So instead we should just preemptively concede to the conservatives on everything? — Pfhorrest

If you'd like to actually read my posts before commenting on them I wouldn't mind at all.

Well, I've tried to say Paul (and you) just what the US did wrong, but from your 'clear minded moral vision' similar to a view from an ivory tower you simply dismiss any critique — ssu

The moral clarity is a requirement for credibility in such conversations. That's how I look at it anyway.

If Saddam and his sons moved in next door to your family you'd freak out, yes? You'd want something done about that, right? Your posts don't show much recognition of this reality. Thus I would ask, which of us is really living in the ivory tower?

But I do know some conservatives who deeply believe in him to this day. — Marchesk

Yea, well, this is a philosophy forum so we tend to think everything is about rational analysis. I think one of Trump's great gifts is that he's a clear minded realist, liberated as he is from any idealism. He's sees that human beings are like an M&M candy, with a thin hard shell of reason on the outside obscuring a much larger soft and squishy middle. You know, this forum too, driven primarily by emotional agendas.

I think we have to acknowledge the man has a great charismatic gift. Yes, he's a horrible human being who often sounds really stupid for sure, but truly gifted nonetheless.

Imho, the appropriate place to start a debate about tactics is with the clear minded moral vision which Paul has provided. I'm totally on board with that vision. Once one has a clear understanding that despots are a disease afflicting humanity, then a reasonable conversation can begin regarding how to treat the disease.

My objection to most Iraq war critics is that they typically get really confused and think that one of doctors attempting to treat the illness is the disease. And so for example we see endless bile aimed at Bush, and nary a word said against Saddam. A typical post from an Iraq war critic goes something like this...

"Of course Saddam is bad (five words) but but but [insert 23 paragraphs against Bush here]". — Iraq war critic

A reasonable critique might have suggested that a full blown invasion and occupation was an excessive treatment for the disease, so instead let's fire cruise missiles at Saddam and his buddies until we finally hit them personally and remove them from the planet. Or perhaps some other alternative to invasion.

And maybe the correct judgment will be that we can't really do anything about a particular despot at this moment in time, North Korea for example. That could be a reasonable conclusion, so long as we remain clear minded about what the North Korean regime really is, a gang of murderous thugs who are raping the North Korean people while stealing their freedom. That's not propaganda, that's just an accurate description of what's happening.

All these despots are just criminal gangs who are smart enough to steal entire countries instead of just robbing banks. Why worry about the cops when you can be the cops?

What made conservatives so convinced Trump is one of them? Most of all, what made religious conservatives think that? — Marchesk

I dunno. Perhaps they saw Trump accurately as a purely transactional actor, and concluded that he would deliver on his end of the bargain, which he did with the Supreme Court. They did a deal with the devil?

Hah! We have a very similar situation in our family - sister-in-law is Trump supporter. We love her dearly. The crazy making thing (well OK, one of many crazy making things) is that she (and most Trump supporters) is not stupid - AND - she voted for Obama in 2012. — EricH

All of us are bright in some ways and stupid in others. Some people are just politically stupid.

Voting Republican doesn't equal being stupid. Jeb Bush was governor here in Florida for eight years and nothing bad happened. He's a very intelligent and reasonable person. He's more conservative than I am, but that doesn't freak me out, a diversity of views is healthy.

Trump is something else altogether. Trump isn't really a Republican at all. He has no convictions other than his own personal self interest. Evidence....

Donald Trump donated $175,860 more to Democrats than Republicans from 1989 to 2010, — BallotPedia

https://ballotpedia.org/History_of_Donald_Trump%27s_political_donations

Trump was questioned about his previous political contributions to Democrats while on the campaign trail. During a June 2015 interview, Trump was asked why he donated to the Clinton Foundation and prominent Democrats, including former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (Nev.), and Obama White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel.

Trump replied, “It’s smart. It’s called being an intelligent person and a great business person. ... But the truth is that, you have to be able to get along with—if you’re gonna be a business person, even in the United States, you wanna get along with all sides because you’re gonna need things from everybody. And you wanna get along with all sides, it’s very important.

One thing I can say in favor of the kind of air war Paul suggests is that such operations do communicate to the despots that we can take them out with minimal expense, such as happened in Libya. That doesn't create democracy by itself, as we saw in Libya, but it does tell the next strongman to run Libya that there are limits to what they can get away with.

