Too busy with a second child, my job and attempts for a startup — Benkei

That sounds like you haven't much time to play the piano either (if I remember correctly, you had a piano).

was just wondering whether politics can ever be aa rigorous as science. Why can't politics be a science? Is it because it's too complex or is the subject itself an unscientific one? — TheMadFool

What we can do is apply scientific methods in the study of politics. This can be simply using statistics or sometimes more advanced models. First and foremost, we can start from the study of history, and try to get the picture of what has happened as correct as possible. Even that is very important to us.

In a way, politics or any social science is inherently different from natural sciences. We can see just how different things come to be in physics when a measurement effects on what is measured. There is a similar issue with the study of societies and people in societies: every historian understand that every moment in time, would it be now, the start of the 20th Century or middle of the 14th Century or whatever, is unique compared to other times. And nothing is as difficult for science as something being unique.

And lastly, the difficulties in social sciences don't make them less important or less advanced... as if telling something with a mathematical formula is somehow better than telling it in English. English is too a very useful language to portray reality.

So, nearly one year later since the last time this thread was active... people still interested in cryptocurrencies?

Bitcoin less than half what it was a year ago. I think the craze time (17000$ or so) was a canary in the coal mine moment, even if the crash hasn't been abrupt in the general economy.

My dad decided to join me with the experiment. We'll have 200 EUR to burn, which is enough to test the system, trade costs, liquidity, settlement times etc. etc. — Benkei

How did it go, Benkei?

Even if I don't live in the UK, I do presume that the British media, as just like any media for that matter, will portray the whole event bigger than life to get people simply to follow the media. And unfortunately some older people will likely believe that food will become scarce, riots will take place and the whole thing will be something equivalent to the wartime Blitz.

This is like the summer before WW1. — unenlightened

Not only is it winter, but even so, this is a bit too dramatic.

Perhaps the no-deal-Brexit is something equivalent to the Y2K scare? Not something to get hysterical about.

This seems a reasonable explanation for a scientific theory failing in its implications (predictions). — TheMadFool

The devil is allways on the premises.

If I remember correctly, even Marx himself said that the proletariat might not go after communism, but simply demand higher wages. (Which in fact would have been the more correct theory with historical development in the West)

Yet since we are talking about the scientific method, the premises have to be with reality. It's bad science if we assume a premiss for our model that isn't true.

Seems to me Marxism has a normative and a descriptive element. — Joshs

Actually, the problem is that social sciences have all a normative element. Politics makes it so. If you say something about the society or it's economy, people will immediately jump to normative questions. Hence so many "natural" scientists are with the view that these humanities aren't science.

Is it subject to empirical test? — Joshs

In a way, there should be the possibility, but as usual there are a lot of problems. How accurately it can explain history, how accurately it can make forcasts. But I would note the word should. Something like the laboratory tests of the stem field we obviously cannot do.

in my opinion, the Marxist explanation for why the predicted class struggle didn't materialize is reasonable. Marxism requires the proletariat to be aware of their condition as a precondition to a revolution. If this didn't happen then their prediction will fail. All that needs to be added to Marxist theory is the necessity for the working class to realize their situation. It's not that radical a change to the theory and so, according to me, Marxism can still be called a scientific theory. — TheMadFool

Living up to your name, eh?

There's absolutely nothing scientific, nothing engaging the scientific method about an erraneous theory that history has proven didn't happen anywhere and has allways lead to totalitarism, violence and economic failure when implemented. The way marxism puts people into classes that are somehow destined to be against each other, hence promotes a violent struggle and advocates totaliatarism (in order to get to communism) has nothing to do with science.

And before you think I would assume some political ideology would be more scientific, I would make the observation that none of them are scientific.

All political ideologies have nothing to do with such an objective method as science as they all are in the end normative endeavours. Science isn't normative: science doesn't make claims about how things should or ought to be, how to value them, which things are good or bad, and which actions are right or wrong. Political ideologies do that and basically ought to do that.

