US CE Spring 2022: I'm convinced it's useless which is why I argue about it all day every day

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > US CE Spring 2022: I'm convinced it's useless which is why I argue about it all day every day

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Cow Bell: Aug 29, 2007

DeadlyMuffin posted:

Without even addressing the truth of this: I do not believe this is widely accepted as true by the people imposing and supporting sanctions.

Governments impose sanctions because the people running those governments believe sanctions can work.

People running those governments also seem to think that stimulus checks cause inflation and that child concentration camps along the border are necessary to the functioning of the country. Maybe we should stop putting a lot of stock in what people running the government think works.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 13:53

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# ? May 23, 2024 11:36

virtualboyCOLOR: Dec 22, 2004

Kalit posted:

So, about that Utah's governor veto the other day:
https://twitter.com/cnnbrk/status/1507472838038470664

I never have much faith in Utah politics, but their lawmakers overriding the governor's veto on this still surprises me

quote:

In a notable departure from how other GOP governors have discussed the issue, Cox proved a compassionate voice on the issue when he explained to lawmakers why he vetoed HB 11. He stressed in a letter to the leaders of the state's Republican-led legislature that only four of the 75,000 high school athletes in his state are transgender.

The Constitution of the United States, Article I, Section 9, paragraph 3 provides that: "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law will be passed."

This Utah law is in direct opposition of the constitution and should be easily squashed if the Supreme Court had any legitimacy.

Democrats and other folks defending the legitimacy of the Supreme Court is sickening. This is authoritarian rule.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 14:14

BIG-DICK-BUTT-FUCK: Jan 26, 2016; by Fluffdaddy

DeadlyMuffin posted:

Governments impose sanctions because the people running those governments believe sanctions can work.

You have no way of knowing if this is true, sheer conjecture stated as fact :sad:

# ? Mar 26, 2022 14:27

Sarcastr0: May 29, 2013; WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE BILLIONAIRES ?!?!?

virtualboyCOLOR posted:

The Constitution of the United States, Article I, Section 9, paragraph 3 provides that: "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law will be passed."

This Utah law is in direct opposition of the constitution and should be easily squashed if the Supreme Court had any legitimacy.

Democrats and other folks defending the legitimacy of the Supreme Court is sickening. This is authoritarian rule.

If you're going to attack everyone who disagrees with you about the legitimacy of the Supreme Court, you should pick a relevant legal principle to hang it on.

This is absolutely lovely, and I think there's an Equal Protection Clause case, but a law that only effects a few people is not a bill of attainder.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 14:35

VitalSigns: Sep 3, 2011

DeeplyConcerned posted:

you weren't addressing me here but I think it's an interesting question so I'll answer: yes! The Iraq invasion was illegal immoral and completely bullshit just like the Russian invasion of Ukraine is today.

in my view the primary purpose of sanctions is to destroy a country's ability and willingness to wage war effectively. Ability is constrained by restrictions on trade to deprive the enemy of supplies critical to waging war. Willingness is destroyed by imposing costs on military and civilian populations to decrease the appetite for conquest and curtail support for invasion. To destroy the morale of fighting forces while cutting them off from relief and resupply.

In the case of the US invasion of Iraq, sanctions ought to have included restrictions on oil imports by major oil-producing countries. High oil prices would cripple the United States's ability to wage war and would be a highly effective sanction. Rah rah bullshit would die down immediately as sky high gas prices break the back of the US consumer, while simultaneously cripplying supply chains and imposing huge additional costs on military operations, which are fuel intensive. The government would be forced to make critical choices about whether to allow their citizens to absorb the cost of higher prices and keep the fuel for their own military operations, or release military reserves for civilian use. calls to end the war would be momentous, Bush may have even be impeached if he refused to pull out. countless innocent lives could've been saved. I think the Iraq war is a perfect example of a situation where sanctions are appropriate. As a US citizen I would have accepted sanctions from the international community and thanked them for it.

Oh my God

quote:

Five weeks after the uprising was crushed, the U.N. Security Council voted to keep Iraq in an economic chokehold even though the sanctions' original goal, forcing Saddam's army from Kuwait, had been achieved. The United States�with the Security Council in tow�had new demands. Washington wanted Saddam to surrender his chemical and biological weapons, as well as the research and production facilities used to make them. And on May 20, three months after the end of the war, Bush announced that the sanctions would remain in place until Saddam was gone. The second decree erased any motivation the Iraqi leader might have had to comply with the first. And it ended up devastating the Basrawi and practically every other Iraqi who was not in Saddam's ruling clique.
...
Saddam Hussein waited more than five years, until late 1996, before accepting a U.N. plan, known as "oil for food," that allowed Iraq to export a limited amount of oil and use the revenues to buy food and medicine. Those rules were later relaxed, and by late 2000 Iraq was able to sell as much oil as it could pump and to spend 72 percent of the revenues to import any products that could not be used for military purposes. During the six-month period ending in December 2000, Iraq earned almost $8 billion under the program and spent just over $4.2 billion. A little more than one-third of that amount was spent on food, and only slightly over 2 percent went for medical products�"despite all the concerns expressed regarding the nutritional and health status of the Iraqi people," as the head of the program, Benon Sevan, wrote in a report to the Security Council.