The way to do it is to portray them as psychopaths gunning down innocent people — ssu

They ARE psychopaths gunning down innocent people you nimrod. I stand with Paul in rejecting all such pseudo intellectual supposedly sophisticated fantasy moral superiority psycho-babble. All of that is childlike nonsense.

Debates regarding tactics for defeating the psychopaths can be reasonable. I've attempted to constructively contribute to such a debate above.

The hubris and the moralistic ideology — ssu

The hubris is a weakness, the moralistic ideology a strength.

Paul has the morality right, and other posters see the weaknesses in his tactics. The meeting ground is for other posters to drop their fantasy moral superiority poses, and for Paul to take a more open minded look at alternate tactics.

None of us want to see psychopaths machine gunning innocent people down in the streets. We are united in that. So let's focus on how we can help prevent such horrors in the most intelligent manner possible.

Fight the psychopaths. Not each other.

But since you're not accepting Libya, we need to try again, preferably on Iran. — Paul Edwards

What the Libyan example seems to illustrate is that while it is indeed possible to depose the dictator from air, that doesn't automatically lead to democracy.

Let's assume we could take out the entire Iranian leadership with precision air strikes. I doubt that's possible, but let's assume it is for now. What happens next?

The mullahs are not the only Iranians who'd like to be in charge. There are many other folks who would like to run the show, and it's likely they begin fighting each other, just as has happened in Libya. Some of those forces would be democratic, but such forces often don't win because they aren't ruthless or organized enough. See the Syrian civil war for example. We could then shift from bombing the mullahs to bombing other bad guys, but at some point so many bombs have been dropped that we lose support of the population.

My suggestion is that we recognize the moral superiority of Paul's freedom philosophy, and then reach for his goals with more sophisticated 21st century kind of tactics.

As example, notice how the Russians are not confronting us militarily but are instead working to undermine our faith in our own institutions. Notice how the Chinese are not confronting us militarily but are instead patiently playing the long game of dominating us economically. Even Bin Laden's attack was not military but psychological warfare.

How about developing methods that would allow us to talk directly to the Iranian people in a manner that couldn't be blocked by the mullahs?

How about looking for ways to funnel money directly to the Iranian people in a manner that couldn't be hijacked by the mullahs? You like air power? Ok, how about 1,000 drones flying over Tehran raining money down everywhere all over the city?

How about offering any Iranian who can get here and pass a background check American citizenship?

How about so infecting the computers used by the regime that they never really know who exactly it is that they are communicating with?

How about taking over their power grid and turning it off for a few minutes every day just to remind everyone that we can?

These ideas came to me as fast as I can type. If the full resources of the federal government were engaged in such creativity I'm sure the list of things we can do to undermine the Iranian regime, short of war, are probably endless.

1) Soviets invade Afghanistan
2) Fundies fight Soviets
3) Soviets leave
4) Fundies take power in Afghanistan
5) Victory for fundies

------------------

The Afghan government can not defeat fundies even while allied with the world's leading superpower, America, who has troops on the ground for 20 years.

America removes her troops.

What we're seeing now is the "Vietnamization" of the Afghan conflict. Face saving negotiations with the enemy, leading to our retreat, while pledging ongoing support. Government collapses. Enemy wins.

Nobody needed to "stand up" the Taliban. They stood themselves up, and sustained their assault without much assistance from outside powers. The Afghan government needs "standing up" because they don't want freedom as much as the Taliban wants to dominate.

What Vietnam should have taught us is that whoever wants victory the most is usually who wins.

Something similar to Afghanistan and Libya — Paul Edwards

I find myself conflicted in this thread. I applaud Paul's moral vision, which I see as being dead on, and very well articulated.

The tactics being suggested for the implementation of that moral vision seem unsophisticated. As example...

Yes, we had good intentions in Afghanistan, and conducted a brilliantly efficient dethroning of the Taliban. But 20 years later the Taliban has succeeded in exhausting us, and we are now retreating with our tail between our legs, just as happened to the Soviets. The Taliban are talking peace only to give us a face saving way to abandon the Afghan government.

Having defeated the world's two greatest superpowers, there is little chance the Afghan fundies will now stop short of their goals.

With the benefit of hindsight a better plan would have probably been to set up bases in northern Afghanistan from which we relentlessly killed terrorists, skipping the part about rebuilding the country, which we have proven ourselves incapable of.

