BruceVC

http://www.ibtimes.com/where-kellyanne-conway-top-trump-adviser-has-been-missing-action-2521192 https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/02/22/where-is-kellyanne-conway-trump-adviser-reportedly-banned-from-television/21719668/ Where has Kellyanne Conway been lately? Her absence or apparent lack of public comments lately is a very good thing IMO as she embarrassed the Trump presidency on numerous levels ...but I am still interested in her current political status in the Trump presidency Also as raised by others is the appreciated fall from power of Bannon and the reasons for this https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/06/us/politics/stephen-bannon-white-house.html?_r=0

There is lots of anti-Western propaganda and anti-Western sentiment on this thread, its okay and its normal and to be expected. Its a Zora thread after all . A few general comments I know the historical precedence is inconvenient for some but we have to try to focus on the sequence of accurate events around the reasons the ME is currently so destabilized, the Arab Spring is the primary reason for the worst conflicts in the region. The reasons for the Arab Spring has got nothing to do with the West, I repeat that The Arab Spring has got NOTHING to do with the West, for those interested in the reasons for the Arab Spring this link summarizes it. Spend 20 minutes going through it https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_Spring It started in Tunisia and spread throughout the ME and various countries and the various protests and outcomes had different results in different countries But the fundamental reason for the Arab Spring was the actual citizens of numerous countries in the ME wanted more civil rights and they wanted to be part of the economy of their countries. It is perfectly understandable for the reasons why the Arab Spring happened ...people wanting a better life for themselves Countries like Libya, Yemen and Syria refused to give rights to citizens and decided to use their security forces to crush and annihilate any opposition, this is on those leaders and it is there fault for not negotiating or looking for a reasonable political outcome. You also have the interminable Shia and Sunni historical conflict which is a huge factor for the Syria and Yemen civil wars Libya was never this perfect country of peace and political stability, Gaddafi came to power through a military coup and never had a Democratic election in over 40 years, he brutally suppressed any opposition and ensured that his tribe and followers were the only ones that really benefitted from the oil and other resources Here is a good link around Gaddafi, he was a brutal and intransigent ruler and he deserved the outcome he created. He was killed by his own people http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-12688033 So in summary, the West is not primarily responsible for the terrible conflicts in places like Syria or Libya. These were created by the results of the Arab Spring

Do we really live in that type of division, what would be an example of this? Before you consider answering this remember you have to ask yourself what the person who lives in obscene wealth does for a living and how they achieved this They are probably bankers. I'm on to you Bruce!Its not quite what you thinking but its not far off You see I have this particular debate probably every 2 weeks with different people all over the world and even though the question or the criticism may appear completely different to your question the expected answer is often similar People ask questions like [*]why do we have such an unequal economic society This is inherent to capitalism. It is also inherent that inequality will grow and grow and grow... r>g and so on. Within capitalism? We don't. The creation of mono/oligopolies is another mechanism inherent to any form of capitalism after the industrial revolution. Changing this requires fundamental changes that would shift the economy considerably to the way of public ownership/common property. Because capitalist systems have to expand to gain new profits. Taking control over your economy means profit for the capitalists, thus this justifies almost every measure to do so. Many probably because of corruption; but in the long run, it can not really be stopped without fundamental changes. The profit incentive is huge, and it allows and requires capitalism to expand over the world. And since very few countries posses the means and the will to resist this, there's nothing to stop it. Unless of course you finally get fed up with being dictated by a small elite that is driven by nothing but profit and sees you as nothing but an exploitable recourse. Maybe you will feel the need to change something. Do call me when that happens. Well... yes Yes I am well aware and expected you to comment on these questions because I have these debates all the time with analysts who share your view on Capitalism and also misunderstand and generalize about what is good about the banks and or financial sector. I am glad you responded so please dont think I am dismissing your post or the effort you made to comment To be honest all your responses are cliches and common examples of how some people still dont understand how Capitalism has changed and how we now have sustainable systems like responsible or regulated Capitalism