Meanwhile, Saddam has had little trouble importing just about everything else he wants except for tanks, artillery, and other conspicuous military equipment. Iraq has earned at least another $2 billion by trad- ing oil outside the U.N. system, mainly through a pipeline across Syria and on tankers plying Iranian waters. U.N. border monitors in Jordan, one of Baghdad's biggest trading partners, inspect only a handful of the thousands of trucks that pass into Iraq each week.

The devastating aspect of the sanctions is not that they restrict what Iraq can import; it is that they keep the country from accessing its cash. Iraq cannot use the money it earns from oil to pay wages, to finance public-works contracts, to run hospitals, or to revitalize the welfare state. This lack of cash flow also makes it easier for the regime to monopolize access to all essential goods and services. There are shops in Baghdad whose shelves brim with merchandise. There are restaurants jammed with diners, and it is not hard to spot new Mercedes, Volvos, and Chevy SUVs burning 15-cent-a-gallon gas. But for the majority of Iraqis who are not part of Saddam's clique, this affluence might as well exist on another planet. Unemployment is so rampant, and wages so low, that according to one U.N. official, about 70 percent of Iraqis derive a key part of their income from selling a portion of their meager monthly food rations.
...
The director of the basra pediatric hospital, Ali Faisal, is a thin, almond-skinned man. At work at the Basra pediatric hospital he wears a white lab coat, a tie, and the worn-out look of someone punished too long by impossible circumstances. He has witnessed the end result of the malnutrition, the contaminated water, and the collapse of Iraq's health care system. But he cannot fully discuss it. Saddam's security thugs have dragged doctors from hospitals and shot them for being disloyal. So each of Faisal's answers is a safe one: The sanctions are responsible for everything. "Even microscopes are not allowed," he says. "And one of the major difficulties is a shortage of oxygen."

Waleed Najeeb, an American doctor from Milwaukee who specializes in pulmonary and critical-care medicine, saw the oxygen problem first-hand on a trip to Basra during the summer of 2000. He traveled there with a Milwaukee newspaper reporter and a photographer in a tour arranged by a Chicago-based organization called Voices in the Wilderness, which advocates for lifting the sanctions. The group also helped make travel arrangements for my visit.

Najeeb and the reporters arrived at the pediatric hospital on a hot August afternoon. They headed for the emergency room to count the death certificates. Six had been issued since midnight; the Iraqi doctors told Najeeb they started a new book of 25 certificates about every other day.

While they were talking, a woman down the hall shouted for a physician. Najeeb and the others hurried to the room. Inside, they saw eight children in metal beds pushed up against dirty, cream-colored walls. The mother of a six-month-old boy named Hassan had screamed for help. Her baby was gasping for breath. He was no more than 12 pounds, half the normal body weight for his age.

"Get him oxygen," Najeeb told an Iraqi physician. A length of plastic tubing was fit into Hassan's right nostril and taped clumsily to his face; it was then attached to a worn green cylinder of industrial oxygen, the stuff mechanics use for acetylene torches.

"Why not put a mask on him?" Najeeb asked. The Iraqi doctor answered, "We have no masks. We ordered them but were unable to get them." Hassan began convulsing. His arms and legs quivered. His skin turned pallid. His eyes rolled backward in their sockets. Najeeb told the doctor that the boy needed to be placed on a ventilator, a device that pumps oxygen through a tube inserted directly into the lungs. "Do you think I don't know this?" the Iraqi doctor responded. "None of our ventilators are working. We couldn't obtain the parts."

Hassan drifted into unconsciousness. The doctors looked on. The photographer snapped the boy's picture. The mother sobbed. She explained that her family lived in a town near Basra. Hassan had come down with a high fever and an earache a week earlier. She had taken him to a doctor who prescribed an antibiotic, but she hadn't been able to find the medicine anywhere nearby. She told Najeeb that she had located it, finally, in a pharmacy near the Jordanian border, hundreds of miles away, but hadn't been able to buy it because she was the equivalent of 12 cents short. She had brought Hassan to the hospital after he began having seizures.

The Iraqi doctor whispered in Najeeb's ear, "Look at the gauge on the tank." The needle hadn't moved since the tank had been hooked up. It stood on empty. "We're looking for a new tank on the market now." "Why do you have this one connected?" Najeeb asked. "We're calming the parents down."

