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Slaughtering our Kurdish allies

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  • #76
    Just wonderful...

    TURKEY BOMBS US SPECIAL FORCES IN SYRIA ATTACK, APPARENTLY BY MISTAKE

    A contingent of U.S. Special Forces has been caught up in Turkish shelling against U.S.-backed Kurdish positions in northern Syria, days after President Donald Trump told his Turkish counterpart he would withdraw U.S. troops from certain positions in the area.

    Newsweek has learned through both an Iraqi Kurdish intelligence official and senior Pentagon official that Special Forces operating on Mashtenour hill in the majority-Kurdish city of Kobani fell under artillery fire from Turkish forces conducting their so-called "Operation Peace Spring" against Kurdish fighters backed by the U.S. but considered terrorist organizations by Turkey.

    The senior Pentagon official said that Turkish forces should be aware of U.S. positions "down to the grid." The official could not specify the exact number of personnel present, but indicated they were "small numbers below company level," so somewhere between 15 and 100 troops.

    https://www.newsweek.com/us-troops-syria-turkey-1464727
    Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

    Comment


    • #77
      Originally posted by seer View Post
      Just wonderful...
      See, and I thought Trump was pulling our troops out because he was keeping campaign promises. Foiled again.

      Comment


      • #78
        Originally posted by seer View Post
        I see this quite often. Some nut with a partisan identity kills three, and immediately there's a cry, "What about ..." this guy with a differing identity, who killed no one. The obvious answer is boring to me, but if it needs to be included for the less quick-witted, on a scale of one to three dead, none killed doesn't move the needle on the scale.

        Similarly, on a party scale from one beer to enough to get you flopping meat uninvited in the face of a co-ed, a glass of wine with dinner doesn't budge the scale either. And on the scale of speaking lovingly about beer in a job interview to so black-out drunk you can't remember locking the door behind a 15-year-old before pawing her in high school, nodding off at an SOTU isn't meaningful, either.

        Could y'all, just once, surprise me, Spanky, and come up with a what-about-ism that actually compares the subject under debate to something ... worse?

        Comment


        • #79
          Originally posted by Juvenal View Post
          I don't think he should be.



          Is that supposed to be a defense of Robertson, or an impeachment of Franklin?
          Neither. I'm not speaking normatively in the first place. The point is that it's relevant that somebody regarded as a close personal contact of the president (if not even an advisor) is publicly taking a different tack. Only Falwell Jr dissenting would probably make more waves.
          "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

          Comment


          • #80
            Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
            Neither. I'm not speaking normatively in the first place.
            If you leave your keys in the visor, don't complain when Captain O. takes your account for a joyride.

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            • #81
              Originally posted by Juvenal View Post
              I see this quite often. Some nut with a partisan identity kills three, and immediately there's a cry, "What about ..." this guy with a differing identity, who killed no one. The obvious answer is boring to me, but if it needs to be included for the less quick-witted, on a scale of one to three dead, none killed doesn't move the needle on the scale.

              Similarly, on a party scale from one beer to enough to get you flopping meat uninvited in the face of a co-ed, a glass of wine with dinner doesn't budge the scale either. And on the scale of speaking lovingly about beer in a job interview to so black-out drunk you can't remember locking the door behind a 15-year-old before pawing her in high school, nodding off at an SOTU isn't meaningful, either.

              Could y'all, just once, surprise me, Spanky, and come up with a what-about-ism that actually compares the subject under debate to something ... worse?
              Oh stop, when Kavanaugh shows up to a State of the Union address so drunk he nearly passes out then you can pass judgement. And everything else you just said is pretty much unsubstantiated nonsense.
              Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

              Comment


              • #82
                Originally posted by seer View Post
                Oh stop, when Kavanaugh shows up to a State of the Union address so drunk he nearly passes out then you can pass judgement. And everything else you just said is pretty much unsubstantiated nonsense.
                What about lying during his Senate confirmation hearing? What if one of Obama's appointees had done that?

                Comment


                • #83
                  Originally posted by MaxVel View Post
                  No, that's a misrepresentation. People disagree with you over the substance of what you think Trump actually did, so they don't have a problem with it. Since they don't think he did what you think he did, they don't draw the conclusion you draw. You have to get them to agree on the premises (what he did) BEFORE you can get them to agree on the conclusion you draw from those premises.

                  This has been pointed out to you more than once.





                  1. See above. Until there is agreement on what he actually did, there won't be agreement on whether it is immoral or not.

                  2. Some people realise that all politicians are to a greater or lesser degree, flawed and immoral. They take a pragmatic view of politics. You seem to be more idealistic.

                  3. I harbour doubts about how even-handed your moral sensibility is in the area of politics. I suspect you focus on the morality of politicians you dislike, and overlook the morality of politicians you support. As do we all.

