US Politics - or: How I Learned to Love the Atomic Don

[maarsen]

Where does this crap about the USSR being a superpower ever start? The only people that considered the old Soviet Union  superpower were themselves and the US military so that they could justify their defence budgets. When push came to shove, the entire Soviet Union came apart like a cheap suit. When the veil was lifted we all saw the astonishingly decrepit state of the Soviet war machine. 

The CIA bragged about having a source in Brezhnev's office feeding them all the reports crossing his desk.   What the CIA did not realize was that Brezhnev was being lied to about the state of the Soviet Union. That was the reason for the big surprise when everything fell apart so quickly and so completely. 

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

1 hour ago, maarsen said:

Where does this crap about the USSR being a superpower ever start? The only people that considered the old Soviet Union  superpower were themselves and the US military so that they could justify their defence budgets. When push came to shove, the entire Soviet Union came apart like a cheap suit. When the veil was lifted we all saw the astonishingly decrepit state of the Soviet war machine. 

The CIA bragged about having a source in Brezhnev's office feeding them all the reports crossing his desk.   What the CIA did not realize was that Brezhnev was being lied to about the state of the Soviet Union. That was the reason for the big surprise when everything fell apart so quickly and so completely. 

With a nuclear stockpile capable of destroying the world 10 times over?

[Dr. Pepper]

Is anyone marching this weekend, either in DC or in their own city?  Is there enough interest to warrant it's own thread?  

I plan to march here in my city, though may choose a shortened route due to inclement weather.  Really looking forward to it.

[Lany Freelove Cassandra]

2 minutes ago, Dr. Pepper said:

Is anyone marching this weekend, either in DC or in their own city?  Is there enough interest to warrant it's own thread?  

I plan to march here in my city, though may choose a shortened route due to inclement weather.  Really looking forward to it.

There is a thread in the BWB forum.

We're lucky in that DC will be in the mid 50's on Saturday, partly sunny.  It wouldn't have been a surprise to find it below freezing and snowing

[Fez]

2 hours ago, Werthead said:

I think I made this exact same point a little while ago

Ah. My bad. I don't follow these politics threads as closely as I did prior to the election. Trying to focus less on political issues for now.

[Fragile Bird]

2 hours ago, Mr Fixit said:

Ummm... I have a functioning brain? Russia has clearly and openly indicated many years ago that, following NATO expansion to their borders, Georgia and Ukraine were their "red lines". We can agree or disagree with their policies, but that is a fact. We all know what sadly happened in those two countries. Extrapolating that onto the Baltic states or even more ludicrously Poland is fearmongering perpetuated by people who need eternal enemies to justify their policies. Russia isn't interested in attacking eastern Europe any more it's interested in attacking Jupiter. It's up to those who claim the opposite to sufficiently support those claims with credible evidence.

Reading your posts has just disgusted me. A functioning brain, really? But you've obviously had a frontal lobotomy. Poland has been repeatedly invaded by Russia over the centuries, by Czarist Russia and by the Soviet Union. The atrocities committed by the Russians after the end of WW II are recent enough to make Poland mistrust and fear Russia. Slaughtering 22,000 army officers, police officers, and members of the intelligentsia considered dangerous in the Katyn Forrest in 1940, a fact they repeatedly denied all the way to fucking 1990, doesn't exactly endear themselves to Poles either. And all the years under Soviet rule were filled with arrests and torture and murder of Polish citizens. When the war was over they stripped Poland of every piece of machinery and equipment they could move and took it back to Russia to rebuild their country. They took Poland's crops to feed themselves. They trapped citizens within the country's borders. They were fucking sons of bitches.

What weird part of your functioning brain tells you that a Russian is not still a Soviet? Especially under Putin? Try using that google-thingy on your computer and discover how many Russians view themselves as Soviets and long for the return of the Soviet Union.

And the Baltic republics, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, had Russian settlers move into their countries during their occupation, something that makes them especially leery of Russia, considering there are more than a million ethnic Russians living in their three countries. A nice base of spies and revolutionaries, just like what happened in the Crimea.

[Week]

14 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

What weird part of your functioning brain tells you that a Russian is not still a Soviet? Especially under Putin? Try using that google-thingy on your computer and discover how many Russians view themselves as Soviets and long for the return of the Soviet Union.

...MASGA! Make the Soviets Great Again! Clearly we know that Nationalism and biased (white/cis-male/hetero), short memories can long for remembered greatness that was (or never was - as the case may be). I would not be surprised.

[Rippounet]

59 minutes ago, maarsen said:

Where does this crap about the USSR being a superpower ever start? The only people that considered the old Soviet Union  superpower were themselves and the US military so that they could justify their defence budgets. When push came to shove, the entire Soviet Union came apart like a cheap suit. When the veil was lifted we all saw the astonishingly decrepit state of the Soviet war machine.

