Jaybird: how is *ANY* group not a vulnerable minority?
Depends on how much terrorism and hostility they have to deal with.
Israel/Jews has multiple hostile armies pointed at it. They've been subjected to genocide. Their opponents openly state that they either want genocide or "only" ethnic cleansing. Peace agreements keep falling apart on the subject of whether or not Israel will exist as a Jewish state.
The "vulnerability" of the Lebanese comes from their love of terrorism and desire to go to war with their neighbor.
I am a member of various minorities groups, including hanging around on this website. No one in the US is targeting any of the groups to which I belong.
RE: several million stateless people inside of the de facto state of Israel.
There is no future where those people aren't brutally repressed. They want the land of their ancestors back. That puts them on an ugly path which will have ugly consequences. Either they're going to be repressed by Israel or a local strongman.
I'm not sure that a local strongman is the better choice.
To "save democracy" you need to do court packing? There's some pretty heavy spin there.
Especially since Trump is something like 0-50 with his court cases attempting to overturn the election.
What this comes down to is Team Blue wants Roe back without doing multi-decades worth of heavy lifting that Red did to overturn it. You want it done and done now.
The most stable setup that I can picture is something like what the West Bank is now. The PA is paid off by the USA and Israel to repress their people and they do so because they're corrupt and it keeps them in charge.
That implies the PA being so unpopular that they can't win an election against Hamas is a feature and not a bug.
If we're going to be charitable, then the creation of a Palestinian state might defuse the dead enders.
The problems with this line of thought are:
Attacking Israel is extremely popular. This implies the Palestinian state can't be a democracy. In a democracy the people get what they want and the people want to refight a war. In addition the state would need to brutally repress the non-state militaries.
In theory having your own state would fix this but having a deeply corrupt repressive dictatorship running a micro-state next to a rich democracy implies problems. We also have the issue that if that dictatorship can't stop all the terrorism then Israel will need to step in which seriously undermines the definition of "state".
Big study on UBI in the USA showed it reduced wealth and income. The researchers and media spun that as a good thing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyoMgGiWgJQ
RE: Ginsburg Ginsburg was diagnosed with early-stage pancreatic cancer in 2009. Tumors were also found on her lungs when she sought medical care for broken ribs after a fall in late 2018.... On September 18, 2020, Ginsburg died at the age of 87, from complications of metastatic pancreatic cancer. (wiki)
Google says the 5 year survival rate for metastatic pancreatic cancer is 6%. I.e. it's stage four.
She died by inches for 11 years, eight of which were under President Obama. During that time everyone suspected she had poor health and we were actually understating it.
This would break the system and is the opposite of "reform". With true reform you would be able to propose rule changes and be fine if the other side implements them.
If Team Blue gives themselves 6 seats because they just want to pack the court then there's nothing to prevent Red from giving themselves +12 or more.
Blue failed to talk a dying Ginsburg into retiring and also let HRC run a second time. Those mistakes cost them 2+ Supremes, just like the GOP bowing down before Trump will cost them them a few.
It's not serious until they get more votes. Also 6 justices is deep into "court packing" territory unless you're planning on making them something than Team Blue's picks.
I was just listening to a "Democracy Now!" news report which went over the pager explosions without ever mentioning that they were purchased by Hezbollah and distributed to their members.
After Hamas was elected, they were offered the chance to renounce terrorism and become a political party. They refused.
It was hugely to their benefit to keep things quiet to take advantage of running a (micro)state. The question was what they were going to do with it.
It is very fair for Israel to think that a terror group that has refused to renounce being a terror group should be treated as a terror group.
When you say that Israel should have treated them differently, you're saying that Israel should have believed Hamas was lying when Hamas was claiming they were going to continue to kill civilians and so on.
DavidTC: They even offered a long-term ceasefire if Israel if would withdraw to 1967 boundaries. Is that the same as a full acceptance and peace? Not exactly, but pretty close.
Facts on the ground make the 1967 boundaries impossible. This offer meant they weren't interested in a "long-term ceasefire".
