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OT: American Politics

Aberdeen said:
Need to see more of a media coalition on the left. Not just a bunch of disparait pockets, but something much more strategic. Also be more underhanded.
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Agreed. I've been thinking about this a bit too much since the election but I think the left has a problem that I don't know the answer to tbh. The right's media system is super easy. It's based on mostly white male dipshits saying shit to make their base angry. There's not expensive or time consuming involved. Syphon off a sliver of that day's news cycle, spin it through your personal bullshit lens and spray it. Literally the hardest part is doing it in a way that doesn't get you demonitized on youtube, twitch, etc. The right is just so much better at this rage bait media because their base is so much more susceptible to it. It exists on the left, but they're not nearly as popular as they are on the right. The wonky short form hot take just isn't as durable a business model on the left.

Where the left is much, much better than the right is in humour/satire, long form journalism/video essays, philosophical deconstruction, etc. All of these things are either time consuming, expensive, or require actual high levels of earned skill. Think of the Daily Show and it's many spinoffs and quasi copycats (which I guess is really just an extended version of SNL's weekend update...). They require legit levels of research and fact checking, actually talented comedy writers, actually talented stand up comedians/performers or it just sucks.

With that said, I agree that some sort of hydra like organizing entity that isn't the fucking democrats is necessary here. Even before Elon bought Twitter it was way more common to see dipshits like Pool & Crowder getting amplified through out social media on a daily basis way more than guys on the left with relatively similar media footprints like Pakman, Kulinski, etc. That's probably a good example of co ordination and organization on a higher level.
 
Wayward DP said:
yeah I accept that, I just don't know how it gets fixed I guess
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It doesn't. It simply ends.

The shelf life of any empire is about 250 years and the US is right on schedule. It is not exceptional, it is just another empire in the history of empires and it is devolving and dying just like they all do. The US is no different than Rome. The only thing is that unlike the fall of Rome, we won't have to read about the US in the history books because we are alive to see it happen with our own eyes. But make no mistake, it is happening right now. America is a failed state and its empire is dying.

Unfortunately for us, democracy is dying along with it.
 
Wayward DP said:
I think they do. or at least the majority of them.

or maybe the issue goes back to an inability to think critically and process information.
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Thinking people should trust numbers put out versus what they feel in every aspect of every day laugh is such a stupid thing to think.
 
Wayward DP said:
appointing Gabbard kills Five Eyes. likely by design


View: https://x.com/Arturmaks/status/1857069636321177849
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Like a lot of things, we're about to find out how durable our coalitions are without a reliable US partner. As an eternal semi-optimist I think that we're going to be surprised how easily we work around US unreliability on an organizational level, but how much we miss their capacity. For example, I think Europe has actually figured out that they need to be in charge of their own security and that the Russian threat to the European mainland isn't as big as it looks at the moment if they get moving on dealing with it now. But it's going to take years for Europe to replace the command and control aspects of US military overwatch that are beyond world class. For intel, the US satelite network is just fucking unmatched, our intel agencies will miss that dearly by partially adapt in other ways. Trade has already been starting to rewire itself into trade regions since covid, etc, etc.
 
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Tryamw said:

View: https://x.com/Osinttechnical/status/1856901019386405180
Well defense industry layoffs are likely if we stop.

That will fix the economy
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They won't stop.

imo the most likely thing re: Ukraine is that the donations of old equipment stop under Trump, but that you see more of the "lease" part of lend/lease in action where Europe starts footing the bill for US equipment (but use a significant chunk of the agreed upon budget increases to fund an increase in the size of their domestics arms industry). Now, this is going to have a weird budgetary effect in the US imo. To this point, the US has basically been inventing the cost of the donated equipment out of thin air (at a monstrously marked up cost compared to what it's market value as 30+ yr old decommissioned equipment would be on the world market) writing it into a bill and sending it over. This has massively inflated the dollar cost of US aid to Ukraine on paper. Basically the US has been giving $150 toilet seats and $700 wrenches to Ukraine. If Europe is footing the bill for this (and they should/likely will) they're going to be paying market rate for 30 yr old Bradleys. Their Euros will stretch much further than the previous aid dollars did.

Trump is transactional. Brussels has way, way, way more money than Vlad has to spend. They're not dumb, they'll buy American friendship. It's way cheaper than going to war in 3-5 years in the Baltics is.
 
WeHaveMoreCupsThanYou said:
It doesn't. It simply ends.

The shelf life of any empire is about 250 years and the US is right on schedule. It is not exceptional, it is just another empire in the history of empires and it is devolving and dying just like they all do. The US is no different than Rome. The only thing is that unlike the fall of Rome, we won't have to read about the US in the history books because we are alive to see it happen with our own eyes. But make no mistake, it is happening right now. America is a failed state and its empire is dying.

Unfortunately for us, democracy is dying along with it.
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I want you to be wrong for my own self-interest, but yeah, reality is a bitch right now
 
MindzEye said:
They won't stop.

imo the most likely thing re: Ukraine is that the donations of old equipment stop under Trump, but that you see more of the "lease" part of lend/lease in action where Europe starts footing the bill for US equipment (but use a significant chunk of the agreed upon budget increases to fund an increase in the size of their domestics arms industry). Now, this is going to have a weird budgetary effect in the US imo. To this point, the US has basically been inventing the cost of the donated equipment out of thin air (at a monstrously marked up cost compared to what it's market value as 30+ yr old decommissioned equipment would be on the world market) writing it into a bill and sending it over. This has massively inflated the dollar cost of US aid to Ukraine on paper. Basically the US has been giving $150 toilet seats and $700 wrenches to Ukraine. If Europe is footing the bill for this (and they should/likely will) they're going to be paying market rate for 30 yr old Bradleys. Their Euros will stretch much further than the previous aid dollars did.

Trump is transactional. Brussels has way, way, way more money than Vlad has to spend. They're not dumb, they'll buy American friendship. It's way cheaper than going to war in 3-5 years in the Baltics is.
Click to expand...
Sounds like it'll be a smooth transition to this administration as isn't that what Donnie does in real life? :geek:
 
MindzEye said:
Like a lot of things, we're about to find out how durable our coalitions are without a reliable US partner. As an eternal semi-optimist I think that we're going to be surprised how easily we work around US unreliability on an organizational level, but how much we miss their capacity. For example, I think Europe has actually figured out that they need to be in charge of their own security and that the Russian threat to the European mainland isn't as big as it looks at the moment if they get moving on dealing with it now. But it's going to take years for Europe to replace the command and control aspects of US military overwatch that are beyond world class. For intel, the US satelite network is just fucking unmatched, our intel agencies will miss that dearly by partially adapt in other ways. Trade has already been starting to rewire itself into trade regions since covid, etc, etc.
Click to expand...
you're more optimistic than I am. but I hope you are right
 
WeHaveMoreCupsThanYou said:
It doesn't. It simply ends.

The shelf life of any empire is about 250 years and the US is right on schedule. It is not exceptional, it is just another empire in the history of empires and it is devolving and dying just like they all do. The US is no different than Rome. The only thing is that unlike the fall of Rome, we won't have to read about the US in the history books because we are alive to see it happen with our own eyes. But make no mistake, it is happening right now. America is a failed state and its empire is dying.

Unfortunately for us, democracy is dying along with it.
Click to expand...
Who are the "Gracchi Brothers" of today? (that could've stopped it)
 
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