Do we really live in that type of division, what would be an example of this? Before you consider answering this remember you have to ask yourself what the person who lives in obscene wealth does for a living and how they achieved this The real question is wether most wealthy people actually worked so much more and harder than a common worker to justify this huge gap. And let's be honest, no. In fact, I'd argue their wealth is based either on exploitation (I'm not gonna repeat the full argument again) or on gambling (and it is nothing more than that) on Wall Street. Most likely both. But to pretend that the rich are rich because they deserve it is, indeed, moronic. You raise a common strawman argument that is inconsistent and impossible to substantiate. Firstly you are creating the actual false narrative when you say " The real question is wether most wealthy people actually worked so much more and harder than a common worker to justify this huge gap " When did that point ever translate to something that is relevant? You have no idea how hard so called " rich " people work or how we should or shouldn't define there wealth and is it justified. So ironically the word " moronic " is your word and has no significance to the debate except being applicable to your assessment

Do we really live in that type of division, what would be an example of this? Before you consider answering this remember you have to ask yourself what the person who lives in obscene wealth does for a living and how they achieved this They are probably bankers. I'm on to you Bruce! Its not quite what you thinking but its not far off You see I have this particular debate probably every 2 weeks with different people all over the world and even though the question or the criticism may appear completely different to your question the expected answer is often similar People ask questions like why do we have such an unequal economic society how do we end the monopoly and collusion of the banks why is the West trying to control our economy why does our government pander to the financial sector or allow foreign countries to dictate to us And the expected answer or outcome is suppose to be something like the banks control the economies of the world and surreptitiously manipulate events to control a certain narrative the banks are products of the West and should never be trusted

Do we really live in that type of division, what would be an example of this? Before you consider answering this remember you have to ask yourself what the person who lives in obscene wealth does for a living and how they achieved this

I do, I believe in human rights but we have to balance that with security....the interesting thing about this digital surveillance is that because you are not aware of it I am honestly surprised anyone can feel aggrieved and feel there privacy is being undermined So its like those riddles we see " can we say our privacy has been undermined if we dont know about it and there is no negative impact to us " ? Its paradoxical in nature but I hope everyone comes to the obvious conclusion....no we cant ? "Bennie you're not under surveillance, it doesn't work like that" "It works like this; They spy on everyone to find something" You don't read or think about what you are saying much, do you? I cant keep explaining the same point guys ....last time for me The surveillance systems that exist in places like the USA don't monitor US citizens 24/7 In places like China, North Korea or Russia they have overt and covert monitoring all the time. But what happens in the USA is the systems that monitor data get activated when needed and they look for specific data like the phone number This is very different to countries that monitor 24/7 where they will address automatically certain words or ideological debates all the time

This is another good news story for a better Trump presidency Bannon has always concerned me