The big picture is that the real threat is not all these little countries, but Russia and China. And they would like nothing better than to see us bleed ourselves to death in an endless series of inconclusive contests which alienate us from our allies, and our own fellow citizens.

This exhortation to use one's brains is completely absent in other religions and needs to be emphasized without hesitation of any kind. — TheMadFool

To use one's brain.

Step One: Find the on/off switch

Busy sorry — jamalrob

Aha, playing hard to get, a clever strategy which builds desire and demand. Make the people beg you. Brilliant!

In fact, it's not a problem. I presented it like that for fun, just to see how you'd all react. — jamalrob

Another troll! Jamalrob For President in 2024!!! :-)

Here's a formula to consider:

Ignore Trump, Embrace His Base

If we're serious as Dems we should be looking for every possible point of agreement with Trump's base, every opportunity to show respect. Here's a few examples, perhaps you can add more.

1) IMMIGRATION: The population of the US had doubled in my life time. It's not unreasonable for people to be questioning (as I do) how much farther in that direction we wish to go. It's not unreasonable for people to desire that we have control over our borders. It's not unreasonable to consider that new people be allowed in the country based on their ability to make a contribution.

2) ABORTION: It's not unreasonable for people to wish to place limits on the killing of babies. We don't kill senior citizens when they become inconvenient, right?

3) GLOBALIZATION: It's not unreasonable for people to conclude that both political parties have done a poor job of managing the impact of globalization on American workers. By failing to protect the workers in the affected industries, we Dems have helped bring on "America First".

4) RADICALS: Both Dems and Repubs have shown considerable interest in candidates far outside the traditional American political mainstream. It's not just the other fellow who is doing this.

Readers are of course free to begin arguing with all of the above in a highly predictable manner. The price tag for clinging to such procedures is that we'll be forever trapped in divisiveness, and razor close elections, that we often won't win.

One of the factors that brought us Trump is a longstanding pattern of snotty Democratic disrespect towards conservatives, rural voters, working people etc. Hillary Clinton's "basket of deplorables" being the easiest example.

It's fun to parade around in our supposed moral and intellectual superiority, but one of the price tags for that is a Supreme Court stuffed with conservatives for the next generation.

My wife is pro-Trump. What should I do? — jamalrob

Oh dear, so sorry.

We have a similar situation. My wife and I are on the same page. But my wife's sister, whom she is VERY close to, inhales Fox News and believes every word. They're dealing with their divide well enough, but it is painful for my wife who truly hates Trump to a degree I've never seen her hate any other person on Earth.

Having someone in the family who finds Fox New credible has helped bring the reality of the situation home to me. Perhaps strangely, I don't resent the sister because her political views are so immature that, on this subject at least, I relate to her as one would an eight year old child. You know, I have no expectations, and so am not disappointed.

I hate the US system though — Benkei

How fashionable! :-)

Still can't figure out how so many people voted for him after all that's been said and done. — Wayfarer

That's been a revelation for sure. It's a common cliche that people are stupid, but the width and depth of it is still shocking when seen in the full light of day. I don't know why I am surprised really, given that every other person in traffic tailgates us, risking everyone's lives, for literally no reason at all. I think I might be one of the stupid people too, or 68 years should have cured me of being shocked at any of this. :-)

Perhaps Trump is a canary in the coal mine, alerting us to the fact that vast swaths of the American public have lost faith in our institutions, and are thus ready to reach for radical alternatives. Trump will soon be gone, but unless that faith is restored some version of him is likely to return.

Many have correctly observed that this is not limited to America, but is happening all over the world. I think that tells us something important, and will analyze further in another thread.

Will people continue to call Trump "Mr. President" after he's no longer President as US citizens tend to do? — Benkei

I suggest we do with Trump what we do, or should do, with trolls on the forum. Ignore him entirely. Ok, easier said than done, gotta admit, but that's the direction we should be aiming for.

A key problem is that even we Trump haters reward his behavior by giving him exactly what he wants, our attention.

Ha, ha! Yea, the end is near, as always.

I think one of the reasons such an unlikely person as Trump was so successful (note the past tense!) is that he's a perfect match for the needs of corporate media. Their business model depends on the use of drama to build audience and ad revenues. Trump provides drama in abundance, and they reward that service with billions of dollars of free advertising (round the clock coverage of his every utterance).

Point being, when we're getting all our information through a system built upon drama and profit, the end will always be near.

