US Politics: Time for the Stormy season with a chance of conviction

[JGP]

21 minutes ago, Mr. Chatywin et al. said:

Pretty sure you read that stat incorrectly, but yes, it's a bigger daily concern than nuclear war. 

Appears so. I'll leave my ignorance unedited so any offended by my recent words in this topic may better dismiss them. 

 

21 minutes ago, Mr. Chatywin et al. said:

They're deterrents for states that don't want to be attacked. Irrational actors, especially stateless ones, could give a fig about all that. 

Some [most] people being weird about continuation is one thing, but no matter how they may post-rationalize their decisions, very few one makes are actually based on logic.

So this is hardly an argument against Ty, but, it might work if you were instead advocating deproliferation rather than: let those who have them keep them, and fuck everyone else.  

Edited April 14 by JGP

[A True Kaniggit]

53 minutes ago, Mr. Chatywin et al. said:

 

They're deterrents for states that don't want to be attacked. Irrational actors, especially stateless ones, could give a fig about all that. 

Fine. I'll put one my 'I'm Right' hat and lay things out plainly for you before my bedtime.

Below is what you posted, and what I responded to.

 

"I wouldn't be surprised if more developed nations have them than we think."

You think unknown developed nations have secret nukes, as in some crazy conspiracy..

And I said any developed nation that had nukes would reveal them as a deterrent.

 

Weird that you responded to this with some crazy tangent.

 

Edited April 14 by A True Kaniggit

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

1 hour ago, JGP said:

Appears so. I'll leave my ignorance unedited so any offended by my recent words in this topic may better dismiss them. 

Eh, we all fuck up now and then. Best just to laugh at it. Makes you a better person.

 

Quote

Some [most] people being weird about continuation is one thing, but no matter how they may post-rationalize their decisions, very few one makes are actually based on logic.

So this is hardly an argument against Ty, but, it might work if you were instead advocating deproliferation rather than: let those who have them keep them, and fuck everyone else.  

I just view it all as a game of chance. Some things have very high probabilities, so it's like rolling a six sided dice. Others are like rolling ten 100 sided dice and they all come up the same. It can happen, but I wouldn't lose sleep over the latter.

53 minutes ago, A True Kaniggit said:

"I wouldn't be surprised if more developed nations have them than we think."

You think unknown developed nations have secret nukes, as in some crazy conspiracy..

And I said any developed nation that had nukes would reveal them as a deterrent.

 

Weird that you responded to this with some crazy tangent.

 

Israel to the best of my knowledge still has never confirmed they have nukes, even though everyone knows that they do. Governments in general do their best to hide information. Would it shock you if in the morning you read that Australia had them? Or how about Canada? Looking at the list of G20 countries I guess South Africa and Japan would surprise me the most. Mexico too. Everyone else, fuck if I know. 

[The Anti-Targ]

I lack the insights to be able to analyse this video. It's predicting 301 ECVs to Trump pretty much achieved by Trump getting the 44 rust belt ECVs. The reasoning seems pretty sound to someone who doesn't know those states at all well. It does seem like to key to who will win is the rust belt. The person says the 3 rust belt states always go for the same candidate.

 

[JGP]

14 minutes ago, Mr. Chatywin et al. said:

Eh, we all fuck up now and then. Best just to laugh at it. Makes you a better person.

I usually can. Might be in a mood. 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

8 hours ago, A True Kaniggit said:

Pakistan and India are for each other. 
 

Israel for the surrounding enemy states. 
 

Great Britain and France are allies. 
 

I suppose North Korea and Russia fit your criteria. 
 

Which ones am I missing?

China.

[SeanF]

14 hours ago, polishgenius said:

I'm sorry but the seeming current trend in US political discourse to equate support for Ukraine and support for Israel as morally similar things or even vaguely similar issues

is

fucking

insane

Unfortunately, it’s probably the only way of getting aid to Ukraine through Congress.

[The Anti-Targ]

8 hours ago, Jace, Extat said:

I'm serious. The Uyghurs might not be in concentration camps if China didn't have nukes.