While this is true to some extent, it doesn't change the fact that the Soviet Union/Russia has always been a rather powerful regional power with its sphere of influence.

[BloodRider]

20 hours ago, DunderMifflin said:

It's like calling someone racist or sexist. Truth fails to matter once it happens.

Or like doing something blatantly racist and sexist and then claiming that it isn't sexist or racist because it's not slavery, or gang rape.  Morality fails to matter if we can only be judged by our most depraved.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

15 minutes ago, BloodRider said:

Or like doing something blatantly racist and sexist and then claiming that it isn't sexist or racist because it's not slavery, or gang rape.  Morality fails to matter if we can only be judged by our most depraved.

BR,

That's true.  However, lack of nuance and suggesting that racism is a binary examination (it is present or it is absent) serves to raise all actions however harmless or unintended to the level of slavery.

There needs to be a mean between these two positions.

[Mexal]

2 hours ago, Mr Fixit said:

I don't have the time for a thorough research, but just go ahead and type Russia or Russia Baltics in Google and see where it gets you. You will see close to ZERO neutral or positive news articles on whatever subject or issue. 

For example I found these headlines on the first 2 pages of Google News in the last month:

Russia's Secret Weapon to Invade the Baltics and Crush NATO: Soldiers Falling from the Sky

Russian activist: If Putin regains Ukraine, the Baltics are next

US Special Forces deployed at Russian border to defend Baltic states ‘scared to death’ by Vladimir Putin

U.S. Lending Support to Baltic States Fearing Russia

Baltic states like Latvia are wary of where Trump’s overtures to Russia could lead

Why Russia's military adventures worry Europe

How Russia could sweep NATO from the Baltic Sea

NATO: RUSSIAN AIRCRAFT INTERCEPTED 110 TIMES ABOVE BALTIC IN 2016

US stations troops in Baltic states facing 'threat' from Russia

A NECESSARY RESPONSE TO RUSSIAN AGGRESSION IN THE BALTICS

Yeah, I'd say propaganda is in full swing.

Yea except only a few of those articles are from the mainstream media (i.e. Washington Post, CNN, NY Times, Wall Street Journal) and the ones that are tend to be the most balanced of the bunch. If you want to say it's propaganda, that's fine because it likely is, but lets be clear it's not really the mainstream media that's pushing it.

[DunderMifflin]

55 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

.

 

1 hour ago, BloodRider said:

Or like doing something blatantly racist and sexist and then claiming that it isn't sexist or racist because it's not slavery, or gang rape.  Morality fails to matter if we can only be judged by our most depraved.

Judging based on political affiliations, which is if we are being honest is what the majority of racism and sexism discussion boils down to in our current climate, is not any less depraved though.

[Lany Freelove Cassandra]

4 minutes ago, DunderMifflin said:

 

Judging based on political affiliations, which is if we are being honest is what the majority of racism and sexism discussion boils down to in our current climate, is not any less depraved though.

So what you're saying is that just because you support someone with racist views, doesn't make you a racist. It just means that you don't give a shit about racial equality. No where near the same thing as being an actual racist.

[Sivin]

 

 

18 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

 

She could have served 6 months in prison and then be barred from certain associations and activities for X years would be an adequate and appropriate punishment for what she did. I dunno why people think shoving people in prison is a good or useful thing, aside from people who are a danger to society. Is Chelsea Manning still a danger to society? Highly unlikely. So why maintain the expense of keeping her in prison other than to satisfy punitive sensibilities?

This is actually something I would like to see as a big part of the democratic platform, prison/sentencing reform. Starting with the complete eradication of solitary confinement. If someone is an imminent danger to others you can put them out of reach in a prison without throwing them in a fucking hole and tossing the key for months on end.

There is no reason to send people to prison for decades for nonviolent crime, and no reason to send people to prison at all if actual rehabilitation isn't even attempted.

17 hours ago, Kalbear said:

It's very, very different for a lot of reasons.

For Snowden, he has never been tried of anything and would likely not return unless he had guarantees of a whole lot of stuff. Many politicians consider Snowden to simply be a Russian spy, point blank, and it would be hard to convince them to pardon him of anything. The intelligence community feels Snowden caused actual, legitimate harm to their operations and operators. The same isn't true about Manning (though the GOP thinks otherwise, likely because Chelsea is Trans and a much more easy target). 

Assange has never been even charged with a crime in the US, and as such there's very little to pardon him for. 

You're right, I was being brief for the sake of posting from my phone.

15 hours ago, karaddin said:

Thanks for being the first to jump in and say this. Every time some asshole does this, when its clearly intentional, its another reminder than any time someone doesn't like you they can stomp you down in the dirt stripping your identity. Fuck that, its not OK.

