I think this will be easy to hire for; imagine the damage you can do to competition, or the low cost regulatory capture you can achieve, by just getting one clever manipulator near this not too bright narcissist

It’s useful when people use “liberal” as a slur as it really saves time on identifying who is a trump supporter or effectively a trump supporter through mental gymnastics

Because

A: electronic voting is an awful idea in so many ways

B: direct democracy is an awful idea in so many ways

C: voting is supposed to be secret which the petition signaures aren’t

Does he need to yet?

It’s not like he can be impeached and most of the cases will pause by default as he’s a sitting president. If any don’t he’ll have a tame Attorney General to kill them for him. State level charges could have a theoretical shot, but what state will take that fight?

The window to hold him accountable was 2020-2024 and the people responsible dropped the ball, sometimes with obvious intention, sometimes from naivité or incompetence

The problem as usual is that the Democrats bring Debate Club weapons to a knife fight

Anyone not voting for Harris, really

Perhaps they’ll fragment after he dies? A lot of dictatorships don’t survive the death of the supreme leader

You have a good point that understanding the voter is a good path to figuring out how to fix this in the future.

We still get to judge them for being awful people, because fooled or not, they effectively are

Dig deep enough in any awful begaviour and you can find causes and explanations, but that doesn’t make every behaviour ok

I’d probably vote for the option causing a bit less suffering in Gaza, as hard as I could. I would not refuse to vote because the lesser evil was still bad.

It’s not hard really

R is pushing more support for Israel so D is the lesser evil. There’s a reason Netanyahu wanted Trump. If you think it couldn’t get worse than D level support, stay tuned

Kanye West?

well at least you’re consistent…

Btw, your chosen course of actions indirectly supported the option of spending even more tax dollars on killing people in gaza, so you might want to consider breaking your consistent streak of picking the wrong choice and try woting in a way that aligns with your stated goals

i don’t think Russia had a right to invade.

So perhaps you should stop defending the invasion and start arguing for support for ukraine?

the fact that Ukraine had an election since 2014 and that there is public support for a western friendly government does not change that there was an abrupt change in government in 2014. these things are not connected

These things are totally connected. They show that the russian friendly government wasn’t acting according to the will of the people. And if you dig deeper you’ll probably find that the russian-friendliness was a bit of a sudden decision that the people hadn’t voted for, thus the protests.

What are you supposed to do if the government you elected turns out to act against the interest of the people and looks to be compromised by a foreign power?

if you cannot state “Yes this is true” or “No this is false because xyz” then you are not actually saying anything and I’m going to assume you are not discussing in good faith

Well you are free to do so, but I won’t agree with your manipulative framing of things. “yes she was raped, but had she been drinking? did she wear makeup? did she wear a short skirt? I’m not justifying it, it’s a simple statement of fact”

You’re clearly invested in defending an invasion you after a lot of arguing concede is wrong, so you should take a look at yourself and ask why that is

So it’s the moral argument of killing kids now in the hope of making a point that might or might not affect future politicians?

I’m mostly curious if and why you think Russia had the right to invade.

I don’t agree with your framing of a,b & c.

A & B: Ukraine has had an election since 2014 so apparently there’s public support for a western friendly government.

C: preparing to defend yourself from invasion doesn’t justify invading

So why do you think Russia were right to invade?

It doesn’t have to make sense for people to convince themselves to do it. It will certainly lead to worse outcomes for gaza

If your morals disregard the probable outcomes and is more focused on normative rules you could make some arguments but that kind of purity won’t save a single starving child in gaza

Edit: spelling

They like what he says and does. There’s nothing deeper, they’re not fooled, they’re not protest voting. A lot of people in germany liked Hitler, a lot of italians liked Mussolini, a lot of russians like Putin, a lot of americans like Trump.

I think most countries have like 20-30% of people who’d love a fascist leader. They’re why high-school bullies are popular rather than shunned for being anti-social. They’re fine with people getting hurt as long as they can imagine themselves part of the “strong” side, as that’s the only win and feeling of safety they get.

Why they’re closer to 50% in the US is a more interesting question

why do you assume i am fine with Russia invading anywhere?