I doubt there is a connection. There are plenty of non-nuclear countries who treat minorities like shit, and who in the world would do anything militarily to help the Uygurs if China didn't have nukes? Iran doesn't have nukes (so far as we know) and the world has done jack shit to put a stop to its pogrom against the Baha'is that's been going on for over 40 years.

[Zorral]

2 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I doubt there is a connection.

Exactly. For a SINGLE instance, Rwanda, didn't and doesn't have nukes. They did a million person genocide with machetes.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Why yes, these investors True Believers are exactly who and what They say They are.

Small-time investors in Trump’s Truth Social reckon with stock collapse
Some Trump supporters who invested in his social media company have seen their share values plunge -— and see it as a test of faith

gift link no paywall to the article that leads with a great big old foto of a guy cutting down a tree.

https://wapo.st/4ayuwJl

Quote

 

.... In moments of apparent despair, some users work to lift one another up by arguing that they are enduring the same kinds of “deep state” attacks that had long shadowed Trump himself. When user @BingBlangBlaow said they were embarrassed to be so “deep in the red” and questioned why “everyone [was] acting like everything is fine,” Chad Nedohin, a Canadian investor and prominent cheerleader of the stock on Truth Social and the video site Rumble, responded, “No [one’s] fine with it, but we are DJT now. The deep state is making their run at Trump … and us.”

The user, however, posted afterward that the argument left him unconvinced. “I’m tired of blaming the deep state,” he said. Later, he added, “You would think that the ‘biggest political movement of all time’ would want to support the man leading it and get much better numbers than” this. (The accounts did not respond to messages and offered no way to contact them.) ....

 

 

[DireWolfSpirit]

Just give all your money to that dear sweet cheerleader Lara Trump. She rates the DJT stock as a Very Strong Buy, Buy, Buy!

 

[Rorshach]

10 hours ago, Mr. Chatywin et al. said:

Israel to the best of my knowledge still has never confirmed they have nukes, even though everyone knows that they do. Governments in general do their best to hide information. Would it shock you if in the morning you read that Australia had them? Or how about Canada? Looking at the list of G20 countries I guess South Africa and Japan would surprise me the most. Mexico too. Everyone else, fuck if I know. 

Well, as you say, everyone knows Israel has the bomb, and it has been common knowledge for decades. So given the NFT, the knowledge of the tech, the raw materials needed, and the destructive potential - yeah, I'd be extremely surprised if any other G20 had the bomb. 

I have no idea how you reason otherwise, tbh. 

[Jace, Extat]

4 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

I doubt there is a connection. There are plenty of non-nuclear countries who treat minorities like shit, and who in the world would do anything militarily to help the Uygurs if China didn't have nukes? Iran doesn't have nukes (so far as we know) and the world has done jack shit to put a stop to its pogrom against the Baha'is that's been going on for over 40 years.

Fair

[Fez]

10 hours ago, Mr. Chatywin et al. said:

Israel to the best of my knowledge still has never confirmed they have nukes, even though everyone knows that they do. Governments in general do their best to hide information. Would it shock you if in the morning you read that Australia had them? Or how about Canada? Looking at the list of G20 countries I guess South Africa and Japan would surprise me the most. Mexico too. Everyone else, fuck if I know. 

I wouldn't be surprised if a few close US allies under our nuclear umbrella started looking into the feasibility of developing their own weapons after Trump made a whole lotta statements while President saying the US shouldn't defend our allies. But I doubt any of them actually have any yet, both because a nuclear weapons program takes a long time to spin up and because I think they would announce they have them as soon as they do.

The only country I could at all imagine might have nuclear weapons but keep it secret would be Japan, because it would actually be against their constitution, much of their population would disapprove of it, and it would unnecessarily antagonize China to announce it. But its known that as early as the 1960s there were Japanese government white papers arguing that tactical nukes at least wouldn't be unconstitutional and their PM at the time told LBJ that Japan should have nukes if China does. So maybe they do have something.

Even if they don't right now, they have missiles and literal tons of plutonium and highly enriched uranium already, so they probably could put some together very quickly if they needed to.

[Zorral]

Not to mention Russia and China having control over the extraction materials out of Africa that are necessary to a program.  Including the 'merc' Wagner group.  Not to mention vast 'private' capitalist business conglomerates.

