1

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 19, 2025, 03:24:35 AM »

It's not that simple. The capitol police were welcoming the protestors into the building. From this, the average person may believe that they are allowed to enter. There were grandmothers caught up in the arrests, who say that they were just following the crowd and touring the building under the apparent approval and oversight of the capitol police.

Uh huh. So these harmless tourists just happened to be in Washington. They just happened to be near the Capitol. They just happened to be devoted Trump fans, like everyone else who had entered the Capitol. This just happened to be on the day that Congress was set to certify Trump's loss to Biden, the same day that Trump himself had focused on and asked his supporters to be in Washington for. This just happened to be directly following a speech from Trump in which he urged his supporters to march on the Capitol to protest Congress certifying his loss. Our luckless heroes had the bad fortune to have never checked the news or apparently even spoken to anyone who had checked the news all day. And when they entered the Capitol, they simply didn't notice the obvious signs of damage and disarray surrounding them, the fact that they were accompanied by an angry mob of Trump fans screaming about how they wanted to kill anyone standing in Trump's way, or the fact that there were no staff on this supposed tour collecting tickets, checking IDs, or guiding people through the building.

You would have to be extremely gullible to buy this story. But for the sake of argument, fine, let's accept that some of these protesters were hapless bystanders. You're still arguing from the perspective of trying to prove exceptions to the rule, rather than trying to overturn the principal facts of what we all saw that day. I don't need to thoroughly demonize each and every protester. What people are correctly focusing on as the worst elements of that day are the protesters battering down doors and smashing windows, forcing their way into the building, and screaming to kill politicians, all in an attempt to overturn an election and keep the president they liked in office. That's not going away no matter how many "exceptions" you can find about this one particular cop looking the other way or this one protester not really doing anything bad. Trump fed his supporters lies about how he had been cheated and was illegally being forced out of office. They believed him. He encouraged them to protest at the Capitol on the day of the certification of his loss. They did so, things got violent, and Trump's complacent reaction strongly indicates that he hoped that would happen. That's all that happened here. The only person who tricked or manipulated the protesters into doing what they did was Trump himself.

See: https://www.businessinsider.com/capitol-police-officers-suspended-after-pro-trump-riots-2021-1

This supports the idea that those cops who did look the other way or even helped the protesters out did so of their volition, not because of any conspiracy coming from the top to make Trump supporters look bad. If these cops had been following orders when they did what they did, do you think they'd be quietly accepting being made scapegoats like this? They'd go right to the media and blow the whistle on the whole thing. In fact, we'd definitely be seeing cops coming forward with the truth even if they weren't being blamed for what they did. If you were a cop and you realized that your higher-ups just used you as a prop in a dangerous, partisan political stunt and an elaborate hoax on the American people, wouldn't you want to blow the whistle? I certainly would.

2

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 18, 2025, 02:18:54 AM »

A reasonable person wouldn't think that the presence of a gallows in front of the Capitol meant that it was permissible to storm the building as part of an angry mob and to smash windows and break down doors while screaming for the blood of the politicians you hate in an attempt to stop the certification of an election, just like a reasonable person wouldn't think that a couple of cops not actively fighting dozens of angry protesters or even opening one or two doors for them meant that it was permissible to storm the building as part of an angry mob and to smash windows and break down doors while screaming for the blood of the politicians you hate in an attempt to stop the certification of an election. Even if I agreed that any of this was indicative of complicity on the part of the authorities (which apparently doesn't include Trump), all that would mean is that further blame should be extended towards the authorities. The protesters' actions would in no way be justified or excused by this. They violently tried to stop the certification of an election in an attempt to keep their preferred president in power. Nobody tricked, forced, or coerced them into doing that. The most you could argue is that someone "let" them do it. If a cop puts a loaded gun on a table in front of you, you are still 100% morally and legally guilty of murder if you then grab that gun and use it to kill someone. The cop will face their own consequences for what they've done, but that will have no bearing on the consequences you'll face. That's all this setup argument comes out to. You're insisting that someone put a gun on the table in front of the protesters and therefore it's not the protesters' fault that they then grabbed the gun and shot someone with it.