Hassan's hands turned cold. Najeeb observed that the boy was barely inhaling. He was slowly suffocating. The doctor knew it. And he knew that there was nothing he could do.

oh my god

Big ups for not being chauvinist about it and saying if it's done to Iraqis it should be done to Americans, but what the gently caress, how is your reaction to what sanctions do to innocent people "we should do this more" and not "we should not do this". Do you guys ever go outside, do you see kids playing in the neighborhood and look at their faces before you go on the internet and say yeah I wish the world would do this to them to get back at Bush, some of you have kids you tuck them in at night and then you smugly argue on the internet how you'd thank the world for doing this back to them what the gently caress.

(USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)

VitalSigns fucked around with this message at 15:44 on Mar 26, 2022

# ? Mar 26, 2022 15:41

VitalSigns: Sep 3, 2011

Shakespeare puts �the lunatic, the lover, and the poet� together, as being �of imagination all compact�. The problem is to keep the lover and the poet, without the lunatic. I will give an illustration. In 1919 I saw The Trojan Women acted at the Old Vic. There is an unbearably pathetic scene where Astyanax is put to death by the Greeks for fear he should grow up into a second Hector. There was hardly a dry eye in the theatre, and the audience found the cruelty of the Greeks in the play hardly credible. Yet those very people who wept were, at that very moment, practising that very cruelty on a scale which the imagination of Euripides could have never contemplated. They had lately voted (most of them) for a Government which prolonged the blockade of Germany after the armistice, and imposed the blockade of Russia. It was known that these blockades caused the death of immense numbers of children, but it was felt desirable to diminish the population of enemy countries: the children, like Astyanax, might grow up to emulate their fathers. Euripides the poet awakened the lover in the imagination of the audience; but lover and poet were forgot�ten at the door of the theatre, and the lunatic (in the shape of the homicidal maniac) controlled the political actions of these men and women who thought themselves kind and virtuous.

E:
VVVV
https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/philosophy/on-the-value-of-scepticism-bertrand-russell/

VitalSigns fucked around with this message at 15:55 on Mar 26, 2022

# ? Mar 26, 2022 15:47

Josef bugman: Nov 17, 2011; Pictured: Poster prepares to celebrate Holy Communion (probablY)

This avatar made possible by a gift from the Religionthread Posters Relief Fund

Who is that a quote from VitalSigns?

# ? Mar 26, 2022 15:50

BRJurgis: Aug 15, 2007; Well I hear the thunder roll, I feel the cold winds blowing...
But you won't find me there, 'cause I won't go back again...
While you're on smoky roads, I'll be out in the sun...
Where the trees still grow, where they count by one...

VitalSigns posted:

Shakespeare puts �the lunatic, the lover, and the poet� together, as being �of imagination all compact�. The problem is to keep the lover and the poet, without the lunatic. I will give an illustration. In 1919 I saw The Trojan Women acted at the Old Vic. There is an unbearably pathetic scene where Astyanax is put to death by the Greeks for fear he should grow up into a second Hector. There was hardly a dry eye in the theatre, and the audience found the cruelty of the Greeks in the play hardly credible. Yet those very people who wept were, at that very moment, practising that very cruelty on a scale which the imagination of Euripides could have never contemplated. They had lately voted (most of them) for a Government which prolonged the blockade of Germany after the armistice, and imposed the blockade of Russia. It was known that these blockades caused the death of immense numbers of children, but it was felt desirable to diminish the population of enemy countries: the children, like Astyanax, might grow up to emulate their fathers. Euripides the poet awakened the lover in the imagination of the audience; but lover and poet were forgot�ten at the door of the theatre, and the lunatic (in the shape of the homicidal maniac) controlled the political actions of these men and women who thought themselves kind and virtuous.

E:
VVVV
https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/philosophy/on-the-value-of-scepticism-bertrand-russell/

Bertrand Russell is loving awesome, and his stuff is much more accessible and relevant than most of the philosophers I've been exposed to. I'm not an educator but problems of philosophy (I believe that's the one) should be required reading for exposing students to more.... abstract(?) thinking.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 16:31

Timeless Appeal: May 28, 2006

virtualboyCOLOR posted:

The Constitution of the United States, Article I, Section 9, paragraph 3 provides that: "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law will be passed."

This Utah law is in direct opposition of the constitution and should be easily squashed if the Supreme Court had any legitimacy.

Democrats and other folks defending the legitimacy of the Supreme Court is sickening. This is authoritarian rule.

The same court also made a decision that means that I can't be fired from my job because I am trans. I would be terrified if everyone just started ignoring all supreme court decisions every day for the rest of my live of losing my job for just existing as myself.