Well you seem fine with russia invading ukraine, and your reasons would cover other european states that also were russia aligned at some point but have since turned west, so it’s natural to assume you’re consistent.

Do you think it’s a coincidence the invasion happened less than 4 days after the new government was appointed (unconstitutionally)? Why do you think that new government immediately started cooperating with the CIA? It’s because they knew Russia was about to invade them. Because they understood their position.

So a bit like an abused spouse making plans to escape their abuser? They made plans to support their escape so clearly they deserved what was coming?

Most of europe is making plans right now and probably cooperating with the CIA to prepare for russia’s next move. I guess we deserve whatever Putin throws at us as we “understand our position”?

When you defend the russian invasion of ukraine with russian talking points, people are going to assume you’ve fallen for russian propaganda. Actually, that’s the generous interpretation as falling for propaganda can happen to good people.

japan is a sovereign nation too. one that doesn’t get to decide whether a foreign power from across the pacific ocean gets to park military bases in their land.

Japan did try to invade quite a lot of places and then lose the ensuing war to end up there though. Ukraine didn’t really do that

russia was content with Ukraine being loosely coupled. They were not OK with Ukraine totally leaving the Russian sphere and joining the west. this is what triggered the invasion of Crimea and the little green men from the east.

That rethoric is applicable to almost any russian neighbour. Which countries would you be fine with russia invading if they win in Ukraine? Finland again? The baltics again? Poland again?

Also Russia’s invasion isn’t something “triggered” any more than an abused spouse “triggers” the violence against them. Russia could have followed international law and not invaded, and so far it seems it would even have been better for them. Blaming Ukraine for getting invaded is pretty russian propaganda in my eyes.

Ukraine was a sovereign state globally recognised as such, including by Russia. It’s not a war of independence against Russia anymore that Poland had a war of independence against Germany in 1939

This is russian propaganda revisionism, and if you’re arguing in good faith I can only advise you to make a serious inventory of what sources of news and information you consume

I don’t think we’ll agree on immigration. In my eyes the proven track reckord of Trump should be ebought to make it obvious, but you don’t agree and I doubt I can say anything that would be more convincing than the pervious Trump administration

this is frankly a reductionist take. the situation today is not like the situation in the 1930s. if anything, Biden’s approach of milquetoast risk-aversion is probably closer to Chamberlain than a hypothetical Trump presidency would be

Have you looked into what Trump is proposing on Ukraine? He does keep it vague, perhaps to allow people to imagine freely like you do here, but he keeps talking about negotiating a peace, which in itself is a stark difference from say Biden who seems to think that such things are up to Ukraine, being a sovereign nation and all.

Here’s a more concrete proposal on the Trump side: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-reviews-plan-halt-us-military-aid-ukraine-unless-it-negotiates-peace-with-2024-06-25/

Of course you can imagine any policy you want, as trump isn’t being clear, but the fact that he refuses to be clear on this should be a signal in itself. Another signal should be that Nato leadership and Europe are making moves to insulate the support of Ukraine against a Trump win. A third signal should be how desperately Russia seems to want Trump to win.

consider why the US doesn’t allow Ukraine to use American weapons in Russia. consider why US aid is limited to just enough to keep Ukraine alive. consider why the US has been openly pumping untold millions into Ukraine under the guise of the National Endowment for Democracy since the early 90s (and almost certainly many millions covertly, too)

I don’t understand your point here. Are you implying that Russia was justified in invading Ukraine because they were getting economic support from the US? Poland was too after the fall of the soviet union, so I guess they’re next?

this is a proxy war for control of Ukraine. if you were to make an analogy to WW2 it would be more Spanish Civil War than the invasion of Poland

The war in Ukraine is not a civil war. It is a sovereign european nation being invaded by russia to expand their territory, much like poland during ww2.

To be fair I think there are scenarios where Harris is less likely to get into a war, a bit like Chamberlain was less likely than Churchill to get Britain into a war. Trump pretty much plans to roll over and give people like Putin whatever they want.

So you have a bit of a point there, but again in the worst way

How you end up on the candidates being equal on immigration is more mysterious to me. One of them is talking of mass deportation and there are still kids left over from the family separation camps

Thanks for explaining your reasoning, and lucky that the woman wasn’t the fascist this time like in France or Italy