3

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 17, 2025, 03:41:00 PM »

...yeah? You're acting like those two points contradict each other. They don't. Hanging virtually never happens nowadays in this country. And any reasonable person would interpret an angry mob screaming that someone should be hanged as a threat.

4

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 17, 2025, 01:38:04 PM »

As barbaric as the US system is in still having the death penalty - something which most advanced civilizations have now moved on from - I didn't think you actually hanged people these days.

We don't, and I think any reasonable person would agree that "Hang Mike Pence" is a threat. Of course they didn't need to explicitly spell out "I am going to hang you" any more than a mugger pointing a gun at someone needs to say "I am going to shoot you" for it to be a threat.

5

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 17, 2025, 01:45:18 AM »

The VIPs were not secured.

I did say fairly quicky. For all I know, these cherry-picked moments of cops not actively fighting dozens of angry protesters came after the evacuations. And even if they didn't, I can still easily see cops making the snap decision to not start fights they couldn't possibly win. I can't say whether or not that was a sound tactical decision, but there's a world of difference between outnumbered cops not trying to fight protesters at a few given moments and the whole thing being a setup to make Trump supporters look bad.

After the Asley Babbit shooting the massive crowd of people in that wing turned back and left. There is well publicized video of this, taken from people within the crowd, which I am certain you are aware of. Stop LARPing. If there were people still in other distant wings after that, it is irrelevant to this demonstration that firearms worked to deter the crowd.

Okay, I looked up a video of the Babbitt shooting. I wouldn't call this a "massive crowd" of protesters. A few of the protesters do seem to leave after the shot is fired. Plenty of them can clearly be seen still sticking around. Perhaps more importantly, we then see a team of cops with assault rifles bring up the rear, which I imagine played far more of a role in whatever deterrence happened in this scenario than the one lone cop firing his sidearm. In any case, your description of what happened is extremely disingenuous, and it's also extremely disingenuous to compare this one particular moment to the cherry-picked scenes of dozens of angry, screaming protesters marching past one or two isolated cops and say that, gee, all these outnumbered cops had to do was fire off a round and all these protesters would have quietly run home.

But ultimately, none of this matters. We all saw the violence of Jan. 6th. We all saw the angry mobs, we all heard their promises to murder anyone stopping Trump from getting a second term, we all saw them battering at the doors and smashing the windows while screaming for blood. None of these quibbles about whether or not this or that cop was actively fighting the protesters or whether or not this or that door was opened for them changes what we all saw and heard. These people were not at the Capitol to peacefully protest. They knew it, and we know it.

6

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 15, 2025, 07:54:51 PM »

If a cop is intimidated for his life, he has a weapon to use. The discharge of a weapon did, in fact, turn back the crowd.

The Capitol Police are there to protect the Capitol and allowing a mob into the premise to get at the VIPs is seriously unacceptable. I sincerely doubt that honk or Lord Dave believe what they claim, or would think that it's okay for perimeter police to let a mob into the Harris White House to get at President Kamala Harris. This is an obvious Liberal LARP, in which one attempts to argue the leftist justification position no matter what and makes poor arguments for internet liberal points.

The members of Congress had been evacuated from the Capitol fairly quickly, so at a certain point the police probably figured that it was better to let the protesters in and allow them to damage the building rather than put their own lives at risk by starting a fight that they had no chance of winning. I don't know what you're talking about by claiming that discharging a weapon was what deterred the crowd. There was no one specific thing that stopped the protest. Like I said, the events of the day lasted several hours, long past the shooting of Ashli Babbitt, and the protest wasn't brought to a full end until reinforcements with riot gear who were actually equipped to physically deal with large numbers of unruly people cleared the last of the protesters out. From the perspective of the cops originally on the scene, taking out their guns and shooting the protesters could have very easily gotten themselves killed, and if it hadn't, might have led to them being vilified and/or prosecuted as murderers. I also don't know what your musing about Kamala Harris being the president has to do with any of this.

7

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 15, 2025, 01:55:42 AM »

I have no problem believing that at a certain point, the police probably just gave up trying to physically stop the participants. The events of the day lasted several hours, remember. To demand that every cop should have been spending every second of that time actively trying to physically stop the participants - which is exactly what's being implied when you present cherry-picked moments of cops not actively trying to physically stop the protestors and insist that it's indicative of a setup - just isn't reasonable.