You're right that the Supreme Court is a huge problem right now and if we're being frank, the problems are built in since the framers couldn't figure out how to have the court be separate from other powers. But "Everyone just ignore everything the court says or you're an evil piece of poo poo" is a ridiculous standpoint that doesn't solve anything.

Like a lower court tried to basically usurp power from Biden as commander and chief which the Supreme Court stopped.* It was a decision that people dissented on and the decision is hosed to begin with, but I think you're oversimplifying the solution here to create an obvious thing that politicians you don't like are loving up instead of recognizing the quagmire that is we just have a lovely Constitution.

*Important note that 2/3 of Trump's nominees were actually on the right side of this while serious normal nominees were basically like LOL WHAT CONSTITUTION WE NOW CONTROL THE MILITARY NOW.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 17:20

Main Paineframe: Oct 27, 2010

virtualboyCOLOR posted:

The Constitution of the United States, Article I, Section 9, paragraph 3 provides that: "No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law will be passed."

This Utah law is in direct opposition of the constitution and should be easily squashed if the Supreme Court had any legitimacy.

Democrats and other folks defending the legitimacy of the Supreme Court is sickening. This is authoritarian rule.

I just typed up a big legal explanation about whether this qualifies as a bill of attainder or not, but I realized there's a much more fundamental question here: What, exactly, do you expect the Supreme Court to have already done about a bill that passed literally yesterday and doesn't take effect until July?

The fact that the law has gone a whopping 24 hours after passage without being struck down by the Supreme Court doesn't mean the Supreme Court is deliberately ignoring it.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 18:47

virtualboyCOLOR: Dec 22, 2004

Timeless Appeal posted:

You're right that the Supreme Court is a huge problem right now and if we're being frank, the problems are built in since the framers couldn't figure out how to have the court be separate from other powers. But "Everyone just ignore everything the court says or you're an evil piece of poo poo" is a ridiculous standpoint that doesn't solve anything.

Incorrect. Biden and the democrats can deem the courts illegitimate until they pack the courts to make them legitimate. Recognizing an authoritarian body of evil shits because sometimes they decide to provide people a sliver of human rights is u helpful let alone an unhealthy outlook.

Also worrying �but the other side will then X� is a terrible fallacy that again rewards the abuser. They other side will do it regardless because �rules� are bullshit in this country.

If you are thinking some incredibly minimal worker rights that have been granted to the trans community is now safe thanks to the sanctity of the Supreme Court may I remind you that reproductive rights are on the chopping block.

virtualboyCOLOR fucked around with this message at 18:56 on Mar 26, 2022

# ? Mar 26, 2022 18:49

punk rebel ecks: Dec 11, 2010; A shitty post? This calls for a dance of deduction.

virtualboyCOLOR posted:

Incorrect. Biden and the democrats can deem the courts illegitimate until they pack the courts to make them legitimate. Recognizing an authoritarian body of evil shits because sometimes they decide to provide people a sliver of human rights is u helpful let alone an unhealthy outlook.

Also worrying �but the other side will then X� is a terrible fallacy that again rewards the abuser. They other side will do it regardless because �rules� are bullshit in this country.

It's something that other democratic nations do all the time. It's not exactly some unholy unheard of radical idea.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 18:56

virtualboyCOLOR: Dec 22, 2004

punk rebel ecks posted:

It's something that other democratic nations do all the time. It's not exactly some unholy unheard of radical idea.

It�s why anyone spotting bullshit nonsense about �no we can�t do that because [some fear mongering bullshit] need to be called out. Supporting the Supreme Court or making excuses why Dems can�t just pack the courts is arguing for the continued lurch toward fascism. There isn�t a a grey area.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 18:59

Timeless Appeal: May 28, 2006

virtualboyCOLOR posted:

It�s why anyone spotting bullshit nonsense about �no we can�t do that because [some fear mongering bullshit] need to be called out. Supporting the Supreme Court or making excuses why Dems can�t just pack the courts is arguing for the continued lurch toward fascism. There isn�t a a grey area.

I think I was confused what you're arguing for because you've been talking about defending the legitimacy. My standpoint is that of course the court has to be legitimate because if you just say the court is illegitimate you don't get to pick and choose what counts. I am not fear mongering, if the Democrats say all the recent court decisions basically don't count, then what stops the other side from supporting the decision that says I can't be fired at will. Me wanting the supreme court decision led by insane libertarian Gorsuch who also thinks that he should be in charge of the US military isn't fear mongering.

Packing the courts is not the same as declaring the courts illegitimate for the sole reason that you're allowed to do it. They should do it, and let's be clear, the reason it's not entertained even if Biden wanted to do it is they don't have the votes from their own party to support packing in the name of saving Roe. But in the hypothetical world where they did that, I think them openly describing the Supreme Court as illegitimate is foolish.

