smjjames

Wasn't this an episode of the The Orville? Episode 7: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Orville#Episodes ? Sounds more like a parody of Reddit with the up/down votes and other places with similar things.

He did later tell CNN that he was speaking on his own behalf, and a source close to Trump said that Dowd wasn't authorized to make that statement. https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/17/politics/john-dowd-mueller-russia-investigation/index.html

Turns out that he wasn't speaking on the Presidents behalf or authorized to speak in that specific moment on the Presidents behalf and the WH walked back the comment. While it's not a new thing that Trump would like the Mueller probe to end, they seem to be raising the stakes here. edit: Also, Dowd was likely pretty obviously speaking to an audience of one. Trying to end the Mueller probe prematurely is going to go nowhere good since it implies that they're trying to hide something.

One imposed by the government and the government sets the rules? I don't mean stuff like no littering signs, I mean straight up social engineering on that scale and scope. I have a feeling our fellow libertarian forumers are going to have a different definition and scope on social engineering like what the Chinese program is, but we generally enforce social rules and expectations with laws rather than something straight out of 1984.

Extremely 1984.... Also sounds like a recipe for getting trapped in a low credit score if an area has a trend or problem with 'low social credit score', also creating stratified social classes. I know the article says that it's only temporary, but the way that the system is named 'once untrustworthy, always restricted' gives it the potential to go full 1984. Because they're silly.

Vox noted that too in an article https://www.vox.com/2018/3/9/17100880/north-korea-republicans-right-conservatives-obama And I think I've seen something about liberals being flipped on it as well. Basically, it's just partianship and tribalism.

Hong Kong wasn't taken over by force by China, it was taken from them by Britian in the 19th century and later given back to them via treaty. Also, Japan could develop nukes right now, but they choose not to make them. They do have the plutonium stockpile, which is enough to unnerve China.

Democrats want her to drop off the radar metaphorically because she really isn't helping while Republicans want her to keep talking for exactly the same reason. She clearly doesn't know when it's best to lay low and not comment, unlike Obama for example.

Yeah, John Bolton would be terrible, he took part in the whole spin for the Iraq war and is an ultra-hawk. Keith Kellog is also mentioned because Trump apparently likes him. Don't know much about him though.

He hasn't been fired yet, it's just an announcement that he's replacing him. If he really was fired, a replacement would have immediately been announced. edit: wierd page shuffle, bartimaeus's post was the first on page 19, then when I posted, mine was instead.

The Senkaku islands? it doesn't seem like those islands are worth going to war over, theres supposed to be some oil in the area, but nothing confirmed or explored. That situation seems closer to 'historical map claim dispute' (which you guys in Europe would be familiar with) type argument than anything else, despite the islands never being permanently inhabited. Hong Kong was a colony of China that Britian took from China and held for over 100 years. Also, the difference between Hong Kong and Taiwan is that Hong Kong is a city-state while Taiwan is a full country. The fact that Taiwan is backed by the US probably makes mainland China more inclined to cooperate with Taiwan than bully them around with impunity.

Well, intervention AND screwing things up and not following through on the long hard road of nation building is what caused that.

Intervention didn't start the conflict in Syria, but arguably non-intervention made the refugee wave worse and by the time there was intervention, Syria was already too much of a cluster**** for intervention to save it.

And when whoever comes out on top reinstates those gulags? Ending up with another dictator who applies the same conditions isn't progress no matter how you slice it.

Civil war would close down gulags fast. With your way of thinking there will never be change in NK Do you have any 100% guarantee of that? There will be disruption for a while, that's true, but whoever comes out on top could be just as bad, or worse. Various countries could try to support their preferred strongman (or woman), but I don't think theres anyplace that has had a track record of doing that and having it succeed towards democracy almost all the time. edit: culling quote pyramid. edit2: quotes got screwed up, but not bothering to fix it here

Yeah, f*ck those gulaged millions of people as long as they are not dying on my yard Then give me a solution that does not end with tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of South Koreans killed in artillery barrages that will likely level Seoul in the 10-12 hours it will take for US air power to silence them. Or, God forbid they actually get a nuclear weapon into play. We are quite safe here despite his boasts but SK & Japan are not. Assassinations and infiltration and heavy propaganda The former is going to lead to all out war, though If it's done by external forces, definetly, and if it's from internal factions, it could start a civil war between factions.

If doing so were easy, the US would have done that already.

