If you are linking things, I cannot see them. Not sure if that's a problem on my end or yours.

I've said some words you didn't like so now I must not be 'speculating in good faith' and some Trumpster or something.

Whatever you say, buttercup.

Not sure why you're getting so snarky all of a sudden. Of course I am speculating, and everything depends on what happens next. :brow:

Of course not, because Biden did not have any intention besides placating the lobby in the hopes it would secure him the election.

Trump pressured Netanyahu to accept a cease-fire. For now that's the status quo, and it's the only reason I'm reserving judgement on what it is we are looking at.

To be clear, the forced displacement of 2,000,000 Palestinians at the end of an American rifle barrel is an outlandishly awful idea, which is why I am assuming Trump has a different intention.

If it's a negotiating tactic it isn't a bad one.

By threatening to give Netanyahu what we wants he's showing Netanyahu's intentions for all the world to see.

The world reacts with outrage, the Middle-East threatens to explode, international support for Israel erodes further, etc.

Trump has all the room he needs to back out, Netanyahu takes another blow, and hopefully that will be the final straw that does him under.

Let's see what happens.

Ah, so see, countries should accept Gazan refugees! — Count Timothy von Icarus

That's up to countries themselves to decide.

No country is under any obligation to make itself complicit in Israel's crimes against humanity.

You're trying to shift Israel's responsibility for its crimes to others.

Glad we agree. — Count Timothy von Icarus

We definitely don't agree.

You're claiming people have a moral obligation to pen women and children in with people attempting to genocide them. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I didn't claim any such thing.

Stop trying to deflect from the fact that you're trying to make ethnic cleansing work.

I'm not the one who is trying to make ethnic cleansing work, Mr. Abhorrent.

Gaza is not the only major urban war to produce essentially no refugees because "no one wants to leave." That assertion is ridiculous on many levels, not least because force was used to keep people in. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I never made the assertion that "no one wants to leave". It's up to you to prove that they do, uncoerced (Yea, good luck with that.), if you want this to be anything other than ethnic cleansing.

In order to even offer the possibility of refugee status you have to prove people want it? — Count Timothy von Icarus

You're not talking about 'the possibility of refugee status'. What you're talking about is opening the border and letting Gazans leave 'voluntarily' at the end of a rifle barrel, then call them refugees to disguise the fact that what is actually happening is ethnic cleansing.

Hamas isn't close to a representative body. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Well, you'll somehow have to prove the Gazans actually want to leave. And "I imagine that they do" is obviously not sufficient.

The first question is: who is going to drive out Hamas? Israel tried and failed. Are the Americans going to do it for them? If you put aside for a moment how completely absurd that would be, it's not even clear whether the Americans would succeed.


First you'd have to prove that the Gazans actually want to leave. The closest thing they have to a representative body is Hamas, and Hamas clearly isn't leaving voluntarily. If there were to ever be a representative body that is open to the idea, negotiations would have to follow, mutually agreed-upon terms, etc.

Until that happens, this is ethnic cleansing, and for Egypt or Jordan to open their borders to "take in refugees" would amount to nothing less than complicity in Israel's crimes against humanity.

Let's see what happens first.

The idea that Trump would send American troops to carry out 'the final solution' in Gaza sounds far-fetched to me. It would be a global diplomatic disaster. It also doesn't make a whole lot of sense to first push Netanyahu to a cease-fire.

If actions are undertaken to make this a reality, then we'll know. Until then I think this could just as well be Trump pandering to the Israeli extremists and the lobby.

In a way, it is good that Trump is putting it on the table. There are a lot of parties, in Europe for example, who are still trying to deny the gravity of what is happening in Gaza. With Trump openly talking about ethnic cleansing, there will be no more denials and all of these parties must openly proclaim on which side of history they wish to put themselves.

To put it in another way: Trump just made it plain for all to see that this is not about Hamas, but about the forced deportation of 2,000,000 Palestinians and the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.

But not you somehow? Just, other people, but not you. No, of course not, you're simply too smart for that to have happened. It's simply impossible. Ah, the human ego. As flexible as it is frail. Willing and able to contort itself into positions previously thought unfathomable. — Outlander

I could just as easily have used 'we'. You can stop projecting now.

You've been ruled by oligarchs for decades, but now that 'your team' has temporarily lost the upper hand suddenly the world is ending?