It exists in the heart of the Internet in the USA, the company I work for is involved in integration We have no access at all to that environment as it is a secure site and they are our customers so no examples right? Pretty much spending billions of cash to watch billions of people without no real reason I have no idea how much a project like Prism costs but yes easily $20-50 Billion, check out this slide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/media/File:Cover_slide_of_PRISM.jpg But remember Prism and other surveillance systems, like I gained access to, aren't used all the time And now we are in the year 2017 and the war on Islamic extremism is going very well for countries opposed to groups like ISIS. Most of us live in countries that are Western and we have very good lives that use the foundation of what defines the West like freedom of speech and laws that protect your sexual orientation. We don't get arrested for criticizing our governments, its okay to marry the same sex, we have working government services in most cases and opportunities to study and get a good job Its a good life, a very good life. And what gets asked of you Bennie? Nothing really except for the normal things like taxes...its not like you are being sent to fight in Afghanistan So when you discover that a country like the USA has advanced active surveillance you should be grateful as now you can contribute towards your country by supporting this and if you not grateful then you should just accept it as part of your citizen contribution I won't. I do not accept that there has to be surveillance. I do not accept that there has to be inequality. I do not accept that there has to be exploitation. I do not accept that there has to be oppression. I do not accept that there has to be pollution. I do not accept that there has to be poverty. I do not accept that there has to be a status quo. I do not accept "human nature" as a reason or a excuse for anything. I do not accept that anything is unchangable. Yes, the west has produced a lot of achievements. Needless to say, there are a vast number of mistakes and flaws in many ways. Some mistakes we created ourselves, some are inherent to our society. But it is my firm believe that a freer, fairer and more egalitarian society is not only theoretically possible but realistically archivable. It is laughable to say I should be thankful or even proud to be under surveillance. Privacy is an essential component of freedom. If I sacrifice my privacy, my freedom dies with it. If my privacy is sacrificed by the government, my freedom is taken from me. Thus, surveillance is nothing but oppression of the people by the government. I see no reason as to why in any way I should support such an practice. The world you, Bruce, imagine is not one I wish to live in. You praise conformity with obviously bad circumstances, and I am not willing to follow this teaching. I am not willing to sacrifice my ideals in the name of defending these exact ideals. Bruce, I hope I see this world you praise replaced by something better. I believe in a world where we might finally realise that a good and healthy life is a right, not a privilege. That you defend a broken system is not exactly helping the cause. But don't expect me to masochistically praise said system. Bennie I never said you would be under surveillance, I can give you an example but it cant be very specific due to the NDA Lets say a US Ranger team in Afghanistan eliminates a Taliban unit and finds a certain cell phone number amongst all the information and documents This would get sent back to the USA and eventually a copy gets sent to the NSA. Now then NSA would wait for approval or maybe a sign of a impending attack and then a filter would be created throughout the USA on the Internet and its various applications in the USA like Facebook If this number is determined to have been used or someone tried to contact it raises a red flag and the US can investigate But in order to do this you would have to analyze the flow of data from all people in the USA including you but you would never know or be aware of this as a US citizen How is this a bad thing?

It exists in the heart of the Internet in the USA, the company I work for is involved in integration We have no access at all to that environment as it is a secure site and they are our customers so no examples right? Pretty much spending billions of cash to watch billions of people without no real reason I have no idea how much a project like Prism costs but yes easily $20-50 Billion, check out this slide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)#/media/File:Cover_slide_of_PRISM.jpg But remember Prism and other surveillance systems, like I gained access to, aren't used all the time The boldened bit made me a wee bit scared of you. I wouldn't go off grid though, I'm trying to change things instead to stop them from doing these things. As much as the thought of Guard Dogs boobytraps scare me, this kind of ignorance terrifies me. What is ignorant about Internet security? Cyber-terrorism and extremists using the Internet is a real threat You guys don't need to understand the precedent, its already working does it works? Any examples?It exists in the heart of the Internet in the USA, the company I work for is involved in integration We have no access at all to that environment as it is a secure site and they are our customers You don't NEED to understand what we are doing. Trust us. We are good. It's gonna be okay. We gonna keep you safe. God Bruce, do you even support democracy? Do you like freedom? Explain to me how constant surveillance can benefit democracy, and I will show you a lying man . I made my case. Bruce, I hate to say it, but it appears you are part of the problem. I absolutely support the principles of Democracy and all the other examples of Western culture like free speech and right to privacy . I would never have ever changed any of these but forces of chaos and extremism descended on the West at 9/11 I think its a good thing you were too young to remember that day and the years that followed.It was a time of war and ideological conflict and many people died defending the right of the West to be as it is And now we are in the year 2017 and the war on Islamic extremism is going very well for countries opposed to groups like ISIS. Most of us live in countries that are Western and we have very good lives that use the foundation of what defines the West like freedom of speech and laws that protect your sexual orientation. We don't get arrested for criticizing our governments, its okay to marry the same sex, we have working government services in most cases and opportunities to study and get a good job Its a good life, a very good life. And what gets asked of you Bennie? Nothing really except for the normal things like taxes...its not like you are being sent to fight in Afghanistan So when you discover that a country like the USA has advanced active surveillance you should be grateful as now you can contribute towards your country by supporting this and if you not grateful then you should just accept it as part of your citizen contribution