8

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 09, 2025, 01:07:52 AM »

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/faa-workers-threatened-firing-spacex-b2709799.html

But remember, guys, it's the federal employees earning median paychecks who are the real problem. Not the oligarchs using their access to usher billions their way.

9

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 04, 2025, 03:42:41 AM »

Being "tough on Russia" implies that we are defending American interests. With the uncovered involvement of democrat financial interests in that country, ie. the Hunter Biden ordeal, it is hard to argue that Ukraine is in the interest of the average American.

I'm going to call out this lie every time you or anyone else reposts it. Viktor Shokin was fired for failing to investigate corruption, including at Burisma. It was not in Burisma's interests that he be fired. It was also the shared opinion of both parties in this country and the international community at large that Shokin was enormously corrupt and needed to go, not a personal whim of Biden's - and no, the fact that Biden himself was quoted at the time as saying "If the prosecutor is not fired, you're not getting the money" doesn't somehow "prove" that this really was a personal whim of his; it simply proves that it was the position of the Obama administration. There are plenty of sources for this, as I've posted before. It's a very well-documented subject. I don't expect you to concede this point, as you never have in the past, but I'm not going to let this lie stand unchallenged. Again, every time you trot this story out, I'll respond with a rebuttal like this so that nobody reading this thread is left in any doubt that it's a lie.

10

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 02, 2025, 12:24:09 AM »

Short, Jewish comedy actors need to be kept off of the world stage. Especially short, Jewish, Nazi comedy actors.

I wonder if he will go back and open up elections in his democracy.

Pretty sure you've got a contradiction in there.

While accusing Zelenskyy of being a Nazi is ludicrous and a transparent attempt to try to rationalize Trump's support of Putin as actually being a sensible and strategic position rather than a shallow and entirely personal caprice, it's entirely possible for someone to express support for or claim to believe in a philosophy or movement that wants them dead or subjugated, or even to join organizations that want them dead or subjugated. Racist organizations often benefit from having a token non-white member they can whip out as a defense to racism, like the Proud Boys with Enrique Tarrio.

11

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 01, 2025, 03:01:18 PM »

It's also worth repeating once again that Trump's sympathy towards Russia rather than Ukraine is not a political, ideological, or even financial calculation. Trump is a layman with no real knowledge of or interest in international politics. This is entirely because he likes Putin on a personal level and wants to impress him. Whatever pleasure he gets out of trying to please Putin is not something that benefits anybody but himself. A good leader would set their own personal feelings aside when making these kinds of important decisions.

12

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: March 01, 2025, 02:35:04 AM »

https://apnews.com/article/romania-andrew-tate-us-04749679b90fad821c2b945955f5b145

Again, it needs to be stressed that this is not a coincidence. The Trump administration lobbied and pressured the Romanian government into releasing the Tates.

The article you posted doesn't say that though.

And yet it's true. Of course Romania isn't going to go on the record and say "The Trump administration pressured us to let the Tates go and we folded." Seeing through obvious attempts at saving face is an important part of interpreting political news, and we already know from previous reports that Trump officials were lobbying on behalf of the Tates. Romania doesn't need to publicly acknowledge this as true for it to be true.

I won't waste time discussing the details of the case against the Tates, especially not with someone who's just going to reflexively argue every single point. It's been extensively documented online, and needless to say, goes well beyond simply operating a camgirl service. And even if I believed that Tate was entirely innocent, he's still such an openly vile person that the Trump administration going out of its way (it's not like it's the president's "job" to secure the release of every American citizen facing prosecution in other countries, after all) so early in its term to lobby on his behalf is a very ugly look - as it was undoubtedly meant to be.

13

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 28, 2025, 02:54:53 AM »

https://apnews.com/article/romania-andrew-tate-us-04749679b90fad821c2b945955f5b145

Again, it needs to be stressed that this is not a coincidence. The Trump administration lobbied and pressured the Romanian government into releasing the Tates. I'll avoid talking about the brother for now because I don't know enough about his involvement to fairly judge him, but Andrew Tate is a vile piece of shit who has openly bragged about the women he's abused, exploited, and yes, raped, even though he's denied the specific crimes he's been charged with. Does he deserve his day in court, and until that time, to be treated by the government as innocent until proved guilty? Of course. Does he deserve to have the President of the United States, within his first six weeks of office, directly intervene in his case on his behalf and get him out of the country that's prosecuting him? Absolutely fucking not.