Which at this point I guess we agree and I probably started a way to angry argument over diction so sorry for not understanding.

Timeless Appeal fucked around with this message at 19:29 on Mar 26, 2022

# ? Mar 26, 2022 19:21

Sharkie: Feb 4, 2013; by Fluffdaddy

Timeless Appeal posted:

if you just say the court is illegitimate you don't get to pick and choose what counts.

Actually you can.

# ? Mar 26, 2022 20:10

DeadlyMuffin: Jul 3, 2007

BIG-DICK-BUTT-gently caress posted:

You have no way of knowing if this is true, sheer conjecture stated as fact

Not really. It's consistent with the stated purpose, statements about it, etc. The position of "governments impose sanctions in order to kill civilians, knowing that they're actually useless" is up there with thinking there's a pedophile ring run out of Comet pizza in DC.

Sharkie posted:

Actually you can.

Pick the rulings you like and ignore the ones you don't. The one weird trick Democrats hate!

DeadlyMuffin fucked around with this message at 06:20 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 26, 2022 22:40

virtualboyCOLOR: Dec 22, 2004

Timeless Appeal posted:

I am not fear mongering, if the Democrats say all the recent court decisions basically don't count, then what stops the other side from supporting the decision that says I can't be fired at will.

Whether the Dems do this or not, NOTHING stops the republicans from ignoring the rulings of the Supreme Court. It has zero power. Every president that has stood by previous rulings has done so on basically a gentlemen�s agreement. The constitution gives all the power to the executive branch to wield as it sees fit.

What you are saying is the exact same defense Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema provide on keeping the filibuster in place. It�s bullshit fear mongering because it assumes the fascist won�t bend the country to their will because �well aw shucks the other side hasn�t broken the rules.� Hell we already saw what rules the Republicans will break since Reagan. Hell look what they did to the Supreme Court via withholding nominations.

quote:

I think them openly describing the Supreme Court as illegitimate is foolish.

Calling a spade a spade is not foolish. It�s recognizing the problem so it can be solved. It�s foolish to bury one�s head and NOT recognize the Supreme Court as illegitimate.

quote:

I probably started a way to angry argument over diction so sorry for not understanding.

You did not use any aggressive language so no need to apologize. I did, and am still, because it is frustrating to see people (especially those suffering abuse) defend an institution designed to oppress human rights.

virtualboyCOLOR fucked around with this message at 23:46 on Mar 26, 2022

# ? Mar 26, 2022 23:18

Yeowch!!! My Balls!!!: May 31, 2006

DeadlyMuffin posted:

Not really. It's consistent with the stated purpose, statements about it, etc. The position of "governments impose sanctions in order to kill civilians, knowing that they're actually useless" is up there with thinking there's a pedophile ring run out of Comet pizza in DC.

perfect metaphor. in that yes, there is a pedophile ring in DC, complete with the last secretary of labor getting a man who pimped underage women out to a who's who of the most powerful people in the anglosphere out of any consequences for his crimes by saying 'he belonged to intelligence' without anyone involved raising an eyebrow.

but because it was clearly not based out of a pizza parlor's basement, some people are comfortable treating the horrifying evil of the larger story as something they can safely ignore going forward

# ? Mar 26, 2022 23:20

some plague rats: Jun 5, 2012; by Fluffdaddy

DeadlyMuffin posted:

The position of "governments impose sanctions in order to kill civilians, knowing that they're actually useless" is up there with thinking there's a pedophile ring run out of Comet pizza in DC.

You keep setting up this strawman and whaling on it like it's going out of fashion. No one is saying the express goal of sanctions is to kill civilians, it's regime change, or pressuring the leadership, etc. A whole bunch of blameless people dying is just an inevitable side effect of broad sanctions, and one that the government seems entirely comfortable with, largely because every single US policy results in a whole bunch of blameless people dying. It's an important distinction, and acting like no one here recognises it makes you really frustrating to talk to

# ? Mar 27, 2022 00:17

Timeless Appeal: May 28, 2006

virtualboyCOLOR posted:

Whether the Dems do this or not, NOTHING stops the republicans from ignoring the rulings of the Supreme Court. It has zero power. Every president that has stood by previous rulings has done so on basically a gentlemen�s agreement. The constitution gives all the power to the executive branch to wield as it sees fit.

What you are saying is the exact same defense Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema provide on keeping the filibuster in place. It�s bullshit fear mongering because it assumes the fascist won�t bend the country to their will because �well aw shucks the other side hasn�t broken the rules.� Hell we already saw what rules the Republicans will break since Reagan. Hell look what they did to the Supreme Court via withholding nominations.

Calling a spade a spade is not foolish. It�s recognizing the problem so it can be solved. It�s foolish to bury one�s head and NOT recognize the Supreme Court as illegitimate.

