Rambo's head off at Rambo's own request (Trautman was happy to do it)
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 02:42 |
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FLIPADELPHIA posted:The original cut of First Blood had Trautman blowing Rambo's head off at Rambo's own request (Trautman was happy to do it) Not happy to do it, basically Rambo commits suicide with Trautman's hand. This is used in Rambo's nightmare in Rambo IV. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jp1mdSQ4BfI
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 02:51 |
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Louisville "attempted assassination" case gets strange.quote:LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- A local activist and columnist has been arrested in connection with firing a shot directly at a Louisville mayoral candidate. Brown had a mental health breakdown last year which was the reason he went missing for 11 days and ended up turning up in New York. Look forward to see this story on Fox News non-stop for the next 2 years.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 03:09 |
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FLIPADELPHIA posted:Thank you for posting this - I've seen this a hundred times and always assumed it was legit.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 03:47 |
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kdrudy posted:So the true winner of this tumultuous time isn't even on anybodies radar yet? S'how it usually goes. Especially given involvement in current US politics destroys your credibility better than anything else.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 04:21 |
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AmiYumi posted:Aren’t both of those real? I thought they edited and then removed the message on different home releases as it became politically inconvenient. Nope.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 04:39 |
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We're now 3 years from when Trump served fast food to the Clemson University Tigers, in celebration of their victory in the N.C.A.A.'s football championship. If you don't remember why Trump served fast food, it's because the government shutdown over his refusal to sign a spending bill without $5 billion for the border wall in it. Eventually he relented and signed a bipartisan bill that did not have the funding for the border wall in it. Then he turned around and declared a Federal state of emergency on February 15, 2019 which allowed him to divert money from the DoD to his wall and and he got what he wanted anyway. On February 11, 2021 President Biden canceled the state of emergency, thereby canceling money to the wall and the funding for, among other things, the deployment of the National Guard to the border. Then quietly re-activated the Guard mission in July, 2021 with funding coming from the CARES Act under the auspices of controlling the spread of Covid. What strikes me about this is how Trump wasn't afraid to let things grind to a halt to get what he wanted, and when that didn't work, he found a way to get his main campaign promise funded anyway, while Biden seems ready to throw up his hands at the slightest resistance and declare the presidency a powerless office. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Emergency_Concerning_the_Southern_Border_of_the_United_States Now, a lot of lawsuits held up the transfer of funding from the DoD, and Trump didn't get nearly as much wall built as he wanted, but he went for it just the same.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 08:45 |
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Seriously, I want to take this picture back to like September of 1980 and run it on national television just saying "This is image is from 40 years in the future. This is what electing Ronald Reagan leads to. Good luck, America." and see what happens.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 09:03 |
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nine-gear crow posted:Seriously, I want to take this picture back to like September of 1980 and run it on national television just saying "This is image is from 40 years in the future. This is what electing Ronald Reagan leads to. Good luck, America." and see what happens. Reagan would win in even more of a landslide, likely.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 09:08 |
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:What? Seriously? The US Consumer Safety Commission has a fandom in the furry community and has publicly acknowledged it? They've been doing this for years and it rules pretty hard. When I had my kid, I followed them on twitter because of hot tips like the tv tipping thing and weird possum giving advice on the safest ways for infants to sleep. They do - occasionally - make serious tweets, which can be pretty jarring. I once saw them go from "Here's the predator photoshopped behind a guy who left his kid in the pool" to "Here's an incredibly serious video of a recalled, unsafe treadmill just sucking a toddler up under it as he screams. BTW there have been multiple deaths, please send your treadmill back."
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 09:28 |
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nine-gear crow posted:Seriously, I want to take this picture back to like September of 1980 and run it on national television just saying "This is image is from 40 years in the future. This is what electing Ronald Reagan leads to. Good luck, America." and see what happens. Cronenberg's work didn't convince them, and that would? Pshhht
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 10:09 |
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FlamingLiberal posted:Biden doesn't actually care about forgiving student debt and the admin clearly places a higher priority on 'the economy is perfectly fine! don't look behind you!' -type messaging over actually doing something to help his voters Oh he cares. He cares about NOT doing it.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 14:28 |
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Congress is considering a gas tax holiday for the rest of the year after reports that oil prices are likely to continue to rise throughout the year. It would reduce gas prices by 18 cents per gallon. This would further drain the Highway Trust fund and is probably bad policy in that we should be incentivizing not using gas instead of an implicit assumption that government will try to keep gas cheap for consumers. https://twitter.com/TonyRomm/status/1493556947878129671 The Democratic establishment has cut Conor Lamb loose in PA. But, he still has a base of support in western PA and a new Super PAC that he will try to use to catch up to Fetterman in fundraising. His strategy is to "vet" Fetterman by highlighting the jogger incident and other personal controversies that haven't been aired yet that he believes will show he is less electable. https://twitter.com/politico/status/1493568282460405762 quote:The left neutralizes the Dem establishment in Pa. Senate primary
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 15:05 |
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On the Republican side in PA, it is still technically anyone's game. But, Dr. Oz has a nearly 2 to 1 lead over the next closest candidate. https://twitter.com/RobertCahaly/status/1493329723904114688
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 15:16 |
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Mellow Seas posted:- Biden would be accused of not supporting the military, which is the most popular institution in the country. Some people would find that persuasive. And you don't think this is a perception easily countered by pointing out that, you know, we're not in a war in Afghanistan anymore?