Hysterical, hypocritical, etc.

I wish the admins would start to crack down on these low quality posts that amount to nothing more than coping over a lost election.

Grow up.

If you just watch the video I linked, you will understand why there is such a "misunderstanding" about what fascism is.

I think people could use a reminder of what fascism actually is, because this is getting a little embarrassing.

Actual realism is that Putin will accept a negotiated peace/ceasefire if he faces a real possibility of military defeat. — ssu

Only if it's a realistic possibility, which it isn't. The US and Europe are and never were going to risk WW3 over Ukraine.

The US Secretary of State just outright admitted it.

But by all means keep denying what is obvious. You've spent 582 pages being wrong, so why not add a couple more?

'Dishonest' to suggest Ukraine could have fully defeated Russia, retake Crimea, Rubio says (The Kyiv Independent, 2025)

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio denounced Moscow's aggression in Ukraine but said it was "dishonest" to claim Kyiv was capable of destroying Russia on the battlefield and returning to the pre-2014 state of affairs, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in an interview published on Jan. 30.

The U.S. official acknowledged that Russian President Vladimir Putin carried out "atrocities" and "horrible things" as part of his invasion of Ukraine but voiced doubts about Kyiv's prospects for a complete military victory.

"But what the dishonesty that has existed is that we somehow led people to believe that Ukraine would be able, not just to defeat Russia, but destroy (Putin), push him all the way back to what the world looked like in 2012 or 2014 before the Russians took Crimea," Rubio said on the Megyn Kelly Show.

Rubio stopped one sentence short of finishing his thought, because of course these lies weren't propagated "somehow" - they were part of a deliberate propaganda campaign designed to instrumentalize the Ukrainian people, to have them refuse diplomacy and instead willingly throw themselves against Washington's former archrival Russia in a battle that couldn't be won.

Notice how when it is said outloud today, it doesn't (or at least shouldn't) sound controversial, even though a year ago it would have been complete and utter heresy.

Isn't propaganda a funny thing?

Team realism scores again.

All good. :up:

I never said you were brainwashed, nor did I 'play you' (whatever that means).

At most I suggested people in this thread were absorbing this information uncritically, exhibiting the reflexive, emotional response this type of media is meant to get out of them.

Apparently that must have hit a nerve, since you immediately felt the need to label me a 'conspiracy nut' - another typical reflexive response.

Ah, gotcha. You are just another conspiracy nut such as the ones who assaulted the US Capitol building. — javi2541997

No clue where you got that idea.

It's 2025. If the idea that media is designed to manipulate you is still news for you, then I don't know what to tell you. Get out from under your rock, I suppose.

There's a reason the mustachioed gentleman referred to the extermination of the Jews as the final solution. Earlier attempts at deportation had failed.

Such a peculiar set of footsteps Israel's hardliners are choosing to follow into.

As far as I can tell, this thread hasn't gotten far beyond gloating over the fate of some random oligarch, who is only being prosecuted because of the war in Ukraine and the western effort to erode Russian influence in Russia's (former) sphere of influence.

We have oligarchs too, and they are much more influential (and cancerous) than this small fry. None of them are currently being prosecuted.

Furthermore, I find it highly worrying to observe intelligent people being unable to see what is going on here:

[...] , but Georgia's people deserve to vote on whether they want more proximity to the West or to Russia. Right? — javi2541997

This is exactly the type of reaction this media spin is meant to get out of you. "Poor Georgians, controlled by corrupt oligarchs, wouldn't it be nice if..."

Aren't you getting a déjà vu moment right about now?

This is exactly how western audiences were warmed up to the idea of Ukraine joining NATO.

So I find myself obliged to mention that we are controlled by corrupt oligarchs too, and that they do not have our best interests at heart, nor that of the Ukrainians, nor that of the Georgians.

Instead of absorbing information uncritically, one should ask "Why?" and "Why now?"

Whinging about other countries' oligarchs to distract from our own. Oh wait, we call them "billionaire philanthropists" here.

The Bosnian Genocide

Srebrenica Massacre

Several high-profile individuals were tried and found guilty of genocide.

You'll note that whether or not the genocide is successful is no factor. And you'll also note that a nation need not kill millions in order to be guilty of genocide. In the Srebrenica massacre 8,000 men were killed. This act was ruled unanimously an act of genocide in 2004, and the ruling was again upheld in 2007.