There's definitely a benefit to this sort of decentralisation. For one, if you want to lobby for something, you need to lobby in different countries, making the EU less suspectible to inappropriate lobbying efforts as we see in the USA (obviously, it still happens). — Benkei

There's strength in that different countries can handle things differently and everybody isn't pushed into the same mold. Historically large centralized states have not created an innovative environment, but have just given rise to bureaucracy and in the end stagnation.

I also prefer there not to be a single EU army for similar reasons that I don't think a powerful, centrally governed military-industrial complex is useful. — Benkei

This is one of the most stupid ideas out there, which a) won't work, b) won't get the benefits visioned about it and c) there is already a NATO that does work... President Trumpov won't have the US resign from it (so NATO is here to stay).

We've seen on and on how ludicrous it comes when a Typhoon fighter is shipped around Europe to be made and how difficult it is for different countries to agree on what specifications their weapons have to have. In reality it doesn't improve much the European military industrial complex.

And the most simple nail to the coffin of a "single EU army" is that it will be nothing else but a hodgepodge assortment of units from various countries. That's the only thing some politicians want as NATO naturally goes the way the US wants.

There is absolutely no intention to truly create an interstate armed forces that would replace the national armed forces. Nobody truly has an idea that lets get rid of the national departments of defence have just one interstate department of defence and one single armed forces. It's as whacky as an idea that all police forces of EU member states would be merged into one organization lead from Brussels. Who would command it? How would it be financed?

I see. So, you don't see anything of note in this. — TheMadFool

That's not actually my point.

It was that being obsessively concentrated on any issue might drive to mental problems. Hence the reference to artists going mad. Especially they can use alcohol or drugs to get "inspiration" and profound emotions to describe. The issue itself, mathematics, science or art, isn't dangerous.

I've heard people warn others to not overthink as if there's such a limit to cogitation beyond which it may be harmful. — TheMadFool

Here it's not a limit of cognitation, but a limit of overthinking... being focused on one thing. The limit of cognition is quite easy to find and isn't so damning: one just doesn't get something. I'm sure you as I know the feeling.

Sometimes when you study truly hard and do thinking for a prolonged time, it's better to take time off and do something totally else. Have a good sleep and in the morning it's all better as you can focus better. Now I'm not a psychologist or know the field much, but I would guess this problem of overthinking is more of a problem of obsessive behaviour, which itself can have bad consequences.

The EU does a bad job of explaining how it functions so your mistake is understandable. Meanwhile, what most people will be amazed to know is that the EU is fundamentally more democratic than the UK. — Benkei

The basic difficult here is to understand that the EU, however it wants to be a federation, is still what you would call a confederation. In fact if someone argues that the EU has a lack of democracy because the EU Parliament doesn't have much say, I beg to differ. Strengthening the EU Parliament would just lead to taking power away from the parliaments of the member countries. I myself am far more happy with EU being an assortment of independent states rather than something else.

Well, let me try at this from another angle. Some of the, what I call ''good stuff'', really difficult concepts in subjects like philosophy, math, science, etc. are beyond the mental reach of ordinary folks. — TheMadFool

Or even the science crowd, usually. Never overestimate the intelligence of academic people. You see, thinking out of the box is as difficult for them as it is for other people.

One favorite example of mine is that the late Stephen Hawking argued that Isaac Newton could have been explained that his theory had a flaw. And because Newton, presumably, was such a genius, he would have understood this Hawking argued. Yeah right, as if Newton was a personality would have taken it easily that his theory is false and one has to have relativity. And what would be the argument here? Some weird contraption called the Michelson-Morley experiment? At least Thomas Kuhn got something right in his ideas of scientific paradigms.

Actually Newton was quite a mediocre science-official (as the president of the Royal Society), which post he was elevated after his breakthrough work.

