*Shrug* I don't see any reason to worry about a president who is going to let a psychopathic dictator continue to develop nuclear weapons because he writes him "beautiful letters".

https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/08/12/boris-johnson-doesnt-want-no-deal-brexit-he-wants-to-win-an-election-jeremy-corbyn-brexit-election-cummings/
"[BoJo is] bluffing both sides of the Brexit divide at home in an attempt to consolidate the Leave vote and provoke his opponents into saving him from the near-certain catastrophe of a no-deal Brexit, which would threaten to destroy the Tories’ reputation for economic competence for a generation. Leaving the EU was never Johnson’s priority: It was seizing power. And now that he’s moved into Downing Street, Johnson will do everything he can to stay there."

Likely you, if no one else here, remembers the news of the Hungarian revolution of 1956. — tim wood

Before my time, but a very apt reference.

Ok, they deserve our support FWIW. Which probably isn't much. And let's face it, leaving us plebs aside, the wider world is very unlikely to do anything either. China is big enough to be approaching US style invincibility. In mafia terms, it's a made man.

It's modern East Asian state capitalism with a fascist smile (the PR term being 'socialism with Chinese characteristics'). The closest system is probably Singapore, a "democracy" which has had the same party in power, 'The People's Action Party' since 1959.

Emma Goldman's comment re Soviet Russia in the thirties is germane:

"Such a condition of affairs may be called state capitalism, but it would be fantastic to consider it in any sense Communistic [...] Soviet Russia, it must now be obvious, is an absolute despotism politically and the crassest form of state capitalism economically."

China does care about brand China, which is why, for example, it actively denies the existence of these, but it cares even more about control and quashing dissent, so if it comes to a choice between suffering a dent in its image internationally but not appearing weak domestically vs looking good to Joe foreigner but losing public face at home, it will choose strength and crush the protests.

Don't agree with this conservative writer a whole lot, but his comments in this article (from 2008) are still current and worth reading.

http://www.aei.org/publication/beijing-embraces-classical-fascism/

against all expectations, Scaramucci says something true'. :lol: — Wayfarer

:lol:

I do relish anyone sticking the boot into the wigged one, but until Moscow Mitch and his cronies decide they have more to lose than gain with crass appeals to the worst instincts of rural white males and the white working class, Trump will ride on.

The guy doesn't have a huge amount of credibility. I doubt anything he says matters except to the choir.

The Chinese strategy in Hong Kong has been to 'boil the frog', to gradually turn up the heat on democratic institutions and personal freedoms until they die away. And the strategy was more or less working until they got overconfident with the extradition law. So, now the frog has jumped out of the water and they're going to have to stab it to death to stop it. Which, unfortunately, I expect they will.

There are micro-arguments to be made about the ethics of some protester actions against the police: it often looks like the protesters are intent on goading them into violence. And up until very recently, security forces have been relatively restrained. However, the bigger picture is the encroachment of a fascist state on a disappearing democracy. Hong Kongers are right to resist and they deserve our support.

:death: :starstruck:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/jeffrey-epstein-camp-sends-pathologist-michael-baden-to-watch-over-his-autopsy

Thought so. See my edit. And I'd forgotten I'd previously registered. But it's worth the two minutes to have that site at your disposal if you're a language buff.

It's both a verb and a noun. Results here though https://www.english-corpora.org/coca/ do suggest you yanks predominantly use it as a noun.

Edit: Maybe you were just referring to my metaphorical use. In which case, yes, gotcha (literal use also predominant in the corpus).

Incidentally, I did once chase a guy away from a bike because I thought he was stealing it though he had no tools that I remember. Maybe it really was his bike :lol: (As it happens, he was white.)

The experiment fails because they didn't have the subjects doing the same thing—it's conceivable that the hacksawing looked more suspicious in itself than the hammer-tapping, and even if it wasn't, changing the activity invalidates the whole thing. Which is a pity because I suspect the underlying point is true but the filmmakers wanted to make sure they got the "right" result and gerrymandered things.

Edit: The video description says this: "They all used the same utensils (hammer, saw, plyers) for the same amount of time." So, as it should be. Why they only showed the white guy using the hammer and the other two using the hacksaw is beyond me then.

His enthusiasm for and knowledge of the subject were contagious and he was a great interviewer. RIP.

You're saying you made that in your kitchen or something?