You did not use any aggressive language so no need to apologize. I did, and am still, because it is frustrating to see people (especially those suffering abuse) defend an institution designed to oppress human rights.

For what it's worth, I think the US has a trash Constitution and we ideally should dump it, but I have no idea how that is accomplished at this point without potentially coming up with something worse. So, I'm not really defending the institution. Like the Senate, the issue isn't that we just have lovely or polarized people or whatever. The issue is that the Senate is a broken system. Like I said in my earlier post, the Supreme Court completely flies in the face of one of the tenants that the Constitution was supposed to have. Given in an enough time, you would always end up in something like our current predicament, just at varying levels of vindictiveness.

That is all to say, I'm not really trying to defend the current court or even the court itself. And I have no problem with you saying it's not legitimate because you're right. I would like Biden to pack the courts and ignore rulings, but I don't think ignoring rulings is the same as saying the court is conceptually illegitimate. Because once you say in blanket terms it's all bullshit and you're going to do whatever you want, I think that gentlemen's agreement goes away.

I'm really just disagreeing with the notion that it is helpful to say that it's illegitimate. I think an ideal Democratic Party would be in practice doing things I think we agree with but coating it in an idea of restoring the spirit of what the institutions should be instead of saying that the institution is entirely bullshit. Because if you do that, if you ruin the gentlemen's agreement, you're taking away the little sliver of protections that I have along with other poo poo or get into weird poo poo like lower courts trying to usurp the President's job.

But they're not even going to pack the court, Biden is full of poo poo in how closely he's following rulings, so like I said, I think we're mostly in agreement and splitting hairs on a counterfactual question of what a better political party would do.

# ? Mar 27, 2022 00:40

Oxyclean: Sep 23, 2007

Kalit posted:

So, about that Utah's governor veto the other day:
https://twitter.com/cnnbrk/status/1507472838038470664

I never have much faith in Utah politics, but their lawmakers overriding the governor's veto on this still surprises me

I wonder why these "fairness in sports" people never talk about banning tall kids or rich kids. (I do not actually wonder.)

gently caress these people. This poo poo is so tiring.

Oxyclean fucked around with this message at 00:56 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 00:42

Harold Fjord: Jan 3, 2004

The "sliver of protection" is a lie. Republicans have never cared about any gentleman's agreements. They bind liberals with them then ignore them at their leisure. They are willful hypocrites who feel no shame

it's on the box

Harold Fjord fucked around with this message at 01:08 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 00:58

virtualboyCOLOR: Dec 22, 2004

Timeless Appeal posted:

So like I said, I think we're mostly in agreement and splitting hairs on a counterfactual question of what a better political party would do.

Kind of but I still think there is still a bit more giving it away to the fascist to, understandable, protect oneself from further abuse. However that abuse and the fear will always be there since it is, as you said, only a �sliver of protection� (see reproductive rights). Worse is it allows the fascist to win with little resistance and appear �legitimate� in the eyes of the privileged / least impacted.

Oxyclean posted:

I wonder why these "fairness in sports" people never talk about banning tall kids or rich kids. (I do not actually wonder.)

gently caress these people. This poo poo is so tiring.

Yeah this may be its own can of warms but there is no such thing as �fairness� in sports, especially when you are speaking on an individual by individual level.

virtualboyCOLOR fucked around with this message at 01:53 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 01:46

Jaxyon: Mar 7, 2016; I’m just saying I would like to see a man beat a woman in a cage. Just to be sure.

punk rebel ecks posted:

It's something that other democratic nations do all the time. It's not exactly some unholy unheard of radical idea.

I'm not disagreeing or disbelieving you, but I can't find any examples of this.

virtualboyCOLOR posted:

Yeah this may be its own can of warms but there is no such thing as �fairness� in sports, especially when you are speaking on an individual by individual level.

Correct. It's not about fairness, at all. Nobody has issues with Michael Phelps producing a fraction of the lactic acid as his competitors, combined with hyper-flexible joints....which is a huge unfair advantage.

It's about transmisogyny.

Jaxyon fucked around with this message at 01:56 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 01:47

A big flaming stink: Apr 26, 2010

Jaxyon posted:

I'm not disagreeing or disbelieving you, but I can't find any examples of this.

Correct. It's not about fairness, at all. Nobody has issues with Michael Phelps producing a fraction of the lactic acid as his competitors, combined with hyper-flexible joints....which is a huge unfair advantage.

It's about transmisogyny.

it's also about enforcing white, male supremacist notions of femininity, as seen when the Olympics banned those two cis black women runners for "having too much testosterone"

# ? Mar 27, 2022 04:12

Sharkie: Feb 4, 2013; by Fluffdaddy

Timeless Appeal posted:

Because if you do that, if you ruin the gentlemen's agreement

What the gently caress. There's gentlemen's agreements in politics but buddy you aint in em.