The boldened bit made me a wee bit scared of you. I wouldn't go off grid though, I'm trying to change things instead to stop them from doing these things. As much as the thought of Guard Dogs boobytraps scare me, this kind of ignorance terrifies me. What is ignorant about Internet security? Cyber-terrorism and extremists using the Internet is a real threat You guys don't need to understand the precedent, its already working does it works? Any examples? It exists in the heart of the Internet in the USA, the company I work for is involved in integration We have no access at all to that environment as it is a secure site and they are our customers

It isnt a big deal losing what you think is privacy, you have been told your whole life " you need your privacy " or " your privacy is your personal obligation " ..says who? You will be fine if sometimes people are able to check your status and monitor certain Internet traffic, and yes this does mean you will have to accept there are people much clever than you who have your best interest in mind. You can trust me on this one But unless you are a terrorist, paedophile or other demented deviant of the dark web then you will have nothing to worry about More and more I have been considering a retirement life disconnected from the internet and everything else too. Lately I've been fascinated by the notion of a completely self sufficient home with no utilities, bills, etc. An added bonus to that kind of life is completely safe from the prying eyes of "Big Brother". Unless they felt a need to use drones or human agents to watch me. GD I keep making this point and everyone ignores it, you wont be monitored all the time. You probably will never be monitored your whole life but it seems imprudent to want to distance yourself from modern conveniences because your government is concerned about the threat of cyber attacks

The boldened bit made me a wee bit scared of you. I wouldn't go off grid though, I'm trying to change things instead to stop them from doing these things. As much as the thought of Guard Dogs boobytraps scare me, this kind of ignorance terrifies me. What is ignorant about Internet security? Cyber-terrorism and extremists using the Internet is a real threat You guys don't need to understand the precedent, its already working

It isnt a big deal losing what you think is privacy, you have been told your whole life " you need your privacy " or " your privacy is your personal obligation " ..says who? You will be fine if sometimes people are able to check your status and monitor certain Internet traffic, and yes this does mean you will have to accept there are people much clever than you who have your best interest in mind. You can trust me on this one But unless you are a terrorist, paedophile or other demented deviant of the dark web then you will have nothing to worry about what if I am deviant? Who is going to decide what deviant is? Is gay deviant? Slippery slope No members of the LGBT community are not deviants, you may get heavily scrutinized though but that's because where you live Everyone knows about the porn industry in Czech

It isnt a big deal losing what you think is privacy, you have been told your whole life " you need your privacy " or " your privacy is your personal obligation " ..says who? You will be fine if sometimes people are able to check your status and monitor certain Internet traffic, and yes this does mean you will have to accept there are people much clever than you who have your best interest in mind. You can trust me on this one But unless you are a terrorist, paedophile or other demented deviant of the dark web then you will have nothing to worry about

Yes it seems our whole political system has been subverted by big money, which is slowly becoming synonymous with Globalist. Even the press, our government watchdogs, have long turned into mere mouthpieces for one side of the government or the other. The fact that Obama did his best to sabotage Trumps presidency on his way out says to me they had nothing concrete on the guy because if they did Obama could have used it before the election, unless what HE was doing was illegal. Everything else seems a smear campaign to distract the Repubs from making much ground with thier new found power. Just more power struggles and hypocrisy at the expense of the American people... You Americans shouldn't worry about something that is implacable and inexorable You know how many times I have mentioned Prism and other ways the government can monitor whatever it wants internally in the USA and it sometimes it does for detection and analytical purposes I sell that eDiscovery software that is based in the USA and some information became apparent to me. None of you have noticed anything which is exactly what I expected ....and mentioned to you, its about your domestic security and to be honest imagine having to get the permissions of every person analyzed. It would be an arduous task and since this company is associated with NSA I dont think it needs to ask? Sorry if this sounds rude and I am technically under NDA but I think you guys can appreciate the reality, the USA is under attack so I am confident most of you guys get it