The interesting thing is that when you get over 100 000 leaving the country in one year, even if that isn't a huge number to the whole population, that does automatically have an effect on the GDP growth, especially when one earlier had an influx of EU migrant workers.

Of course, immigrant workers are a sign of a strong economy. Them leaving is similarly a sign of bad times.

I imagine that they similarly have a lower unemployment rate and less need for benefits as the local populace and as group are a net contributor. — Benkei

Of course. EU migrant workers are a different breed from Third World migrants, that's the ugly truth.

Interestingly, the British statistical office did give earlier employment figures (for 16-64 year olds) about EU nationals, UK nationals on other nationals living in the UK.

The stats were (last May):
81.9% EU nationals employed
75,6% UK nationals employed
63% non-EU nationals employed.

Now the British statisticians divide the group just to UK and non-UK residence, which then shows that non-UK residence have a slightly lower employment level. More politically correct, than the statistic that other EU nationals are better employed in the UK than the aboriginals.

That's why net migration from EU is still 100,000 p.a. despite Brexit. — Inis

Really???

Here's your latest official statistic (Nov 2018) on this issue:

• There were 2.25 million EU nationals working in the UK, 132,000 fewer than for a year earlier (the largest annual fall since comparable records began in 1997).

See Office for National Statistics, latest release

Yeah, the largest fall since the records began. Good job getting the data right, Inis!

If what I say is true then all the geniuses in science and math have been walking a tightrope - precariously balanced on a thin line, with high risk of falling (insanity). — TheMadFool

I say you are wrong.

All geniuses aren't walking a tightrope, and mathematicians don't have a high risk of falling insane. There will be for sure at least one very gifted mathematician who isn't insane or hasn't a high risk of falling insane, hence by logical reasoning your argument is false.

The term 'genius' in popular terminology has a mix of a positive and negative aspects in it. That's why President Brainfart in his mentall illness had to declare himself a very stable genius. Yes, you might feel a bit worried if the person having the nuclear launch codes is a genius. A 'genius' can be very unpredictable.

The idea is that as people are on such an edge of knowledge and beyond what 'ordinary' people can fathom, that they have the risk of losing it. This view emerges from the idea that 'smart' or 'mathematically gifted' people are some kind of a different breed from others. Although stereotypes may have an inkling of truth in them, they are still stereotypes.

What do the British MPs and the government want exactly? — Benkei

Same thing that the Scottish wanted from the UK: nice independence, but all things good for business to stay as it was in the union. It's called cherry picking.

Assume you think just about mathematics. Nothing else at all. All the time. Now, if you get to be not only eccentric compared to others, but this makes other things like interaction with other people and to do other daily issues difficult, you shouldn't be suprised.

It's not because of the math or knowledge. A lot of people working in arts have also had mental problems, even if their artwork has been brilliant. Yet should we then argue that art is dangerous? Are we better off with art?

(Ps. Have you seen Darren Aronofsky's Pi?)

Yet, a significant portion of the population still exists in a threshold society, in that a significant portion of the population is living paycheck-to-paycheck, trying to reach the wealth threshold required to sustain themselves. — Bliss

That "sustaining themselves" has a variable threshold. A lot of people live paycheck-to-paycheck to maximize their utility.

The majority of people living this way do own a car (even if an old cheap one), a home (even if not in the best neighbourhood), have clothes and don't go to sleep hungry because they cannot afford to buy any kind of food. Their consumption and spending might be meager compared to others, but who we compare to is the question.

The whole problem is that povetry is usually defined as the from some low percentile of the population. Threshold society, especially historically speaking, would be something totally different. Hence if by one statistic in the US about 1,3% live on less than 3.25$ (PPP) per day, in Congo about 90.1% live on 3.24$ (PPP) or less.