I get most of my news from NPR. It's been interesting to observe that they are obviously not Trump fans, but they do a 3 hour special every time he farts.

We've been suckered by a world class troll folks.

Nope, but I can do research on what elections were like back then — Mr Bee

There was way more to the sixties than elections in the way of conflict. But speaking of elections...

Kennedy - killed in office

Johnson - refused to run again

Nixon - resigned in disgrace

I don't think that the country was as divided as it is now, at least not politically. — Mr Bee

Were you there?

What about the sixties was so bad? — Mr Bee

Riots in the streets of major cities, heavy death toll in Vietnam, assassinations (and attempted assassinations) of leading political figures, massive cultural upheaval on almost every front, hyper-divisiveness etc. The Cuban Missile Crisis! A firestorm that came, and then went.

I'm starting to think Trump is just writing a script for the next phase of his career.

Trump isn't an ideologist, he's a business man. And renting his name is his business. And his name is supposed to be equivalent to being a winner. He can't afford to leave office as the loser who was fired, so he's crafting an alternate story line, the brave outsider who was cheated by the system etc.

I'm guessing we may see him start something like TrumpTV, his own media network. He'll go from being king to a king maker, a pretty common career path for politicians out of power. Think Rush Limbaugh on steroids, no direct power, but tons of influence.

Honestly I can't really see how the US can survive like this. They're incredibly screwed as a nation. — Mr Bee

The sixties were far worse, and we're still here.

As for the rest - it would be my shame to be held 'credible' by people like you. Trust you to cite one of the most despotic and regressive of American institutions as an exemplar of behaviour. — StreetlightX

Every time you speak the credibility of this forum sinks another inch. Oh well, it's just a silly little forum, I'm being stupid to care, gotta agree there.

The problem is that you don't see that your candidate was a cartoon character as well — Harry Hindu

Thanks for sharing your complete nonsense!

I realize bashing Americans on a predominantly American populated forum isn't exactly the ticket to becoming homecoming queen, but it's not so wild to hold that the US has been and remains a predominant a force of enormous ill in the world - and a force that is accelerating. — StreetlightX

And yet, everyone seems to want to come live here. They're all lined up and pounding on the door, begging to be Americans. The population of the US has doubled in my life time.

As already stated elsewhere, your popularity problem is not that you challenge American policy, which seems entirely reasonable, especially on a philosophy forum. The problem is that you present your challenge in a consistently hysterical manner which undermines your credibility as a mod on a philosophy forum.

Do you wish to be a mod? Or a bomb thrower? Either might be a reasonable choice, but the two together doesn't work very well. I have the very same issue. I like rocking the boat way too much to be credible mod.

A mod should be more like a member of the Supreme Court, and less like a bomb throwing back bencher in the House of Representatives (or House of Commons).

The president has been saying the same thing over and over for the last couple of months — Echarmion

Part of Trump's political genius is that he talks non-stop (thus dominating all forms of media) but you can never really know for sure what he's saying. So for example, we don't really know whether he's going to try to use executive power to invalidate the election or not. And because we don't know, we're off balance, we're confused, we wait, we don't act.

Yes, he's been talking for months but that doesn't mean anything. What happens next will mean something. If he does nothing but talk, then he's an exciting Republican. If he acts to invalidate the election, then he's a fascist. He's cornered and will have to choose and show his hand.

While I'm honking, I gotta say, whatever happens we Dems need to sit down in front of a mirror and finally figure out why we continually find ourselves in close elections against cartoon characters.

Losing to Jeb Bush? Ok, there's no shame in that.

Having to fight tooth and nail to have a chance of defeating Trump? That's clear evidence that all the blame can't be aimed elsewhere. We've somehow alienated vast swaths of the population to an extreme degree. We need to figure out how that happened. Calling them a "basket of deplorables" isn't going to fix it.

Of course, if Trump wins, the opposing side need to just suck it up too. That's Democracy — Baden

That depends on how he wins. If he really does have the votes, then yea, we suck it up. If he doesn't have the votes but tries to use executive power to invalidate the election, that's something else.

I find it hard to see anything good about the results. — Echarmion

I'm not really disagreeing. I'm trying to articulate the following...

Most of the people who voted for Trump are Republicans, not fascists. To date Trump has been a closet fascist who has been able to convincingly play the role of being an exciting Republican. To the degree Trump over plays his hand in the coming days that facade may collapse.