If you believe that the settlements and Israel's other bad behaviors are the cause of the Arab's bad behaviors, then Israel creates a Palestinian state and everything is happy.
Problem #2 is a lot of these examples of bad Israeli behavior are responses to their civilians being terrorized.
Problem #1 is the Palestinians have been very clear that "the Palestinian state" needs to cover all of Israel.
So we're still fighting over whether or not the Jews get a state.
To be fair, that region probably doesn't have enough land/resources to make two functional countries. At best we get one functional country and one sawed off rump.
On “Open Mic for the week of 9/23/2024”
Jaybird: how is *ANY* group not a vulnerable minority?
Depends on how much terrorism and hostility they have to deal with.
Israel/Jews has multiple hostile armies pointed at it. They've been subjected to genocide. Their opponents openly state that they either want genocide or "only" ethnic cleansing. Peace agreements keep falling apart on the subject of whether or not Israel will exist as a Jewish state.
The "vulnerability" of the Lebanese comes from their love of terrorism and desire to go to war with their neighbor.
I am a member of various minorities groups, including hanging around on this website. No one in the US is targeting any of the groups to which I belong.
"
RE: several million stateless people inside of the de facto state of Israel.
There is no future where those people aren't brutally repressed. They want the land of their ancestors back. That puts them on an ugly path which will have ugly consequences. Either they're going to be repressed by Israel or a local strongman.
I'm not sure that a local strongman is the better choice.
"
To "save democracy" you need to do court packing? There's some pretty heavy spin there.
Especially since Trump is something like 0-50 with his court cases attempting to overturn the election.
What this comes down to is Team Blue wants Roe back without doing multi-decades worth of heavy lifting that Red did to overturn it. You want it done and done now.
"
The most stable setup that I can picture is something like what the West Bank is now. The PA is paid off by the USA and Israel to repress their people and they do so because they're corrupt and it keeps them in charge.
That implies the PA being so unpopular that they can't win an election against Hamas is a feature and not a bug.
"
If we're going to be charitable, then the creation of a Palestinian state might defuse the dead enders.
The problems with this line of thought are:
Attacking Israel is extremely popular. This implies the Palestinian state can't be a democracy. In a democracy the people get what they want and the people want to refight a war. In addition the state would need to brutally repress the non-state militaries.
In theory having your own state would fix this but having a deeply corrupt repressive dictatorship running a micro-state next to a rich democracy implies problems. We also have the issue that if that dictatorship can't stop all the terrorism then Israel will need to step in which seriously undermines the definition of "state".
"
You don't have the ability to do this and constant suggestions that it should be done encourage both sides to break the system.
If you're serious about reform, then don't comingle it with court packing and get Red to cooperate.
Of course imho you're not serious about reform. You're just unhappy that you got outplayed and are playing Trump's "if I lose it's unfair" card.
"
Big study on UBI in the USA showed it reduced wealth and income. The researchers and media spun that as a good thing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyoMgGiWgJQ
"
This sounds like after the fact stock predictions. I also find it hard to believe a 160x return on money.
"
I don't remember the Russians giving info to Trump.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Links_between_Trump_associates_and_Russian_officials
"
RE: Ginsburg
Ginsburg was diagnosed with early-stage pancreatic cancer in 2009. Tumors were also found on her lungs when she sought medical care for broken ribs after a fall in late 2018.... On September 18, 2020, Ginsburg died at the age of 87, from complications of metastatic pancreatic cancer. (wiki)
Google says the 5 year survival rate for metastatic pancreatic cancer is 6%. I.e. it's stage four.
She died by inches for 11 years, eight of which were under President Obama. During that time everyone suspected she had poor health and we were actually understating it.
"
This would break the system and is the opposite of "reform". With true reform you would be able to propose rule changes and be fine if the other side implements them.
If Team Blue gives themselves 6 seats because they just want to pack the court then there's nothing to prevent Red from giving themselves +12 or more.