Timeless Appeal posted:

I have no idea how that is accomplished at this point without potentially coming up with something worse. So, I'm not really defending the institution.

You are. Nobody's making you post "Hey it could be worse."

# ? Mar 27, 2022 04:58

punk rebel ecks: Dec 11, 2010; A shitty post? This calls for a dance of deduction.

Jaxyon posted:

I'm not disagreeing or disbelieving you, but I can't find any examples of this.

Dabbling in Wikipedia:

Bolivia in 2009 essentially replaced the entire Supreme Court full stop.

Costa Rica in 1982 expanded their court.

India initially had 8 court members in 1950. This expanded to 11 in 1956, 14 in 1960, 18 in 1978, 26 in 1986, 31 in 2009, to 34 in 2019.

Jamaica nearly doubled their supreme court from 26 to 40 in 2008.

Honduras expanded it's court in 2012.

There is also some interesting tidbits, such as in Romania there are 9 justices, but every 3 years 3 of them have to step down with the President and congress electing them. This means that in just two consecutive government terms a party can have a super majority in the court. This essentially makes the Supreme Court at best a short term guard.

# ? Mar 27, 2022 05:53

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

The US Supreme Court is extremely unusual in a lot of aspects, including the lifetime appointments and that there's literally no qualifications required for it. Like. could go full Quinten Trembly and nominate 7 infants to it and there's literally nothing stopping it.

# ? Mar 27, 2022 05:58

DeadlyMuffin: Jul 3, 2007

some plague rats posted:

You keep setting up this strawman and whaling on it like it's going out of fashion. No one is saying the express goal of sanctions is to kill civilians, it's regime change, or pressuring the leadership, etc.

My initial comment, and the responses I was responding to are below.

The "no one is saying this routine" about things people are actually saying gets really old in this thread.

Yinlock posted:

Practical? Sanctions have been proven, repeatedly, to not actually work. There is no practical argument to be made in favor of them. [sic]

1) Cruelty: They simply want The Enemy to suffer. This is a symptom of War Brain so the suffering of The Enemy is justified on it's own merits and any arguments against this will be dismissed as either foolish or traitorous.

2) Self-satisfaction. "What should we do instead???". The U.S must act because otherwise they, personally, would feel helpless about the situation. Whether that action actually helps or not doesn't matter as long as they feel better.

DeadlyMuffin posted:

Governments impose sanctions because the people running those governments believe sanctions can work.

BIG-DICK-BUTT-gently caress posted:

You have no way of knowing if this is true, sheer conjecture stated as fact

DeadlyMuffin fucked around with this message at 06:36 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 06:25

Yinlock: Oct 22, 2008

DeadlyMuffin posted:

My initial comment, and the responses I was responding to are below.

The "no one is saying this routine" about things people are actually saying gets really old in this thread.

I notice you conveniently omitted the part of the post where I said I was trying to reason out why someone would support sanctions despite their proven ineffectiveness.

I was however admittedly in A Mood and left out possibility 3) That they are simply misinformed as to how sanctions work and/or their overall effectiveness and are digging in their heels about it.

Yinlock fucked around with this message at 07:11 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 07:09

Cow Bell: Aug 29, 2007

DeadlyMuffin posted:

My initial comment, and the responses I was responding to are below.

The "no one is saying this routine" about things people are actually saying gets really old in this thread.

The bottom quote you included is literally in response to your asinine assertion that people in the government "think" sanctions work, ergo they must.

# ? Mar 27, 2022 13:59

Harold Fjord: Jan 3, 2004

It's just intentionality handwaving. "I didn't mean to" is a classic way of denying accountability, including when children starve.

# ? Mar 27, 2022 15:03

Kalit: Nov 6, 2006; The great thing about the thousands of slaughtered Palestinian children is that they can't pull away when you fondle them or sniff their hair.

That's a Biden success story.

Harold Fjord posted:

It's just intentionality handwaving. "I didn't mean to" is a classic way of denying accountability, including when children starve.

So, since I'm having a hard time following this conversation, what exactly are posters arguing about these past handful of pages? Is it about sanctions in general? Or is it about the Russia sanctions specifically?

If about Russia specifically, are those who are against them saying that there are alternative, less harmful, better ways to deter Russia? Or just that the US/NATO should stay out of it completely and let Russia/Ukraine do their thing without any attempted interference/etc and think that it'll end up in less violence/harm?

Harold Fjord, this isn't directed towards you specifically. I just used your post as an example for me being confused about what the conversation is even about anymore.

Kalit fucked around with this message at 15:34 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 15:29

virtualboyCOLOR: Dec 22, 2004

Harold Fjord posted:

It's just intentionality handwaving. "I didn't mean to" is a classic way of denying accountability, including when children starve.