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 15:24 |
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Dr Oz figured out the Trump Cheat Code- just be a TV personality and you can win a GOP primary no problem
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 15:50 |
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FlamingLiberal posted:Dr Oz figured out the Trump Cheat Code- just be a TV personality and you can win a GOP primary no problem Do you think it's only GOP primaries? I honestly don't know.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 15:52 |
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I'm not really sure what people are arguing about with the military budget anymore. Other than some abstract concept that the President doesn't decide the budget. Biden didn't want to cut the military budget, he didn't want to increase it 3.22%, and he didn't care enough about that extra 3% that congress appropriated to make a huge deal about it. There isn't a mystery there. Sort of related, but the one thing that nobody seems to talk about when discussing cutting the military budget is that the U.S. has a very large standing army and that is very expensive. All new procurements are only about 1/7th of the military budget, so if you cancelled every truck, clothing, missile, contract, and computer order and never ordered anything new, then you would cut the defense budget by about 1/7th. Salary and direct benefits are just under half the military budget. When you add in healthcare, administration, pension funding, and civilian DoD costs, then you get up to about 54%. Maintenance for real estate and equipment is the next biggest chunk at ~20%. The only way to meaningfully reduce our military spending is to drawdown our standing army, recruit fewer people, and enforce early retirements for non-commissioned members. Once you have the overall standing army count down, then you can get further decreases by reducing the maintenance and real estate spending since you have fewer troops to resupply and need fewer bases. Everybody fights to the death to protect their local bases, though. Some towns have bases for no real reason and they are basically what the entire town's economy is centered around. One of the good things Bill Clinton (and to a smaller degree, George H.W. Bush) did was drawdown the size of the military by 15% and had plans for further force reduction. But, that only lasted about 6 years until George W. Bush was elected and he reversed it, then 9/11 happened and he not only reversed it, but undid all the previous force reduction and expanded the number of active-duty troops even higher than it had been in the 80's. Nobody really wants to balance/cut the military budget by making the army smaller and forcing retirement/phaseouts for non-commissioned officers, though. Even Bernie Sanders, who had the most aggressive defense spending reduction plan, only barely touched them by just saying they would recruit fewer replacements over 10 years. Leon Trotsky 2012 fucked around with this message at 15:59 on Feb 15, 2022 |
# ? Feb 15, 2022 15:57 |
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I don’t think he wins the general
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 15:57 |
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FlamingLiberal posted:Dr Oz figured out the Trump Cheat Code- just be a TV personality and you can win a GOP primary no problem Maybe that'll be the re-entry method for Al Franken, given his recent foray into testing the me-too waters to see if they're any warmer than they were when he resigned.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 15:57 |
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FlamingLiberal posted:I don’t think he wins the general Absolutely agree on the general; dude's a lightweight even in politics these days.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:01 |
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:I'm not really sure what people are arguing about with the military budget anymore. Other than some abstract concept that the President doesn't decide the budget. Imma stop you right there. Can people just express discontent without having to make a broader point? What would you, specifically, Leon, like to see out of posters like myself decrying the ludicrous amounts of money that get thrown at the MIC (with regard to Ukraine, most specificall the "I" part of that, since we're not going to war, just warming another country to wage theirs in the hopes we'll get a killer deal on importing resources) when we can't even care for our citizens at home? It's a controversial topic, and I certainly don't plan to cease highlighting the lassez-faire attitude our government has towards MIC spending when it insists that we have to tighten our belts domestically. Weapons coming out of our stock means POs go out to Lockheed Martin and Boeing and Northrop Grumman to replace our/NATOs stockpiles, those companies make money on those purchase orders, and then in 10 years Ukraine separatists will be using the same weapons we sent over there to conduct operations against US forces across Europe, meanwhile President Manchin will have vetoed medicare for all or a UBI dozens of times during the first year of his term. The entire Ukraine situation is performative of exactly where the values of our government lie - and it's not in lifting up the common citizen.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:04 |
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Lib and let die posted:(with regard to Ukraine, most specificall the "I" part of that, since we're not going to war, just warming another country to wage theirs in the hopes we'll get a killer deal on importing resources) It's not "", it's not some pedantic point, it's not spin or "Demsplaining," we are literally, unquestionably not going to war, and the people who are posting as if the situation was otherwise are wasting everybody's time.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:08 |
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Lib and let die posted:Imma stop you right there. Yes, but I'm talking about Vox and other people trying to discern what % of the military budget Biden truly wanted in his heart vs. just looking at what he signed and proposed. Yes, he didn't write the final budget, but he did sign it without much complaint. It seems like it started with a pedantic defense of Biden because he technically didn't write the budget since only Congress can and has sort of spun off into metaphysical debates about what percentage of responsibility each individual member of Congress and Biden hold based on what they "really" wanted. Leon Trotsky 2012 fucked around with this message at 16:10 on Feb 15, 2022 |
# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:08 |
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Willa Rogers posted:Maybe that'll be the re-entry method for Al Franken, given his recent foray into testing the me-too waters to see if they're any warmer than they were when he resigned. He has been hosting a politics podcast (very cursed) in the time since then which I only bring up to note that he typically has guests on them. Just taking a gander, Tammy Duckworth was on a recent episode and some other notable dem names like Chris Coons and Adam Schiff have been on within the past year too. Dunno about how it's faring for him in the eyes of the public but it sure seems like he's gradually getting rehabilitated within his own party! (To make it extra cursed, at one point he had one of the Lincoln Project founders as a guest on his podcast too.)