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/mar/31/julian-assange-waits-for-ecuadors-election-to-decide-his-future Assange may finally get booted out the Ecuador embassy, then he can get immediately arrested by the UK authorities...that will make me happy

Yeah, I hear you Lets see how this works out But this is a good thing for me, we need to settle this matter one way or another so the country can move on to other more meaningful political debates around certain global issues for example

This is a huge development, especially since Flynn is asking for immunity the salient question needs to be " what would Flynn require immunity from " ?

PC is absolutely not suppose to be about saying things that you dont believe in order to gain a political or social advantage. Some people may believe this but that is not its purpose. Its where we make points that may offend people if spoken in a certain way but instead we make the same point without offending people So there is nothing wrong with being PC if its purpose is used correctly

This makes sense on some levels but isn't IMO the actual correct answer that applies to " why are some people marching for Trump " For some Trump supporters they truly believe all the promises and hyperbole that Trump used during the election campaign. Trumps victory was a combination of tapping into a certain view many white Americans have of the reality of the USA under Obama and what the USA needs to do to become " great " again This is a very nuanced and complex topic that will have many different and varied views but if I just focus on what the objective " making the USA great again " could mean For some Americans free speech has been undermined by politically correct commentators who they believe falsely represent hypercritical so called " SJ " types Trump gained support from this group from day 1 when he openly ridiculed and dismissed "PC ", his view resonated with people who think "PC " is about people not telling the truth And sometimes supporters of SJ unintentionally corrupt and make the concept of "PC" appear like a real dysfunction and they do come across as hypocrites. For example if you say you believe in a tolerant and non-discriminatory society then white men also deserve this same respect But PC is not suppose to be about hiding the truth, its much simpler than that. Its supposed to be where we are able to debate and discuss potentially controversial topics like " colonialism and its impact on black African people " without offending any one group So for some Americans they still think its okay for Trump to say what he wants on Twitter because they cannot or will not accept the way that Trump communicates can be both interesting but also divisive and leads to unintended confusion. They think this is an irrefutable part of what they like about Trump For me Trump should drop Twitter because he is impulsive and his opinion on Twitter is more confused than positive ...so its about the greater societal impact his Twitter comments have

This is complete nonsense, how have we destroyed our way of life [by going against terrorism]? -Constant surveillance of everyone through several secret services -Rise of unreasonable and uneducated prejudice towards one specific religion -As a result, (rising support for) unreasonable policies against members of said religion -(rising support for) ignorance of humanistic values due to protectionist fears -Rise of authoritarianism -Rise of populism -Rise of demagoguery -Rise of nationalism -Rise of protectionism -Rise of isolationism That's just of the top of my head None of these automatically need to be relevant to any country that decides to be assertive in dealing with Islamic Extremism and this definitely applies to governments This is not a zero sum game, we can address terrorism without suddenly it signaling the perceived end of the Western world. How do you think the West has dealt with any ideological challenge over the last 100 years? Security gets increased but we dont lose our values around tolerance, equality and our belief in Democracy. We just make some societal and legal adjustments around the threat that we face at the time Its not complicated or difficult to implement

This is complete nonsense, how have we destroyed our way of life by killing any armed terrorist? No we need more armed policemen in the UK, the UK is use to dealing with terrorism. In the 1970's and 1980's they dealt with terrorism from the IRA and now its Islamic Extremism Im fine if you think addressing this type of threat is " somehow destroying the entire Western world " but most of us are very supportive of eradicating this threat, we stand for tolerance and Democracy but that doesnt mean we dont combat something like Islamic Extremism