Right, I think this expresses the beginning of my argument very nicely. But there is a follow-up challenge. What is the difference between a sheep, and a wolf in sheep's clothing? An answer has to avoid essentialism, and your 'just' is doing all the work for you. It's not just a cloak for racism, it's that and also a legitimate nativism. — unenlightened

There's the Paradox: nativism gives a premise to racism (and xenophobia), yet is also the cornerstone of any ethnical or cultural identity. Just like patriotism and nationalism or jingoism are related. It's just what the viewpoint you select to look it, which typically is a bit illogical in our present society. As the joke in the university went, ethnologists study and are fascinated of all human cultures except their own, which they loath. Or that in the US promoting your ethnic/racial identity and heritage is fine... except when being a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant.

The illogical attitudes basically comes from hypocrisy, that we want to be far more good and benevolent than we are and get tangled up in our so righteous reasoning.

The "sentinels" are the perfect example of this hypocrisy. As the island is so small and meaningless, the Indian authorities have made it an example of how a benevolent actor the country is. Would the Island be more important, then ages ago somebody claiming authority would have "put down the law" to the place. Now we can ponder about the rights of the "Sentinels", but if they would have been in contact with outside culture and would clothe themselves in Nike T-shirts and shorts and speak broken English, we wouldn't care a rats ass about them. Likely that idiot American who got killed wouldn't have gone there in the first place.

That's how actually the "noble savage" thinking goes.

If the states start doing something that the federal government doesn't like, the President and Congress have a certain amount of latitude in reigning them in. (California for instance, being an especially large state and large economy, has a lot of economic muscle to throw around, and has butted heads with the federal government on certain issues, e.g. emission standards for autos.) — Arkady

California is equivalent to something like Germany being the 5th biggest economy in the World (if counted separately). Hence if these state level actors would actively start creating their own relations because Washington DC isn't capable of doing it, that might make things interesting. As long as they get their agenda pushed through their people in Congress, everything works fine. But if for some reason it becomes even worse than now, states may opt being more independent. Yet the biggest obstacle for true secession is an ideological and truly important one: Californians relate to being Americans, not being separate as Californians. Even with the Texans, their brief stint with independence is more of a peculiar historical oddity now, not something that Texans truly relate to. Nothing compared for example to the Scots and their heritage of Scotland or how it is with Catalonia and Spain.

In fact, it seems to me that the rare discourse of state secession in the US is mostly a hypothetical one usually discussed by people who are not happy about the current state of the federation.

My view is that the only cohesive idea in all of this, is that it all serves Russian interests. And we have to admire our enemy for how he has and is - and is likely to continue to - manipulate us. But my gosh it's dangerous. Putin gets it into his head he can try to reclaim the Baltic states, or even try the Fulda Gap with a tank or two, and you can cash in your annuities. — tim wood

The Fulda Gap of today would be the Suwalki Gap or corridor, btw.

The important issue here is that thanks to a brilliant spy master as head of state, Russia was one of the countries which mastered propaganda in the age of social media. It shows how easily a determined state actor can influence the discourse in social media. I think another far more subtle actor has been the state of Israel. Hence internet and social media didn't give us total freedom as anybody can get his voice heard as sometime portrayed, it just took for a while for state actors to understand the new media.

Nial Ferguson makes a good comparison about our times and the time the printing press was invented and argues that our time resembles the late 15th Century. The printing press was a huge revolution in the cost of spreading information and creating a way to communicate. While an important positive breakthrough, it also had it's downsides. Europe saw the wars of Religion, where the new ideas were spread through the new media, which hadn't existed before.

It's times like this that I wish Sarah Palin were back running the show in Alaska. It was only her steely resolve, diplomatic finesse, and deep knowledge of the intricacies of geopolitics which kept Russia at bay (did you know you can see Russia from Alaska? Really see it!). — Arkady

Yep.