When Trump says he's won before the votes have been counted people just laugh at Trump being Trump. But when the President of the United States says we should stop counting votes, that's different. Most Trump voters are not fascists. They don't want somebody on top deciding whether their votes should be counted. They want to vote and they want to win of course. But they don't want somebody deciding whether they get to vote.

Say you're a conservative Catholic single issue anti-abortion voter. So you hold your nose and vote for Trump. But do you hold your nose and vote for Mussolini? Such voters wish to use rule of law to achieve their ends, not abandon rule of law.

The voting is over of course, but there's still a public opinion election underway. Those with ultimate power may act if they conclude that there's a broad consensus emerging that Trump the Republican is becoming Trump the Fascist.

To the degree Trump overplays his hand and shows his true colors this becomes more likely.

I didn't hear Trump's speech yet. My wife stayed up all night and told me about it.

My first impression was that this is good. A Biden tidal wave would have been much better of course. But lacking that, it looks like Trump is about to totally over play his hand. All the other forces within the power structure may soon be concluding that this is an emergency situation which can't be handled with the usual procedures. Keep in mind that the White House staff has no guns. The only real hard power they have is that their orders are followed.

The US military swears an oath to defend the Constitution from all enemies foreign and domestic.

Will you answer the questions I posed earlier in this thread or are you just going to ignore it? — Benkei

I choose the later. You can declare victory if you want. Who cares? Not me.

He's committing fallacies, dismisses things he doesn't even take the effort to understand what he's arguing about and you think he's "kicking ass". Good to know you can't tell the difference between a fallacy and an argument. — Benkei

I'm sorry, you're totally out of your depth here, though your enthusiasm is applauded.

The Iraq war may not even deserve to be called a war of liberation, the US has made it clear many times that the war was to prevent Iraqi acquisition of WMDs. The war cost billions of dollars for the US, many lives were lost and WMDs weren't even there. The war damaged US credibility, it undermined US leadership and still today, Iraq is not far from anarchy, it is a place of instability and violence and its very existence is under threat. — Judaka

95% of the time, Iraq war critics will list all the price tags for the war, conclude those prices were too high, and base their argument on that judgment. They may be factually correct in listing the price tags for the war, but it's still sloppy reasoning.

The appropriate calculation is to compare the price tags of the Iraq war to the price tags of doing nothing.

As example, if an escalating nuclear arms race between Iraq and Iran had been the price tag for doing nothing, are we willing to pay that price? A million people were killed in the Iran/Iraq war without any nukes involved.

I believe such sloppy reasoning occurs because critics of the war are comparing the horrors of the invasion and occupation to a mythical imaginary state of peace which never existed. The critics had no interest at all in the Iraqi people until the Americans got involved so evidence like the Iran/Iraq war and Saddam's ruthless oppression are obscure to them.

Yeah, Ciceronianus the White @Hanover, what do you think? Lawyer material. — Benkei

Well, he's totally kicking your ass. Isn't that what lawyers are supposed to do?

Paul, I applaud your moral vision, and feel you make many great points. You're arguing your case like a skillful lawyer, which perhaps you actually are.

I'm not sure you're fully taking in to account the results of the last two invasions.

We've been in Afghanistan for 20 years and the outcome is still unknown. We're being forced to leave because the Taliban have succeeded in exhausting the patience of the American people, just like in Vietnam. The invasion of Iraq went a long way to undermining the unity of the democracies, basically making it politically impossible for more invasions until everyone alive now is gone.

Whatever the merits of such a decision might be, there is basically no chance we're going to invade Iran or North Korea, unless their armies roll across the border in to some other country, which neither despot is stupid enough to do.

It was only in 1945 that democracy became a settled fact in Western Europe. Almost in my lifetime. The Middle East is centuries behind us in political maturity. Many in the Middle East view democracy as "we get elected and then jail our opponents".

An invasion of Iran would be a huge roll of the dice. It could literally lead to WWIII, see for example American and Russian troops delicately avoiding each other in Syria. If Afghanistan takes 20 years, and Iraq takes ten, Iran could take a generation. As evidence, note how determined the mullahs were in resisting the invasion of Saddam. A million dead.

In order to control the air over Iran we'd have to shock and awe Iran's air force, all it's missile installations, and navy too. Trying to shoot the mullah's henchmen from the air in the middle of urban chaos all over the country is not likely to go very well.

You have excellent goals, we just need a more sophisticated strategy. This is a very long chess game.