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:09 |
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Mellow Seas posted:It's not "", it's not some pedantic point, it's not spin or "Demsplaining," we are literally, unquestionably not going to war, and the people who are posting as if the situation was otherwise are wasting everybody's time. Right, we're not going to war. We're just helping Ukraine wage theirs, by equipping them with rockets that cost $175,000 every time one gets fired. We did this overnight, at the behest of a nation with a vast and rich availability of mineral resources to be exploited, and people are dying and starving in the streets at home. What do you gain by ing over if we're spending money "going to" war or "financing a" war? I won't accuse you of doing it with intent - I think you're better than that - but you're unintentionally bogging down any meaningful talk with tactics literally out of the CIA playbook: https://www.hsdl.org/?abstract&did=750070 This does not advance a conversation or a meaningful transfer of ideas- it frustrates it - by design.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:14 |
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It took a while to get there, but I'm glad we're all finally on the same page regarding the US going to war with Russia or not.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:16 |
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RBA Starblade posted:It took a while to get there, but I'm glad we're all finally on the same page regarding the US going to war with Russia or not. Yeah, we're sending everything but the troops - coincidentally, we're sending all the parts that cost the most and generate purchase orders for arms manufacturers to resupply our reserves with! I fail to see a meaningful difference.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:18 |
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Lib and let die posted:This does not advance a conversation or a meaningful transfer of ideas- it frustrates it - by design. It's easy enough to ignore pedantry and move on, if it's not what you want out of the conversation. Though also, I'd argue simply venting is similarly not furthering a meaningful transfer of ideas: Lib and let die posted:Imma stop you right there. Though I'm all about implementation being as much if not more important than naming the goal when trying to get something done. A concerted call to draw down our standing forces would be much more effective, IMO, than the usual general carping about Pentagon too big that's become background noise since Ike.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:19 |
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Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:Yes, but I'm talking about Vox and other people trying to discern what % of the military budget Biden truly wanted in his heart vs. just looking at what he signed and proposed. Yes, he didn't write the final budget, but he did sign it without much complaint. It seems like it started with a pedantic defense of Biden because he technically didn't write the budget since only Congress can and has sort of spun off into metaphysical debates about what percentage of responsibility each individual member of Congress and Biden hold based on what they "really" wanted.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:20 |
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Lib and let die posted:Right, we're not going to war. We're just helping Ukraine wage theirs, by equipping them with rockets that cost $175,000 every time one gets fired. We did this overnight, at the behest of a nation with a vast and rich availability of mineral resources to be exploited, and people are dying and starving in the streets at home. I don't think you're intentionally being a loving dipshit about this, but here we are. We're not "financing a war". Russia (allegedly) wants to start a war. We are trying to prevent one. And considering the vast, vast difference in the danger to American lives and the expenditure of American wealth, as well as our actual culpability in starting the conflict, what we are doing is not a difference in degree but in kind from "starting a war". Of course, everybody knows that, so I don't even know why I'm arguing with you and your indefensible position. If Russia feels that her soldiers are threatened by American-supplied arms, then I would suggest the following course of action: Don't invade and attempt to conquer a sovereign nation. Mellow Seas fucked around with this message at 16:33 on Feb 15, 2022 |
# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:26 |
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# ? Jun 8, 2024 18:49 |
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Lib and let die posted:Yeah, we're sending everything but the troops - coincidentally, we're sending all the parts that cost the most and generate purchase orders for arms manufacturers to resupply our reserves with! The most obvious one I can think of is the US not going to war and invading anyone, which seems like a pretty big one to me.
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# ? Feb 15, 2022 16:27 |