But actually you touch an interesting point, that is namely the states or districts, below the national level, and their role in international relations. Many times, especially in the forgotten North where your stable genius isn't building a wall, the states and local actors that share the border with another country (like Canada) do have a genuine need and urge to establish relations with their neighbours at the local level. I remember here the governor of Lapland (female btw, as Sarah Palin, but there the similarities end) saying: "We have more connections and a need for more connections to Finnmark, Norway, than to the capital Helsinki" and continued that basically the Capital was a thorne in the side for Lapland in these issues.

With the government shutdown and with the debacle called the Trump administration, it might create and environment where US states might decide "Fuck this, we'll deal with our neighbours ourselves" and there might be similar aspirations on the other side.

Karl, you're not making a great case here. Leave won by lying; but remain deliberately lost by lying. — unenlightened

Sounds similar to when we had the join EU debate in this country.

The "Join" crowd painted a picture of the gates of paradise opening with EU membership and the "Don't join" crowd painted a picture of utter doom, perdition with the end of our independence. Back then the old politicians with warm ties to Russia dominated the "Don't join" crowd (so things have some continuity at least here).

Neither side was anywhere near being correct, but their lies live on. The realistic prediction that "things actually won't change so much for the ordinary person and from the viewpoint of the ordinary person" would have been far better, but who would campaign with that kind of slogan?

I'd like to see what happens when(if) the money runs out from the Department of Defence.

Unfortunately that will happen only next fall as the Department of Defense is funded through September 30, 2019. But as you have the Greatest dealmaker ever as President of the US, it could be a possibility.

It would be great to see the response by Americans and in the media. Because as the Russians routinely check the response times of the USAF, if the aircraft remain grounded, the Russians will surely violate US airspace (just like they did with Sweden and Swedish airspace some time ago on a sunday, when the Swedish Air Force was incapable of launching aircraft to intercept them). A Tu-95 Bear doing victory laps over Washington DC might not happen, but you never know. That the government workers relying on food aid to feed their families would be the ones responsible of the nuclear arsenal gives a nice twist to the story. Would be like the end of the Soviet Union times!

How intense would be the accusations then by both sides would be a spectacle.

I get it. Uk must pay £13billion membership fee, £4billion in fish, £4billion in benefits to EU citizens, and suffer a £95billion deficit in traded goods, so your country can benefit to the tune of EUR10billion?

Anything else you want? — Inis

Ah yes, the mercantilist whining about a trade deficit. This is a Basic problem: people don't know or understand international trade and how beneficial it actually is. You only have to say that a) there's a trade deficit and b) foreigners are taking the jobs, and people go straight into believing the lies that trade barriers and "protection" of your domestic industry is the way to go.

Besides, the Dutch pay per capita (that means per person) a lot more to the EU than the British do (Benkei has explained), so again a questionmark on your crying about payments to EU.

After all, before the EU payments were simply a method of transferring money to the agricultural sector: in the 1980's like 70% of the EU budget went to agriculture and even now about 41% go there.

Your principle is sound, but does not apply in this case. — karl stone

Why so?

How couldn't the rulers be oblivious to the fact that what they are proposing could go wrong? To think that fine, we have the support for EU membership, perhaps we can silence the opposition with a referendum that we will win?

I am generally in agreement with Hanlon's Razor, the aphorism being: Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

But it's not adequately explained, and Cameron is not stupid. He had a first class degree in PPE from Oxford and rose through the ranks of the Conservative Party like a rocket to the pinnacle of his profession - and you're saying he was a bumbling incompetent who fell out of the EU by accident? — karl stone

Having a degree from a highly respected university and being a rising star in the ranks of a political party doesn't mean you have a grasp of political reality at all. Stupidity here doesn't mean that the person would score low in an IQ test. Stupidity here means that you go with the thinking of the power elite and being blind to your own hubris without actually realizing what you are doing and only in hindsight realizing how bad decisions you have made.

Just think about another example: Blair supporting Dubya's invasion of Iraq. How much applause and popularity did he get in hindsight for that? How crucial was it for the UK, really? The French passed that one and yes, Americans had their cry baby tantrum with "freedom fries" as a result... and forgot the whole thing later as they usually do.