14

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 26, 2025, 04:45:22 AM »

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c7435pnle0go

Pathetic. Absolutely pathetic. Trump is desperate to impress Putin. No, don't even start with talking about how this has anything to do with strategy or the budget (the latter claim is especially unbelievable given how Trump and Republicans have now passed their enormous tax cuts for the rich). This is entirely personal and comes down to nothing more than Trump's fawning crush on Putin. That's literally all it is. Your big strong macho president is Putin's little bitch.

15

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 23, 2025, 04:09:44 PM »

Only a resignation is a resignation. You can't just say "I'm taking this as a resignation." As for taxes, I haven't seen anything about Musk paying billions since 2021, when he claimed he'd be paying $11 billion from selling stock. It's worth noting that every article that covered that subject seems to be taking Musk's word for it. It's extremely likely that he was lying or exaggerating. Like I posted a while back, Trump is planning trillions in tax cuts. Those tax cuts aren't for you or me. They're for the enormously wealthy. Trump has you so convinced that you're being taken advantage of a bunch of bureaucrats earning median paychecks that you're entirely blind to the oligarchs who really are taking advantage of you, to a degree many times worse than the federal workforce (even assuming all the FUD about them being a bunch of lazy freeloaders is true - which it isn't).

16

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 23, 2025, 02:42:24 PM »

https://apnews.com/article/elon-musk-trump-federal-workers-f44257ce4cf8c04c96c8ce0ce262842f

“Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump’s instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week,” Musk posted on X, which he owns. “Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.”

Pretty sure that's not how it works. Anyway, like I said, the salaries for federal employees comes to only a very small percentage of the budget. If the concern really is saving money, then I would again suggest we tax the oligarchs. Make Musk and his fellow billionaires pay their fair share. But that won't happen, because the real goal is of course crippling the federal government.

17

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 20, 2025, 03:44:12 AM »

The problem being discussed isn't the nuclear stockpile or whether or not we should be in fear for our lives over nuclear stability, but that Trump and Musk have proved, once again, that they have no idea what they're doing.

So if they haven't put me in danger, why should I care? I don't see any argument for why anyone should care about these firings. If the President wants them out of the branch he oversees, then they are out. You seem to think that I care deeply about random probationary executive branch employees who were given the boot in cost cutting. I don't.

Again, what you should be concerned about is the fact that Trump and Musk don't know what they're doing and are making major decisions without doing basic research or preparation first. Perhaps no harm was done in this particular incident, but it won't be the only time something like this happens. Someone who always thinks that they're smarter and better-informed on every subject than everyone else, and assumes that every idea they have is a good one that should be carried out immediately without taking any time to consider the possible consequences is not going to be a good leader. In other news:

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/politics-news/trump-andrew-tate-romania-lift-travel-restrictions-1236139575/

Pathetic. Trump and co. are now going to bat for an odious rapist and sex trafficker. This case shouldn't even be crossing their desks. They're busy and have a million things to do running the country. But no, this is a priority for them. They're going out of their way to help out Andrew fucking Tate. They're sending a clear signal that Tate is their guy, that they have his back.

18

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 19, 2025, 04:44:37 AM »

The employees fired were probationary clerical workers. Therefore it is not likely that it they were critical to the integrity of America's nuclear stockpile. Probationary employees are not put in critical and sensitive positions for the reason that the permanence of their role is still in evaluation. This is also why probationary employees were terminated rather than regular employees.

The only reason why probationary employees rather than regular ones were fired is that probationary employees are a lot easier to fire. That's it. If Trump and Musk could have fired the regular employees as easily, they would have done so as well.

I don't see why I should be concerned for my safety knowing that some probationary employees were fired and then rehired and that the NNSA has a lot of other tasks that they are doing around the world which do not directly relate to America's nuclear stockpile. This alarmism is pretty dumb.