Come on, Kim Jong Un has gotta be like the most secured person on the planet, aside from the POTUS. Plus, with the way that getting intel in NK is so difficult and tracking his movements would be difficult, and there are a billion and one ways that an assassination option would go wrong. Yes, bombing his location is an option, but it's not guaranteed to kill him, and he's going to retreat to his deepest mountain bunker at the first sign of trouble. Sending an assassination team would be a one way suicide mission. Besides, we've disadvowed that practice sine the cold war.

Except that the previous two had cultivated a definite designated heir, there is no sign that Kim Jong Un has done that yet (he's still young, for one). Sure, theres people that can take his place if he suddenly dies now, but if theres no crown prince, if you will, there could end up being a bloody succession fight. That's the problem with dictatorships, without a designated heir, everybody with some power will want to try and take over. Monarchies have a system for designating who is the heir if the leader suddenly dies without a designated heir, dictatorships generally don't.

Exactly, war with the US (either direct or by proxy) is the last thing China wants, both because of economic interconnections and because their navy isn't a threat to ours. They have said that they'd support NK if the US strikes first, but how far they'd go, I'm not sure. They'd definetly demand that the US not get too close to the NK/China border for sure. However, they've also said that if NK strikes first, NK is on their own. A pre-emptive strike seems to be in that grey area between definite first strike in a war and not intending to start a war. I like that analogy actually, heh. Anyways, yeah, that's the problem with doing a pre-emptive strike, and NK doesn't need nukes to do massive damage.

I suppose the bird is talking like a pirate as that's sorta what it looks like.

I honestly don't know. First there was the sudden (though I guess in hindsight it would have been predictable) offer of one-on-one talks with Kim Jong Un, then silence (no confirmation or anything) from NK, then Trump decided now was a good time to reshuffle his cabinet, which is going to delay the talks. It's definetly possible that Kim was also worried that Trump might do a pre-emptive strike after the Olympics, but the talks up the stakes and make it more likely for things to go wrong. Now he's putting in Pompeo who is a real hawk on NK and Trump is rumored to be possibly putting in Bolton to replace McMaster as National Security Director, and he's even more of a hawk than Pompeo. So, really, it depends on Trumps mood and the time of day. edit: On Hillary, yeah, she really needs to just disappear from the radar, metaphorically, because she isn't helping anything. Kim's offer for talks is strategic move to make it harder for US do pre-emptive strike, because it would look quite badly for US to do strike against NK after they have offered to participate in denuclearization talks, especially China would react quite badly to such strikes in their sphere of influence and they would use them as excuse for either military or economical actions against USA. Also there is quite little to gain, outside of some possible domestic political points, from strike NK even if they have ICBMs capable to delivering nukes to continental USA and nuclear warheads to arm them with. So even though Kim seems like nutty leader, he seems to be much better politician than Trump at least in this issue, considering that Trump gave quite additional power for Kim by not just acknowledging his offer but boasting how big deal said offer is. Not to mention that doing a pre-emptive strike has the potential to do the same effect as a smashing a hornet nest. Kim Jong Un pretty much has to respond or he'll lose face, but the question is how will he respond? Will it be restrained (short of all out war) or will he go all-out-no-holds-barred?

Well to each their own, but she's just ok. As for Clinton, yeah, not sure why she can't just retreat to private life and be quiet. You'd think she would go for that, means not dealing with this bull**** all the time or having Trump talk about you, etc. While it does appear sexist to tell Clinton (a woman) to retreat to private life and be quiet and it does have a touch of sexism to me, but sometimes it's best to just exit stage left (or right). Especially when she really isn't helping things. I'm not accusing sexism, just that it does have the appearance of sexism, but in this case, it really would be best if she stopped talking since it's not helping Democrats.

Translation? All I see is a parrot walking around.

I honestly don't know. First there was the sudden (though I guess in hindsight it would have been predictable) offer of one-on-one talks with Kim Jong Un, then silence (no confirmation or anything) from NK, then Trump decided now was a good time to reshuffle his cabinet, which is going to delay the talks. It's definetly possible that Kim was also worried that Trump might do a pre-emptive strike after the Olympics, but the talks up the stakes and make it more likely for things to go wrong. Now he's putting in Pompeo who is a real hawk on NK and Trump is rumored to be possibly putting in Bolton to replace McMaster as National Security Director, and he's even more of a hawk than Pompeo. So, really, it depends on Trumps mood and the time of day. edit: On Hillary, yeah, she really needs to just disappear from the radar, metaphorically, because she isn't helping anything.