And then when Obama wanted the UK to join a similar endeavour with bombing Syria, the UK did pass. Result: Obama didn't do anything, in fact he didn't start a war which he had promised. How worse did the relations got after that?

"Talented stars" in the political arena can make quite easily bad decisions they regret later.

Less than 8% of UK GDP depends on selling goods to EU. — Inis

What about services, though? Particularly financial services. Many of them have already departed for Europe, I believe. — Pattern-chaser

44% of all British exports (that is products and services) went to the EU. Of the imports the UK got over half of them from the EU.

From one statistic, UK trade-to-GDP ratio is 28,1%. That would give that trade is about 12% of GDP, a bit higher than 8%, but roughly in the same ballpark (as the statistics, exact time and measurement can differ).

Hence, that 8% or 12% might sound little, but if there are huge changes, the effects are big. Let's not forget that a -2% GDP change one calls a severe recession.

Naturally if City would lose it status as an European financial hub, that would have dramatic consequences. I assume it won't, the British aren't so crazy, and simply the EU isn't as determined to really challenge London's position.

UK citizens already have to register their residence in Finland — Inis

Looking at the timid plea asking people to register, I'm not so sure how adamant the authorities have been of this with Britons as members of the EU. You see, in our small northern country, Britons make only a tiny community. It was earlier reported that there are 4 000 Britons living here. Then the figure climbed to 4 500 and now the number has gone up to 5 000. A 25% increase tells that the numbers weren't so exact in the first place.

Britain, of course, which has to put up with hordes of Finns coming here to take advantage of the wonderful happy life that we all lead here with our super-generous benefits system and state of the art health service. — unenlightened

Of course! In your Island Kingdom there are 20 000 of our lazy freeriders with Finnish passports enjoying your benefits and just idling around and drinking beer. Just like my best friend, who works there in a managerial position at BP. Hope you throw all those bums out and among them my friend, who then perhaps has to take the job offer from the Norwegian Statoil. He just dismisses the whole Brexit thing as a non-event, so rudeness from his country of residency would be good for his cocky attitude.

And as the EU messes up everything (where the EU, there a problem) and your politicians seem not to be better, a total fiasko is possible. Looking at it positively, it would be nice that we would go back to old time travelling days when not only did you need a passport, but also a visa to enter a country. And what else to get people more happy than to make a huge immigration chaos and demand people to apply for residence permits everywhere. I can imagine all those over one million Britons living in the continent and those millions of EU citizens in your country waiting in line in overcrowded immigration centers along with the Iraqis, Syrians and Afghanis.

Here the applications from Britons for Finnish citizenship has gone up over +200%. Yet what better thing to do than create a problem for a group of foreigners that really in no way have been a problem here. Here's one story:

Originally from Manchester in England but now living in Tampere, Andrew Frankton is just beginning the process of applying for Finnish citizenship. Having lived in Finland for 22 years, he certainly meets the residency requirement - but his application is currently hindered by his poor Finnish language skills.

“If you put a gun to my head and said ‘speak Finnish’, I would just say ‘pull the trigger’,” jokes Frankton.

Undeterred, he has been attending Finnish language courses and he is determined to reach the proficiency level required to pass the YKI language test required for all applicants to qualify for Finnish citizenship. Without Finnish citizenship, his status as an EU national resident in Finland could be in question.

Unfortunately, my friend might be correct that not much if anything happens with a no-deal Brexit on the surface. Even the EU Comission has urged to take easy with Andrew Frankton and with other Britons here.

When it comes to Brits living in Finland, the Commission says the government should “take a generous approach to the rights of UK citizens” and “should take measures to ensure that UK citizens legally residing in the EU on the date of withdrawal will continue to be considered legal residents”.

Even here the officials are preparing for the no-deal Brexit:

If you are a British citizen living in Finland, here is what we recommend you to do:
•Register your right of residence in Finland, if you have not done that already.