Blue failed to talk a dying Ginsburg into retiring and also let HRC run a second time. Those mistakes cost them 2+ Supremes, just like the GOP bowing down before Trump will cost them them a few.
"
The value of money has only changed by 5x from the late 70's till now.
What does "passively invested in Manhattan real estate" mean?
"
It's not serious until they get more votes. Also 6 justices is deep into "court packing" territory unless you're planning on making them something than Team Blue's picks.
"
The ways in which the two are different is less important to the way that they're same, i.e. that they're both terrorizing Israeli civilians.
"
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/9/25/israel-is-repeating-its-gaza-assault-in-lebanon-why
On “Why a Trump Loss is Best for Conservatives”
The counter argument is he said he wouldn't run in 2024.
The counter argument to that is I'm not sure how he runs from inside of jail.
On “Open Mic for the week of 9/23/2024”
I was just listening to a "Democracy Now!" news report which went over the pager explosions without ever mentioning that they were purchased by Hezbollah and distributed to their members.
On “Open Mic for the week of 9/16/2024”
If we're going to claim that social isolation and not traveling are a public good because of Covid, then this was absolutely a case of free riding.
It's impossible for everyone to isolate so the rest of us are supposed to in order to prevent (or just lower) the spread of Covid.
"
DavidTC: Hamas agreed to a ceasefire in 2005.
After Hamas was elected, they were offered the chance to renounce terrorism and become a political party. They refused.
It was hugely to their benefit to keep things quiet to take advantage of running a (micro)state. The question was what they were going to do with it.
It is very fair for Israel to think that a terror group that has refused to renounce being a terror group should be treated as a terror group.
When you say that Israel should have treated them differently, you're saying that Israel should have believed Hamas was lying when Hamas was claiming they were going to continue to kill civilians and so on.
DavidTC: They even offered a long-term ceasefire if Israel if would withdraw to 1967 boundaries. Is that the same as a full acceptance and peace? Not exactly, but pretty close.
Facts on the ground make the 1967 boundaries impossible. This offer meant they weren't interested in a "long-term ceasefire".
"
Rules are for the little people.
"
When presented with facts that disprove theories, the facts are right and the theories are wrong.
Most people have problems with that.
"
If you believe that the settlements and Israel's other bad behaviors are the cause of the Arab's bad behaviors, then Israel creates a Palestinian state and everything is happy.
Problem #2 is a lot of these examples of bad Israeli behavior are responses to their civilians being terrorized.
Problem #1 is the Palestinians have been very clear that "the Palestinian state" needs to cover all of Israel.
So we're still fighting over whether or not the Jews get a state.
To be fair, that region probably doesn't have enough land/resources to make two functional countries. At best we get one functional country and one sawed off rump.
"
DavidTC: a military shooting across international borders is generally considered an act of war.
Yes. Exactly that. Every rocket attack by Hamas and Hezbollah is an act of war.
So in theory, every rocket attack gives Israel permission to come in and level the place if that's what it needs to do to make it stop.
BTW that's why Israel didn't pull out of Lebanon after the PLO pulled out. The PLO was the biggest problem but not the only problem.
"
DavidTC: Hey, why do you think Gaza, a thing Israel is insisting is a sovereign country, doesn’t get to have weapons?
Gaza is run by Hamas, which is an openly genocidal terror group that openly and consistently targets civilians.
The trade interdiction was imposed after Hamas took charge. The economic and trade problems that Gaza has are a result of Hamas.
Legally, yes, Israel imposing a blockade is an act of war... however Hamas has always made it clear that it is at war with Israel so that's fine.
"
DavidTC: The only one it’s really given up completely is Egypt’s Sinai, which they eventually gave back. ...I suspect Israel regretted that.
Given the degree to which that part of land has been used to bring in weapons to Gaza? Yeah, they probably do regret handing all of it back.
Unfortunately "Israel handing land back" tends to become "Israel seeing that land used to support terrorism against it's civilians".
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.