                  Take a good look at the current 'Elizabeth Warren lying' thread. You have a group of posters interpreting her statements in the most charitable way they can (and reasonably, I think), because they broadly oppose Trump and support her. And you have a group of posters who find her statements to be contradictory, and indicative of her lying (reasonably, I think). They don't like her politics, her personality, and find things in her past (claims to be Native American) as evidence that she's likely lying now.

                  Now imagine that we changed 'Warren' to 'Trump' but left the statements, backstory, etc the same. I think that they posters who have been supporting 'Warren' would condemn 'Trump' and vice versa. The people who interpret 'Warren's' statements charitably would interpret 'Trump's' statements unfavourably.

                  tl; dr : I don't think anyone is completely unbiased, certainly not you. Hence 'Trump bad' from you carries little weight.








                  For the sarcastically impaired the following is said in jest

                  That's waaay better than asking what someone really thinks. It's far easier to deal with people if we put them into categories and stereotypes, and assume their motivations.

                  Of course there's confirmation bias on every side of partisan issues. That's assumed. But as far as lying goes, to say that "everyone lies" is an absurdly false equivalency with regard to Trump. All politicians lie to some extent, but Trump's lies are of a completely different order of quality and magnitude. Trump manipulates others' perception of truth strategically as a malleable negotiable means to gain what he wants from a given transaction. He lies about his weight, how he gained his wealth, his crowd size, his electoral victory, Muslims cheering 9/11, the friggin' weather! He'll lie when it's of no advantage to him, when it's too petty or trivial to matter to anyone or anything but his own tender vanity. This is not partisan. He is not a Republican, IMO. He is not a conservative, IMO. He spent most of his adult life as a moderate DEMOCRAT with progressive views, other than for a mild distaste for black people, until befriending Roger Ailes after 2000. This has nothing to do with ideology or left vs. right. It has to do with AUTHORITARIANISM. The first thing an authoritarian does is take control of one's sense of truth, one's sense of reality.

                  Comment


                  • #84
                    Originally posted by seer View Post
                    Oh stop, when Kavanaugh shows up to a State of the Union address so drunk he nearly passes out then you can pass judgement. And everything else you just said is pretty much unsubstantiated nonsense.
                    Speaking of just stopping, your reputation for attacks on smaller women is never going to fade away if you keep bringing them up, Spanky. If you can't repent your misogyny, you should at least have the grace not to advertise it.

                    Comment


                    • #85
                      Originally posted by Juvenal View Post
                      Gorsuch would be okay with me if it weren't a seat stolen from a black president by a southern senator who's now on record saying he'd seat a Trump appointee given the same circumstances. There's no way to whitewash those racist optics.
                      Huh? This is the absolute first time I've ever seen anyone try to identify some kind of racial component. Setting aside the fact I don't consider Kentucky to be a "Southern state", the fact is that race had nothing to do with it. Obama was a Democrat, it was an election year, the Republicans wanted a Republican appointee (especially given that the departing Justice was a Republican appointee), so they held it over. Despite the constant claims of it being unprecedented, it wasn't even the first time that's happened in American history (to be fair, it was closer to the election the last time it happened, but this "don't hold hearings, wait until after the election to see if our guy wins" has been done before for the SCOTUS). Was it unfair? Maybe. But there was no racial component to it whatsoever and I can't even say it was "racist optics" when you're the first one I've ever seen try to bring it up.

                      Also, where did McConnell ever say he'd do it for Trump under the "same circumstances"? If you're referring to him saying that they'd do it prior to the 2020 election, that's not the "same circumstances." The circumstances that kept getting pointed to back in 2016 was it being the election year of a president ineligible to run for re-election. That is not the case in 2020. Yes, we know all of it is a simple matter of preferring the president be of your own party, but it's still not the "same circumstances".
                      Last edited by Terraceth; 10-11-2019, 11:53 PM.

                      Comment


                      • #86
                        Originally posted by Terraceth View Post
                        Huh? This is the absolute first time I've ever seen anyone try to identify some kind of racial component. Setting aside the fact I don't consider Kentucky to be a "Southern state", the fact is that race had nothing to do with it.
                        I'd imagine you're arguing that Kentucky was principally a Union state in the Civil War, and I'd agree, while noting that a quarter of its population was freed from slavery at the end of the conflict. The sympathies are another matter, and the suggestion that race had nothing to do with McConnell's immediate and continuous opposition from the time of Obama's initial election would be an opinion, not a fact, and one that strains credulity.