The registration might be of advantage if the United Kingdom decides to withdraw from the EU and British citizens are required to apply for a residence permit in Finland in the same way as any other so called third-country nationals.

One could say that we, as a group, haven't attained the status of critical thinkers as yet. So, provisionally, to err on the side of caution, censorship is necessary. — TheMadFool

The thing is that we, as a group, will never attain the status of being "critical thinkers", achieve a discourse where people are so informed, knowledged and critical that they can spot what is true and what is false, what is acceptable and what isn't. That is a fact.

And there are many reasons for this, not only because some people aren't thinkers.

Evangelical support for Trump was [April, 2018] at an all-time high: 75%. Disturbingly, as he left the White House, President Barack Obama enjoyed the favorable view of only 24% of white evangelicals.
Obama, a man who had no sex scandals, was never accused of sexual harassment, had two children with the same woman, couldn't crack 25% white evangelicals. — “CNN”

Evangelicals are cynical hypocrites, what's new?

At least the Mormons don't like Trump as much.

Among Mormon voters in Utah, 76 percent preferred Republican congressional candidates, but only 56 percent said they approved of Trump.

(Of course that may be thanks to one Mormon Republican politician being against Trump.)

Trump is clearly an authoritarian - in the bad sense - racist, fascististic bully-boy of whom the kindest and gentlest thing that can be said of his performance as president is that he simply does not have a clue. No clue at all. — tim wood

And this is a huge issue here. You see, Trump started with the dream any President would have, a Congress that his party dominated, which itself was totally shellshocked from his candidacy and election victory and totally. Imagine what a authoritarian who wasn't as inept could have done.

Even the whole Russia debacle would have been confined to a scandal pondered among the intelligence circles and later historians would likely not have become an issue if moron Trump wouldn't have personally made it an unavoidable result with firing Comey and then personally admitting that he did because of the Russia investigation. The fact is that otherwise the FBI would have made a report that, Yep, Russia was active, and that would have been end of that and ended a year ago or so.

Hence the inability of Trump makes the Hitler reference, even if you talk about a Proto-Hitler, highly dubious in my view. Or simply just uninformative. Bush Jr came and went and got us the Patriot Act, but that didn't turn the US into the Anglo-version of the Third Reich. Basically Trump's narcissist egotism and ineptness makes it impossible for someone like Dick Cheney to operate behind the curtains.

Perhaps you will accept this challenge. Trump commuted the life sentence of Alice Johnson - a good thing. A very good thing which likely could be replicated thousands of more times, pardoning people who have been in prison for too long under mandatory drug sentencing guidelines.

A good thing. He did a good thing. Name another good thing Trump ever did. Can you? — tim wood

UUUuuuhhh.... that's a hard one, Tim.

A person with so little of agenda of his own (except his egotism and self promotion) is a hard one, especially if it's even so that "the Wall"-thing was basically made up by his staff to get him to remember to talk about border security. The ignorance of Trump can be seen from his suprise that the chant "Drain the swamp" gathered so much support for him. The thing is, this person is very clueless.

Anything positive? Basically when he got to power, the generals he took to his cabinet with the exception of Flynn weren't such a bad option. Typically a GOP President would have picked lobbyists and clueless neocon politicians to the positions (which actually fill the seats now), but Trump picked highly appreciated generals to the spots for some unknown reason. Kelly for the position of secretary for homeland security (and not the Chief-of-Staff-Nanny) wasn't actually a bad pick, because Kelly had prior been the commander of SOUTHCOM, hence he understood well the situation in Latin America. Mattis was a respected general and McMaster had actually written a book "Dereliction of Duty" how the Joint Chiefs of Staff went along with LBJ and McNamara to the Vietnam war. These generals were basically nonpolitical government employees, naturally favouring the "normal" geopolitics that the US armed forces is for.