What are you on about? You didn't create anything. You posted a diagram of a known chemical compound. You know what discussion you're in right?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imidazenil

Looks like Mickey Mouse with a hard 'on. Nice.

The shame orientation is corrupted by a kind of empty disavowal ("Look at me, I'm ashamed of my privilege. Can you leave me alone to enjoy it now?") or maybe a fear of association with pride ("These white supremacy guys are disgusting, so I should be the opposite... White shame?") as if the negation of one requires an embrace of the other. Seems to me humility not shame is the proper orientation and the distinction is probably most pronounced in the amount of publicity required to validate it.

I don't see May's deal as a compromise because the country is to polarised now. It is either total no deal exit, or revoke. Neither side would accept May's deal. — Punshhh

The deal was a compromise between Britain and the EU. The fact that Britain is internally polarised in no way negates that.

Not only is it the compromise, it's the compromise BoJo voted for when he thought he couldn't be blamed for it by the Brextremists. Now that it's his responsibility, it's morphed into inexplicable EU intransigence. Scratch head. Michael Gove is sad. So, we're in rewrite-history-maybe-noone-will-notice bullshit land. And Michael Gove is sad. Fucking frauds.

(I have a tendency to go off-topic myself but just a gentle reminder to all to please focus on the OP.)

You're kind of all over the place with this. I get it you like your country. It's just maybe not as superior as you think. But I'm not going to waste time arguing that point with you. I only suggest you consider travelling and maybe working abroad and see how that affects your perspective. Good luck.

I'll have a happy burger in response to these threats of imminent violence against my person, please.

But in order to have any responsibility for causing someone to do something, you literally have to physically grab their body and move it around. Kind of like puppeteering. And your emotional and behavioural responses to speech acts are just like menu items you pick and choose at your whim regardless of context. It's not like anyone can force you to do anything like they do in human puppeteering. History, psychology, and neuroscience all back this up. Like, totally.

me and my parents agree that the rest of the countries are garbage, which is why everyone wants to come over here — Shushi

You and your parents might consider educating yourselves on the wider world. The US certainly has its good points, but on most quality-of-life indicators (crime, education, health, poverty levels, environment, corruption, democracy indices) it's behind the leading OECD nations, the majority of whose inhabitants have no desire to move there.

The idea of people having guns to defend themselves from a Superpower state that somehow would start to act like a loose cannon is basically just ideological masturbation on how special Americans (and their Constitution) is. It gives this fantasy of 'being free' or 'standing on your own feet'. It has absolutely nothing to do with reality, nothing to link it with any historical facts of any political crisis or civil wars. — ssu

Well said.

It's worth drawing a firm distinction between appropriacy and utility here. One does not necessitate the other. Feeling a mixture of anger and indignation at your child being slapped in the face by a stranger is an appropriate reaction regardless of utility. Conversely, not feeling much and being concerned only with utility could be considered inappropriate. Same with mass shootings. It's not about being reasonable, it's about being human. (But it's not very on-topic so I'll leave it at that).

If you're going to quote in an OP (or any post), you need to say where the quotes came from for a start.

Suppose you have a young child and while you are out with them, a random stranger comes up and slaps that child in the face. You are outraged.

Suppose the same child gets cancer. You are deeply saddened. Now someone asks you why you are only saddened at a serious chronic disease but outraged at a temporary trauma. What do you say to them?

Please join the ongoing anti-natalism conversation mentioned.

You weren't censored, you were caught in the spam filter. Either that or big government did it.

@Hanover

Clearly, Hitler did nothing wrong. It was all just talk. The world we need is one where psychopaths and killers rather than have to do their dirty work themselves should be given free rein to threaten, coerce, and bribe others into doing it for them. That way, though we'll have much more death and destruction around, at least we can rest assured that we'll have absolutely free speech. Because in the end that's what's really important.

...schizoid scientific philosophy... — fdrake

So, very soon this will morph into "volcano souls" and we'll be talking Xenu and hydrogen bombs. *Grabs popcorn*.

U.S. comes in at seventh on this list.

http://www.oldest.org/politics/democracies/

Not all continuous though.

Also, the Isle of Man.

You might want to do something about this guy too, folks.

Your politicians are not going to kill you. That would deprive them of the opportunity to continue to make fools of you. In any case, this hysterical fear is probably best dealt with by mental health professionals. No-one here is going to be able to help you.