Agiel
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The real influence of populism\nationalism in the EU
Agiel replied to BruceVC's topic in Way Off-Topic
I'd say the populist and crypto-xenophobic groundswell has always been at least somewhat present in France. I think that sentiment is rather succinctly expressed by De Villepin's quote from '05: "[G]lobalization is not an ideal; it cannot be our destiny." -
Those of us who loathe Trump on the basis of his more fundamental and basic failings (that of being the most dishonest, vacant, and most unstable person to have been installed into the highest office of the United States) take issue with his China approach less for the principle of recognising a fellow liberal democracy (as one wag once put it, "Taiwan can go on being a country so long as nobody acknowledges that it is a country") and more for his totally reckless and incoherent approach with zero consideration over second and third-order consequences (by the way, the difference in attitude another thing he and Mattis, someone who is known for taking a very long view on issues, might be at loggerheads over). As the Richard Nixon Twitter account once noted: The US approach on Taiwan, love it or hate it, has worked, insomuch that it has contributed to one of the longest periods of stability in East Asia while also insuring that we can go on enjoying our artificially inflated quality of life built on iPhones and laptops made in Chinese factories.
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In my opinion it should not be choice. Everybody needs to serve in capacity they are capable. Which is one of the reason why I support Finland's constitutional obligation to serve. I posted this article on another topic, which kind of explains why that approach probably doesn't really work for the US, emphases mine:
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It's almost as if America hasn't had close to 30 years to get the full measure of that man (note that this strip was first published in 1987):
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Let's see how this goes. Though I did have a good time with DA: I, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't at least mildly disappointed that it didn't turn out to be the return to form I had hoped it to be. That said for all the issues the Mako had in Mass Effect 1, I thought the series was worse for it when they got rid of those segments wholesale rather than improve on it (and replaced it with the far more tedious planet scanning), so I'm glad they brought it back.
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There remain other conceivable scenarios. For instance, should Trump not be amenable to the wisdom of Mattis and the potential SecState Pertraeus (as stated before, Mattis is very much in favour of continued engagement in world affairs which stands in stark contrast to Trump's Know-Nothing campaign rhetoric on foreign policy, and history has shown Trump to be the type that values loyalty above all else and is utterly intolerant of criticism), they may elect to resign, and given how Mattis and Pertraeus are quite popular in both military and civilian circles many in the State Department and DoD may choose to follow them.
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You're kidding, right? At any rate, I've had my reservations about such a decision, but the fact that in terms of fopol he couldn't be any more different from Trump if he tried allays some of my concerns over the next four years: https://youtu.be/SCD5zHBNWG8?t=12m29s
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A few days ago a very good friend of mine remarked to me that the election of Trump allowed him to finally use the phrase "we are through the looking glass." It was a phrase that took a double meaning for me. A piece from Alex Wellerstein, and in line with what I've been trying to hammer home for the past year and a half, emphases mine:
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What it's like to become a YouTube gaming celebrity at 80 years old
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I'll bet you Miami is going to be lit tomorrow night.
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Another good piece on Mattis potentially being SecDef (operative word "potentially," given that word on the grapevine is that Romney is no longer quite the shoe-in for SecState as was previously thought). Emphases mine:
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Not sure I'd necessarily look forward to a Neil Blomkamp Alien movie. After all, he did make Chappie, which was absolutely wretched, and that seems like a recipe for an utter disaster on the level of Alien: Resurrection. I will say that the first half of Prometheus works harkening back to the first third of the first Alien movie (tied with the Thing for my 3rd favourite movie of all time) when they're exploring the derelict on LV-426, but after that it starts to go downhill. I alsoI got back some degree of confidence in Ridley Scott from the Martian, and it's been said that this one will be even more of a throwback to the first Alien.
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Dropping a lot sooner than people were expecting. Hope it's awesome this time.
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General James Mattis has been floated as a possible SecDef under Trump. Purportedly from their meeting, Trump was honestly shocked when Mattis told him that he was against waterboarding. Emphases and annotations mine: *I've spoken with quite a few enlisted guys in my time and I'm not entirely sure the term "a general's general" carries positive connotations for them, neither would any of them say this was an adequate description of Mattis. **Believe it or not, I tend to be someone who strongly believes in civilian checks on military power and abiding by institutional norms (keep in mind that normally someone would have to be out of the service for at least six years prior for this posting, but as was the case for Marshall and for Flynn when he was supposedly on the shortlist for SecDef, this requirement may be waived), so in spite of Mattis' sterling record I remain somewhat wary about his potential appointment.
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Food for thought:
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Please address the substance of the video. Say that "it isn't representative of the 'real America,"" anything, but don't give me whataboutism that Putin apologists resort to.
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At an event hosted by a man praised by Bannon: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/11/richard-spencer-speech-npi/508379/
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Is there not a spot before the actual character creation where you can save the game? And isn't there an opportunity to change your appearance a bit before the opening sequence ends?
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The writer of the original comic worked with Enki Bilal on some fantastic comics like <<La ville qui n'existait pas>> and <<Les phalanges de l'ordre noir>>, and also my favourite comic of all time, <<Partie de chasse>>: Oh, and yeah, Valerian is a bit like Jack Burton in Big Trouble in Little China; despite appearances, he isn't actually the hero of the story.
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Saw Arrival with some buds today. I'd give it a 7 out of 10. Great cinematography from Villeneuve, but there was quite a few things I saw coming from miles away like the horse**** kangaroo story, the rogue soldiers, and the twist about Amy Adams' daughter.
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Oh huh, a man who ran on a platform against political correctness now advocates for "safe spaces." I guess it's the great walk-back in more ways than one, or twenty.