Probability theory is just a tool.

What actually happens, happens with 100% probability (or with 1.0 probability).

Is the World deterministic or not is just a metaphysical question.

Trump is a proto-hitler: he's maniac enough, but has none of the other necessary qualities. — tim wood

Just how, really, is Trump a "proto-Hitler"?

I don't find anything similar with Hitler when looking at Trump. Has Trump had any kind of ideology and even written a book about it? No, and the art of the deal was written by a ghostwriter who isn't proud of it. War veteran? No. Somebody who has huge megalomaniac visions for his country? No.

Even to say that Trump is the American version of Berlusconi would be far more appropriate, yet Silvio actually came from a middle class family and didn't inherit his wealth.

This is just slapping a term used as a swearword on Trump without any thinking behind it. Just like people put the label "Marxist" on leftist politicians on the other side without any contemplation on what actually Marxism is about.

Tolerance isn't submission.

In tolerance there is the part of resisting, to putting up with. Just like in engineering, tolerance is about the permissible limits of variation in an object.

Hence unlimited tolerance is an oxymoron. Or as andrewk said above, complete indifference.

All in all, he presents a grotesque image of religion and he doesn't seem to be completely off the mark and that scares me.

If you ask me, I think nothing ever is a total failure. Religion may have a black spot or two or too many for Hitchens, but what of its all important message that goodness is great and evil is condemnable?

So, what do you think?

Religion poisons everything?! — TheMadFool

People just love simple answers. And the media loves confrontational arguments.

To say "on one hand there are bad aspects" yet then to continue "on the other hand there are positive aspects" is to the modern social media consumer a very confusing view and/or simply lame. It's dull.

What modern public wants from the discourse are stark views that can be rude (as if they would be more sincere when they aren't nice or tolerant) and annoy people who are against these views. You see, a lot of people who agree with Hitchens views just love how rude he could be to others. This is a general thing not just related to Hitchens. Just look what kind of material in Youtube there is about him and how these debates are named:

- Hitchens delivers one of his best hammer blows to cocky audience member
- Christopher Hitchens brutal honesty pissing off muslims
- Christopher Hitchens own debate
- Christopher Hitchens -the best of the Hitschlap
- etc....

This of course isn't just about Hitchens, but typically all media-philosophers or social critics (like Hitchens) are loved by media because of the confrontational narrative. And people just love this "X owns y"-type of discussions. Grotesque can be entertaining.

And then, America is a very religious country, hence being an atheist is something "scandalous"!

We have a taste for meat and so have to kill but our morals forbid us to harm or kill.

The Vegan paradox. — TheMadFool

Vegan's see no Paradox and in their hypocrisy denounce humans being omnivores.

I'm not so sure about that. You should hear some of the Republican politicians grovel before Rush Limbaugh, for instance. Having right-wing media turn on you can likely damage your popularity among conservative voters. — Arkady

Yet the right-wing media didn't at first like Trump. Rupert Murdoch didn't like Trump and in the first moments of the elections you could see this with Fox hardballing the candidate at first. But then he had to back down and the rest we know.

Normal republicans surely grovel at Limbaugh just like both parties grovel in front of AIPAC. Yet the difference with Trump voters, his base, is that they actually aren't loyalists of the Republican party at all, but people who genuinely thought of Trump being an anti-establishment candidate and would likely turn on everything seen as being part of the old Washington establishment. Add there into the populism the racism and or xenophobia and you have the hard core Trump supporters. The thing is that these idiots haven't run the Republican party and likely won't take full control of the party. Yet having the ability to offset the Republican party leadership, the Bush family and Murdoch does show that there would be the ability to control the talking heads like Limbaugh too.

What I've tried to say that if Trump would posses actual leadership abilities, he could mold the GOP into his own party. The (lucky?) thing is that he is so inept in leadership that he cannot do it. The two years of his administration has shown this totally clear. The party is a disaster just like the White House.