That's a blatant strawman. The problem being discussed isn't the nuclear stockpile or whether or not we should be in fear for our lives over nuclear stability, but that Trump and Musk have proved, once again, that they have no idea what they're doing. They fired a bunch of people from the Department of Energy without realizing that the department controls the nuclear stockpile, and presumably because those jobs were too important to be so casually cut, they had to offer the fired workers their jobs back. I won't claim that the DOE controlling the nuclear stockpile is basic common knowledge or something that "everyone" knows (I'm saying this because I suspect that otherwise someone will accuse me of implying that everyone knows about what the DOE does), but it's still information that's readily available to anyone willing to Google it. If Trump and Musk are going to gut the federal workforce, they owe it to the country to at the very least do some very, very basic research about the people they're firing before they, you know, fire them.

19

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 16, 2025, 03:36:31 PM »

Correct. There are many justly layoffs occurring in the federal government right now. The DOE gave the orders, and they likely know what the NNSA is, so they should know if they are actually putting the nuclear stockpile at risk with the layoffs.

You're very gullible if you believe that, which I seriously doubt you do. The Department of Energy knows what it's doing when it comes to properly managing nuclear weapons. Trump and Musk don't. The obvious conclusion is that it was Trump and Musk who ordered these firings without realizing what they meant, not that the DOE coincidentally just happened to fire a bunch of employees at the same time that Trump and Musk have been pursuing mass firings of federal employees. In other news:

https://abcnews.go.com/US/doj-files-motion-dismiss-charges-mayor-eric-adams/story?id=118847473

This is transparently corrupt. Adams is a crook who should have been drummed out of office a long time ago. Instead, Trump has thrown out the charges against him in a blatant quid pro quo for his own political benefit. It's not draining the swamp, it's not telling it like it is, it's two crooks making a deal.

20

Philosophy, Religion & Society / Re: Trump

« on: February 15, 2025, 09:25:16 PM »

https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/14/climate/nuclear-nnsa-firings-trump/index.html

Even if we take it for granted that the federal budget is in urgent need of cutting, and even if we take it for granted that this cutting needs to take the form of mass firings (despite the salaries of federal employees making up only a tiny part of the federal budget), this is ample evidence that Elon Musk and his team of broccoli-headed kids aren't the ones who should be doing it. They're morons.

I don't see "DOGE" or "Elon" mentioned anywhere in that article. It says "Congress is freaking out because it appears DOE didn’t really realize NNSA oversees the nuclear stockpile". Why wouldn't the Department of Energy know that the National Nuclear Security Administration maintains the nuclear stockpile? This article cites anonymous sources "with knowledge on the matter". That is code that they interviewed random nitwits.

Read the article, DOGE or Elon are not mentioned. It accusing the Department of Energy of not knowing that the NNSA is, which is questionable. The article is also trying really hard to conflate Department of Energy officials with "Trump administration officials":

Trump administration officials fired more than 300 staffers Thursday night at the National Nuclear Security Administration — the agency tasked with managing the nation’s nuclear stockpile — as part of broader Energy Department layoffs, according to four people with knowledge of the matter.

Sources told CNN the officials did not seem to know this agency oversees America’s nuclear weapons.

An Energy Department spokesperson disputed the number of personnel affected, telling CNN that “less than 50 people” were “dismissed” from NNSA, and that the dismissed staffers “held primarily administrative and clerical roles.”

The DOE spokesperson says that it is false alarmism. If you keep reading it turns out that the DOE had terminated new probationary employees, and then brought them back. If they fired them and brought them back it could be for a number of reasons, such as budget or priority revision, and it is a stretch to imply that there was ever a direct danger of nuclear accident without these people. The article heavily suggests that everyone in the NNSA is an incredibly important and critical part of nuclear safety, and that job losses undoubtedly put us all in grave danger, which is blatantly false. This is just fear mongering and yellow journalism.

Of course it wasn't really the Department of Energy that suddenly, independently decided to fire a large number of employees at the exact same time that Musk and Trump have begun their promised purge of the federal workforce. That's obviously just how they're dressing it up. They gave the orders, and everyone fired is told "(insert agency/department name here) has determined that your position is now redundant," blah blah blah. That's obvious. And of course career officials at the Department of Energy would know that nuclear weapons would fall under their own purview. They wouldn't make that mistake. The two famously arrogant and not particularly bright businessmen now running this country, both of whom have spent their whole lives thinking they know better than everyone else? They would.