                        Obama was a Democrat, it was an election year, the Republicans wanted a Republican appointee (especially given that the departing Justice was a Republican appointee), so they held it over. Despite the constant claims of it being unprecedented, it wasn't even the first time that's happened in American history (to be fair, it was closer to the election the last time it happened, but this "don't hold hearings, wait until after the election to see if our guy wins" has been done before for the SCOTUS). Was it unfair? Maybe. But there was no racial component to it whatsoever and I can't even say it was "racist optics" when you're the first one I've ever seen try to bring it up.

                        Also, where did McConnell ever say he'd do it for Trump under the "same circumstances"? If you're referring to him saying that they'd do it prior to the 2020 election, that's not the "same circumstances." The circumstances that kept getting pointed to back in 2016 was it being the election year of a president ineligible to run for re-election. That is not the case in 2020. Yes, we know all of it is a simple matter of preferring the president be of your own party, but it's still not the "same circumstances".
                        I suspect I'm the only American posting this thread who is without a party affiliation, which is something to bear in mind when I suggest partisan politics should have nothing to do with Supreme Court nominations or confirmations. The politicization of our courts is a shameful matter, in my opinion, as is the precedent set by McConnell for partisanship to negate the clear constitutional duties of the Senate.

                        And seeing as we're off-topic anyway, I'm still waiting for a response from you, elsewhere, on alternatives to the documentary hypothesis, if you can find the time. That thread's not dead. It just takes a lot of time for me to consider and respond to Adrift. Every one of his posts is an extensive reading assignment.



                        Originally posted by Juvenal View Post
                        Originally posted by Terraceth View Post
                        What about the Supplementary Hypothesis as a counter-theory? Or do you count that as an "amendment" of the documentary hypothesis?
                        Please feel free to expand on this. I'm not familiar with this alternative, or how it differs from Wellhausen.

                        Comment


                        • #87
                          ISIS Rears Its Head, Adding to Chaos as Turkey Battles Kurds
                          A prison break and a bombing claimed by the Islamic State punctuated fears that the Turkish invasion, now in its third day, was sowing mayhem.

                          By Carlotta Gall and Patrick Kingsley
                          Published Oct. 11, 2019
                          Updated Oct. 12, 2019, 3:03 a.m. ET
                          CEYLANPINAR, Turkey — The Turkish invasion of Kurdish-held territory in northern Syria raised new fears of a resurgence of the Islamic State on Friday, as five militants escaped from a Kurdish-run prison and the extremist group claimed responsibility for a bomb that exploded in the regional capital.

                          As Turkish troops launched a third night of airstrikes and ground incursions, Kurdish fighters said they had thwarted a second attempt to break out of a detention camp for families of Islamic State members.

                          To be clear, the prison break was minor, but it's clear the ISIS fighters are now in a position to take down an entire prison camp, recovering significant assets for their struggle.

                          Comment


                          • #88
                            Originally posted by Juvenal View Post
                            I'd imagine you're arguing that Kentucky was principally a Union state in the Civil War, and I'd agree, while noting that a quarter of its population was freed from slavery at the end of the conflict. The sympathies are another matter, and the suggestion that race had nothing to do with McConnell's immediate and continuous opposition from the time of Obama's initial election would be an opinion, not a fact, and one that strains credulity.
                            It hardly strains credulity. McConnell's "immediate and continuous opposition" comes from the simple fact that Obama, as a Democrat, enacts policies that McConnell disagrees with. It's simply downright silly that try to ascribe a racial factor to this.

                            I'm reminded of when a conservative (Andrew Ferguson) reviewed Dinesh D'Souza's book "The Roots of Obama's Rage" which claimed Obama's policies came from some kind of African racial reaction to imperialism, and Ferguson essentially said "Uh, dude? Maybe the reason he enacts liberal policies is just because he's a liberal."

                            I suspect I'm the only American posting this thread who is without a party affiliation, which is something to bear in mind when I suggest partisan politics should have nothing to do with Supreme Court nominations or confirmations.
                            I don't have a party affiliation. I don't think KingsGambit does either. Unless you're counting third parties as a "party affiliation"? But anyway, whether they should or should not be politicized wasn't the point. It was that that's a far more plausible interpretation than some kind of racism towards Obama.

                            The politicization of our courts is a shameful matter, in my opinion, as is the precedent set by McConnell for partisanship to negate the clear constitutional duties of the Senate.
                            Politicization started before McConnell, and this "precedent" of waiting for after the election to hold any vote for SCOTUS nominee was already done long before McConnell--see Fillmore's attempts to nominate Supreme Court justices, which the Senate (composed of Democrats--Fillmore was a Whig) refused to take action on, and then after the election went with the nomination of the newly elected Democrat president instead.

                            I am not sure what you mean by "clear constitutional duties" of the Senate. If this refers to holding votes, there is no constitutional duty. The "advise and consent" is a restriction on the power of the president, not a requirement for the Senate--and furthermore, even if you insist it is a duty of the Senate, "come back next year" is absolutely advising on the subject. The Senate could, if it wanted to, simply refuse to appoint any Supreme Court nominee for the next 20 years. It'd be a bad idea, but it's not unconstitutional.