Re: Chelsea more generally - as others have already pointed out the time she has served was not only in cruel and unusual circumstances (an awful lot of solitary confinement serving a sentence as a woman in a men's prison) and longer than is a typical sentence for what she did. Its more than served as a deterrent and the legal consequences are going to stick with her for the rest of her life, aside from the social and psychological ones. If you want her to suffer more at this point its purely wanting to punish someone and I'd ask those of you I consider actually decent human beings why on earth you need someone who has clearly suffered a huge amount to need to dwell in suffering so long she never even has a life?

Before she leaked the information she was quite clearly undergoing a psychological breakdown whilst on duty, she reached out to her CO to try and get help and due to being short handed it was all ignored and she was pushed to keep working and bottling everything up. Even if you oppose what she did, surely that also functions as extenuating circumstances (again - just directed at the decent people like Lany and Zabzie, certain other posters have made their feelings more than clear).

This second bit is why even though I prefer to see the people have a voice on the matter, I feel overwhelming relief for Manning. 9 months is an insanely long time to spend alone in a box, the psychological scars will almost certainly never fade from that.

15 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

For those who have asked, why did Obama do it, I think the answer is clear. Obama is man who has compassion.

He also commuted the sentences of 1500 non-violent drug offenders.

One of the biggest reasons I love the guy, despite a lot of disagreements with things he's done.

11 hours ago, DunderMifflin said:

 

Concerning Manning, I'd let her out today if it was up to me. But as far as her treatment being cruel and unusual I have to disagree with that. Cruel yes, unusual no. In the context of American prison (and probably the world) it doesnt seem unusual at all. I guess it's all in how you define unusual, legally defined cruel and unusual punishment is extremely vague but untreated conditions, higher than normal sentencing, and solitary confinement are not at all that anamalous in prisons.

Locked in prison as a gender you are not is one thing but physically weaker and effiminate(not neccesarily gay) males can have it pretty bad in male prison as well. Or one just deemed an outcast in general is likely to have a terrifying experience. I dont know that incorrect gender imprisonment automatically means ones experience is more cruel or unusual than any of these others.

EDIT: if it's cruel and unusual in context of military prison I don't know much about that. I just don't like an idea that her treatment has been anything wildly cruel or unusual. That really paints a rosy picture of conditions of prisoners that doesn't exist.

I don't know about others, but for me the cruel and unusual referenced is the time in solitary. It's not just her though, it is used far too much in this country.

You simply cannot put a human being in a room alone for months on end. Full stop. It's fucking monstrous, a horrific practice that is absolutely inexcusable.

 

 

 

[DunderMifflin]

19 minutes ago, Lany Freelove Cassandra said:

So what you're saying is that just because you support someone with racist views, doesn't make you a racist. It just means that you don't give a shit about racial equality. No where near the same thing as being an actual racist.

No, that's not what I'm saying.

 Allowing you to be the ultimate decider of what is and isn't a racist view is not morally superior to allowing anyone else to do it. And I mean "you" in general not "you" personally.

[DunderMifflin]

3 minutes ago, WinterFox said:

 

I don't know about others, but for me the cruel and unusual referenced is the time in solitary. It's not just her though, it is used far too much in this country.

You simply cannot put a human being in a room alone for months on end. Full stop. It's fucking monstrous, a horrific practice that is absolutely inexcusable.

 

 

Indeed, its terrible.

I just dont want there to be a thought that her treatment is something outlandish in context of what goes on in prisons. Solitary confinement as punishment for contraband and suicide attempts is fairly status quo stuff.

[mormont]

34 minutes ago, DunderMifflin said:

 

Judging based on political affiliations, which is if we are being honest is what the majority of racism and sexism discussion boils down to in our current climate, is not any less depraved though.

If we're being honest, that isn't the case. If we think we're being really smart and perceptive and above the political fray but really, we're just kidding ourselves, we might think that. But if we really are being honest, then we shouldn't be going around making statements like this that have no basis beyond our own flawed perceptions.

[James Arryn]

25 minutes ago, DunderMifflin said:

No, that's not what I'm saying.

 Allowing you to be the ultimate decider of what is and isn't a racist view is not morally superior to allowing anyone else to do it. And I mean "you" in general not "you" personally.

No one's the bad guy in their own movie.

[DunderMifflin]

Just now, mormont said:

If we're being honest, that isn't the case. If we think we're being really smart and perceptive and above the political fray but really, we're just kidding ourselves, we might think that. But if we really are being honest, then we shouldn't be going around making statements like this that have no basis beyond ur own flawed perceptions.

Let me guess, this doesn't include calling someone racist or sexist right?

[mormont]

Just now, DunderMifflin said:

Let me guess, this doesn't include calling someone racist or sexist right?

Oranges, apples.