In the meantime I keep thinking that the machete geocide in Rwanda that lasted approximately 100 DAYS killed more people than died in our War of the Rebellion.

[Week]

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

3 hours ago, Rorshach said:

Well, as you say, everyone knows Israel has the bomb, and it has been common knowledge for decades. So given the NFT, the knowledge of the tech, the raw materials needed, and the destructive potential - yeah, I'd be extremely surprised if any other G20 had the bomb. 

I have no idea how you reason otherwise, tbh. 

I'd almost be disappointed if they weren't trying to at the very least. Every developed country likely has the ability to do so in secret if they wanted to and there are plenty of developing countries that would have an interest in trying as well. Libya serves as an example. 

2 hours ago, Fez said:

I wouldn't be surprised if a few close US allies under our nuclear umbrella started looking into the feasibility of developing their own weapons after Trump made a whole lotta statements while President saying the US shouldn't defend our allies. But I doubt any of them actually have any yet, both because a nuclear weapons program takes a long time to spin up and because I think they would announce they have them as soon as they do.

Again, I wouldn't assume they haven't started. It's very possible they felt no need to rush it in the past, but a very unstable Russia and US could inspire them to move forward.

Quote

The only country I could at all imagine might have nuclear weapons but keep it secret would be Japan, because it would actually be against their constitution, much of their population would disapprove of it, and it would unnecessarily antagonize China to announce it. But its known that as early as the 1960s there were Japanese government white papers arguing that tactical nukes at least wouldn't be unconstitutional and their PM at the time told LBJ that Japan should have nukes if China does. So maybe they do have something.

Japan is actually the country I find least likely of the bunch to do it. The combination of their historical horrors, cultural norms, political and legal systems just doesn't make all that much sense for them to do it. But to your last point, I wouldn't doubt every country that theoretically had the capability hasn't at least considered it regardless of whatever international treaties and resolutions they've signed. 

[polishgenius]

Who needs nukes when you can have orbital railguns?

[Erik of Hazelfield]

Sweden decided against continuing its nuclear weapons program in 1968 after having spent two decades to try to build them. The reasons were not only political but also economical. The program realised they had to build a uranium plant, heavy water plant, a uranium enrichment facility, and one or two reactors just to produce the plutonium needed. This was so costly and time consuming that they decided to scrap the program and pursue other means of defence. 

I take Sweden as an example because I happen to know about it, but I’m sure other countries have similar stories. Now, the G20 countries are far more populous than Sweden and have more resources, but that doesn’t mean they can automatically pull off what Sweden failed to do in the 60s. It also doesn’t mean it’s any better of an idea than it was for Sweden back then. It’s a shitload of money to build something you hope never to use and which may be of limited military use anyway. Nuclear weapons are only a true deterrent if you have lots of them and the means to deliver them to you target, i.e. ICBMs or advanced bombers, and lots of those as well so they don’t just get shot down in flight. You can’t just build one bomb and call it deterrence. And then there’s maintenance and training and security around those bombs… did I say shitload of money?

For these reasons, I don’t think any country has nuclear weapons apart from the already known ones. 

[DMC]

The concern about nuclear proliferation has never really been about the US (albeit, yeah, that’s part of it).  But rather more of a domino effect worry - which, in case you haven’t heard - was pretty en vogue during the Cold War.  China’s bomb begat India’s, which begat Pakistan’s.

Now, put those relations into the context of the Middle East.  Or sub-Saharan Africa.  Or even Latin America.  Not hard to see how even the most stolid IR observer can start to lose sleep at night.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

7 hours ago, Zorral said:

Not to mention Russia and China having control over the extraction materials out of Africa that are necessary to a program.  Including the 'merc' Wagner group.  Not to mention vast 'private' capitalist business conglomerates.

Well, Russia and China both have Uranium mines on their territory (in China's case it's in Tibet, but let's be blunt Tibet won't be free in the foreseeable future). Which is not that surprising. If your territory spans over a continent, you very likely have access to resources. Fun trivia. Canada has some of the biggest Uranium mines in the world. Like I said, if your country covers a large enough area, you'll have a fair chance of finding natural resources somewhere.

So China and Russia  are also sitting on the materials to produce domestically, if necessary.