That annoying thing is that sanctions are meant to intentionally harm the vulnerable instead of the privileged.

Recent example: https://www.reuters.com/world/squatters-occupy-russian-oligarchs-london-mansion-2022-03-14/

quote:

The squatters had gathered on the balcony at the front of the property, where they unfurled a Ukrainian flag and placed a banner reading 'This property has been liberated'. A lengthy standoff ended at 2000 GMT.

"The four people protesting on the balcony of a building in Belgrave Square ... have come down and been arrested," police said. Earlier, police said they had arrested four others who tried to gain access to the property.

Nothing like using police resources to protect the wealthy oppressors and their benefactors. If the point of the sanctions were to pressure those in power to stop the invasion and destruction of Ukraine then Western Europe would have either seized the property themselves or, at minimum, ignored the squatters.

vvvv be the change you want to see

virtualboyCOLOR fucked around with this message at 15:54 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 15:33

Heck Yes! Loam!: Nov 15, 2004; a rich, friable soil containing a relatively equal mixture of sand and silt and a somewhat smaller proportion of clay.

Man I love the discussion of current events going on here by the same group of posters over and over again. it really fosters a great discussion place.

(USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)

# ? Mar 27, 2022 15:49

Gumball Gumption: Jan 7, 2012

Kalit posted:

So, since I'm having a hard time following this conversation, what exactly are posters arguing about these past handful of pages? Is it about sanctions in general? Or is it about the Russia sanctions specifically?

If about Russia specifically, are those who are against them saying that there are alternative, less harmful, better ways to deter Russia? Or just that the US/NATO should stay out of it completely and let Russia/Ukraine do their thing without any attempted interference/etc and think that it'll end up in less violence/harm?

Harold Fjord, this isn't directed towards you specifically. I just used your post as an example for me being confused about what the conversation is even about anymore.

It's about DeadlyMuffins being locked into having to be technically right by using arguments like leaders think it's true so you can't say the point of sanctions is to hurt civilians. They just keep splitting away from the actual argument to attack some small detail and then become hyper focused on it. It's gotten to the point where the difference between genocide and accidently killing people in the name of good is if you wrote a manifesto about how much you want to kill. Do you think you're helping? Well, that's enough according to DeadlyMuffins. There's no sane way to continue the discussion when that's one of the arguments being presented.

# ? Mar 27, 2022 15:51

Gumball Gumption: Jan 7, 2012

Heck Yes! Loam! posted:

Man I love the discussion of current events going on here by the same group of posters over and over again. it really fosters a great discussion place.

You posted about it too? No one is stopping you from posting other things like news you wanted to discuss. Be the change you want to see in the world.

# ? Mar 27, 2022 15:53

Heck Yes! Loam!: Nov 15, 2004; a rich, friable soil containing a relatively equal mixture of sand and silt and a somewhat smaller proportion of clay.

Gumball Gumption posted:

You posted about it too? No one is stopping you from posting other things like news you wanted to discuss. Be the change you want to see in the world.

I do but the same five people continue to treat the thread as their personal soap box

https://twitter.com/jmartNYT/status/1507909948189159425

# ? Mar 27, 2022 15:56

virtualboyCOLOR: Dec 22, 2004

Heck Yes! Loam! posted:

https://twitter.com/jmartNYT/status/1507909948189159425

Oof. Sounds like the party in power might want to do something about this menace and his enabler that can run for the highest office in America in 2024.

Maybe the party in power could do something when their investigations point directly to people in power, like elected officials or judges in high courts.

Or maybe they�ll continue to just do fundraising efforts and wag fingers.

Edit: the snarky comments aren�t specifically directed at you. At the very least your posts are keeping a record of the US�s willingness to move right into fascism.

virtualboyCOLOR fucked around with this message at 16:06 on Mar 27, 2022

# ? Mar 27, 2022 16:01

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# ? May 23, 2024 11:36

BIG-DICK-BUTT-FUCK: Jan 26, 2016; by Fluffdaddy

DeadlyMuffin posted:

Not really. It's consistent with the stated purpose, statements about it, etc. The position of "governments impose sanctions in order to kill civilians, knowing that they're actually useless" is up there with thinking there's a pedophile ring run out of Comet pizza in DC.

There are other possible positions beyond those two you've presented .. "governments impose sanctions bc it would be economically favorable to them and/or allies" and "governments impose sanctions strictly for punitive reasons, w no concern for efficacy" are two I can think of

For a general example, do you really think the US maintains sanctions on Cuba bc they are "working" to achieve their stated purpose, "democratization and greater respect for human rights"?

# ? Mar 27, 2022 16:03

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > US CE Spring 2022: I'm convinced it's useless which is why I argue about it all day every day

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