                            I also, more than anything else, put the blame on Roe v. Wade. What we're seeing now is what we were starting to see in the Lochner era--but in that case the Court reversed course and stopped the process before it got out of hand.

                            For background, the "Lochner era", named after the court case Lochner v. New York (although it started earlier), was a several-decades-long time period when the Supreme Court got it into its head that there was some kind of "freedom of contract" that prevented the government from enacting things like minimum wage laws or maximum work hour laws. Eventually FDR got so frustrated over it he tried his court-packing plan, but the Court in West Coast Hotel v. Parrish essentially ended the Lochner era by starting to uphold the kind of legislation it previously struck down (a common claim is that it did so in response to FDR's court-packing attempt, but the historical evidence indicates the timing was pure coincidence), so that died down. Interestingly, a common--and in my view, entirely valid--criticism of Roe v. Wade is that it relies upon the same basic judicial errors as the Lochner era did (see here, for example).

                            Roe v. Wade is having similar effects (granted, it took a while for it to really build up--but then again, the same is true for the Lochner era) in terms of the politicization of the Supreme Court. For denying the democratic process to a major issue, and even worse doing so on shaky (at best) constitutional grounds, the Supreme Court essentially played the role of a legislature. And legislatures are very politicized. If the SCOTUS had overturned that decision back in 1992 (and they nearly did), I doubt we'd have the problems we currently do. Not only that, but Roe v. Wade took it from being a state issue and turned it into a federal one. Scalia was dead on in his dissent in Planned Parenthood v. Casey when he noted that Roe v. Wade "fanned into life an issue that has inflamed our national politics in general, and has obscured with its smoke the selection of Justices to this Court in particular, ever since. And by keeping us in the abortionumpiring business, it is the perpetuation of that disruption, rather than of any Pax Roeana, that the Court's new majority decrees."

                            And seeing as we're off-topic anyway, I'm still waiting for a response from you, elsewhere, on alternatives to the documentary hypothesis, if you can find the time. That thread's not dead. It just takes a lot of time for me to consider and respond to Adrift. Every one of his posts is an extensive reading assignment.
                            Done. I forgot that topic even existed.
                            Last edited by Terraceth; 10-12-2019, 02:41 PM.

                            Comment


                            • #89
                              Originally posted by Juvenal View Post
                              I'd imagine you're arguing that Kentucky was principally a Union state in the Civil War, and I'd agree, while noting that a quarter of its population was freed from slavery at the end of the conflict. The sympathies are another matter, and the suggestion that race had nothing to do with McConnell's immediate and continuous opposition from the time of Obama's initial election would be an opinion, not a fact, and one that strains credulity.
                              I don't know how one anecdote can go for but my grandmother spent the majority of her life in eastern Kentucky and proudly taught Kinist views that she says she learned in church. She attended a Southern Baptist Church, not some random small snakehandling operation.

                              (I'm estranged from that side of the family for other reasons.)

                              Originally posted by Juvenal View Post

                              I suspect I'm the only American posting this thread who is without a party affiliation
                              Nope. (Well, I registered as a Democrat when I lived in Missouri just so I could access one set of primaries, but felt no affiliation toward them, so I don't know what that counts for.)
                              "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

                              Comment


                              • #90
                                Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
                                I don't know how one anecdote can go for but my grandmother spent the majority of her life in eastern Kentucky and proudly taught Kinist views that she says she learned in church. She attended a Southern Baptist Church, not some random small snakehandling operation.

                                (I'm estranged from that side of the family for other reasons.)
                                A quick google and enough time to return my jaw to its upright position later ... dayum.

                                I never even imagined there was such a thing.

                                Nope. (Well, I registered as a Democrat when I lived in Missouri just so I could access one set of primaries, but felt no affiliation toward them, so I don't know what that counts for.)
                                I was Republican until voodoo economics drove me out, and now that I think hard about it ... yes, I did register D for a while to vote "anti-green," but it was anything but political. "Green" was the gang color on my block in the Humboldt Park neighborhood of Chicago, and also the color of the car I'd picked up, meaning every other gang swinging through thought it was there for target practice.

                                After replacing a third back windshield shot out because I didn't know anything about gang colors, or what that had to do with my windshields until I asked a neighbor, I got ticked off enough to register, just to vote against the "green" candidate pushed by another neighbor, who also sported a "green" car because, or so he said, it was "the prettiest car on the lot," which he was careful to keep in a garage, not on the street.

                                It was wicked convenient. He'd stop by and tell me who to vote for, like clockwork, a week before any election. I'd carefully write it down and thank him profusely, every time.

                                Comment

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