Article II

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with
intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as
such:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its
physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. — Convention on the Prevention of the Crime of Genocide

Intent is of great importance here (which is why comparisons with Allied bombing during WW2 are moot). Unfortunately for Israel, several high-profile politicians have stated their genocidal intent outright and in public.

This is why Netanyahu is currently wanted for crimes against humanity.

All that's left is for the apologists to have their "Are we the baddies?" moment.

Trump has apparently barred any development of a US-based CBDC. I couldn't find much information on this particular decree. It seems most of the Media™ hasn't reported on it yet.

Trump Kicks Crypto Policy into Gear and Hammers Nail in US CBDC Coffin

That many nails may follow, and that this abomination of surveillance, financial repression and unrestrained currency devaluation may be thrown in the ocean never to resurface.

:up:

Only because the reasonable - and I will not debate the definition of 'reasonable' - people who have dared to speak out in public will have been silenced. — Vera Mont

Is this a prediction? Four years from now, no one will be speaking out in public against Trump because they will all have been silenced?

Given the absolute deluge of criticism that Trump has received and is receiving I find that very hard to believe. But hey, if you're willing to make that prediction then we have at last found someone who is taking the premise of this thread seriously.

However you refuse to back your point up by identifying what these evens of note might be. — Tobias

I've given you literally a blank check - 'fascism' can mean whatever you believe it means - and you still won't take the bet because you yourself evidently do not take the idea that the US may devolve into fascism of any description seriously either.

And if you're expecting me to wade into details about something I don't take seriously to begin with then you are sadly mistaken.

Now, I appreciate the fact that a 1000 Tzeentch-coins represents a substantial value, but you're sort of missing the point. I don't care what definition of fascism you use. Use your own made up definition if you want to.

In four years no reasonable person will believe the US has become fascist by any definition of the word. — Tzeentch

Now you are shifting from 'nothng of particular note' to a whole country becoming fascist. — Tobias

'Shifting' :rofl: If you fail to grasp that in a thread about fascism I was talking in the context of fascism then that sounds like your problem to me.

Yes, obviously, but you seem to have a rather ... peculiar... notion of what that term means. you think that cutting the subsidies of a member of the club that frustrates the clubs overall policy amounts to ' looming fascism' whereas threatening military action against against entirely peaceful nations does not. — Tobias

I pointed not just to the EU's actions vis-á-vis Hungary, but at a wider trend in the EU, involving the fact that it is an untransparent, undemocratic, authoritarian den of nepotism and corruption, which makes it a likelier candidate to develop into fascism than the US - which isn't to say that it is likely that it will.


Secondly, military action against peaceful nations is what the US does best. If you believe that shows the US is fascist, then it already is and has been for decades.

The US invades and destroys other nations like its their national pastime. But the term for this is 'jingoism', not fascism. Fascism refers to how a state is organized, not to a foreign policy.


Now, I appreciate the fact that a 1000 Tzeentch-coins represents a substantial value, but you're sort of missing the point. I don't care what definition of fascism you use. Use your own made up definition if you want to.


In four years no reasonable person will believe the US has become fascist by any definition of the word.

Of course we have to settle on what 'of note' means. — Tobias

I'm talking about fascism, obviously. Or anything catastrophic that is beyond the scope of what is normal for US presidents and is directly attributable to Trump. Keep in mind that he'll have Biden to contend with in terms of wanton incompetence.


It's routine for US presidents to ruin some part of the world for profit during their term, so don't yap about personal consequences.

Of course I'm not just talking about the Trump family. What rock have you been living under that you think oligarchy only became a thing under Trump?

Ah, right. No need to listen to anything they're saying, because we already know they're nazis. We've been told as much by the Media™, and they never lie to us about anything.

You had better get used to that if you're intent on misrepresenting what I say or putting words in my mouth.

If you refuse to listen to what they actually say and only listen to their opponents, you're refusing to do your due diligence.

Did you watch the interview Musk did with Weidel?

Was there anything in that interview that struck you as particularly nazi?

I called the EU a better example of looming fascism than the US, which you then tried to misconstrue as me calling the EU fascist according to a set definition.

All I'll ask of you is to not put words in my mouth or deliberately take the things I say out of their context.