That’s a troll, fyi, I’ve run into him a couple times now. If you drive him into a corner he’ll just start name-calling and block you, so you can’t debate him in the future. He does not seem to realize this does not prevent us from leaving our own replies to his posts for everyone else to discuss, without him.

That is actually a fair criticism. I simply don’t think it’s as strong an influence over strategic thinking. In any decent thinker anyway.

Ah, I see. So, I don’t believe Bin Laden foresaw the Patriot Act in any way shape or form. From his perspective specifically, it’d be about sowing as much fear and discomfort as possible. I doubt he personally was able to predict the exact form that fear and discomfort would take, but it doesn’t really matter. Surveillance harms us exactly because it creates more fear and discomfort. The specifics are an irrelevant detail though, not something he has influence over or needs to care about. Not mission-critical information.

The fear and discomfort in turn leads to more radical behavior, it helps drive folks crazy, to speak colloquially.

This is the real key that can and probably eventually will drive us from the Middle East. Without it, and the emotional feeling of disgust it creates within us, it would’ve taken a mammoth amount of casualties and/or economic damage to accomplish that. We have a long history of being unbelievably stubborn. Additionally, we weren’t yet energy independent back then, before our fracking boom, so being there was an additional economic necessity he would’ve felt needed to be overcome.

Look at it this way: He wanted to create more Islamophobia. So we would leave all the Muslims alone, eventually, since genociding them isn’t an option for decent folk, which we (mostly) want to be. Something we now have to wrestle with concerning Israeli actions.

It’s basically how terrorism works as a political and military tool, how it attempts to accomplish its intended goals. It’s not usually so successful, though. But I would say this time, fear was successfully sown, and domestic harmony effectively destroyed. We haven’t really been politically functional since then, though that’s my opinion, again.

At least you’re willing to be honest, I respect that. I’ll point out though, that the Patriot Act in isolation requires me to explain at length how a surveillance state harms American citizens, which in turn harms America. This would be a tangent. It’s far easier to deal with in conjunction with American diplomatic reputation, debt, and casualties as well, wouldn’t you agree? Taken all together, I think it becomes almost impossible to not see how grievous harm has been done, and continues to be.

One more time. I have at no time asserted that his stated goal was impossible or unachievable. Quit putting words in my mouth. I’m talking about how they get accomplished, yes? I’ve said several times now that they are possible, just not in any way quickly or straightforwardly, which I assert he likely knew, due to how painfully obvious it is and was, to anyone who picks up the briefest of US history books. Our involvement in WW1 and 2 was definitive and for very clear reason. I don’t know how someone could assert that he’s paying attention to Vietnam but not WW2.

You really want to get into a sidetrack about how a surveillance state harms the citizens of a democracy in a way that makes them prefer isolationism? I think it’s fairly straightforward if you acknowledge our voting system, but I can explain if you wish. It’s common enough sentiment in privacy circles. Importantly, it lasts until we do away with it, where war exhaustion due to casualties fades fairly quickly, historically speaking. Knowing our government, we will probably not do away with it for quite some time, though that’s more an educated guess.

edit: The main reason I don’t want to get into the privacy discussion, incidentally, is because we’re on Lemmy, where a very large number of privacy-oriented types hang out. So it strikes me as unnecessary and a little silly, despite your questioning of it. But ask one last time and I will provide some resources for you, that’s fine.

Heh, funny how the constitution has no problems specifying sole power vs power, which torpedos that final argument entirely.

Who has the “sole power” of impeachment, for instance?

Paywall blocked me out. My response to the synopsis though:

This is a fucked if you do, fucked if you don’t thing. Militaristic thinkers, because they only care about winning, are often very good at maneuvering their opposition into untenable positions, catch-22s. They’re rationally inescapable, that’s the whole point, so it’s best to fall back onto your feelings, as much as I hate to say it. To paraphrase popular youtuber Ryan McBeth, don’t give your enemies problems, because problems have solutions. Give them dilemmas. That’s what they’re doing to us. When you find yourself in one, just acknowledge pain is your future, and pick something.

I’ve also slowly begun to suspect that there’s Russian intelligence penetration into our broader media ecosystem. I cannot otherwise explain the prevalence of Russian war propaganda coming from western outlets, and how certain American churches seem to be drifting closer and closer to Eastern Orthodoxy.

Let’s just keep our eye on the ball here. We’re trying to prevent the full might of the US military from falling into fascist hands unchecked by any Mike Pence type figures. It’s gonna get really ugly, but we can still win this with political activism and words. We need to remember our ground game. Nobody fully trusts these glowy screens we’re looking at, so its talking to your friends, knocking on doors, getting people registered, volunteering to drive voters to the polls, etc.

We win this one face-to-face, with the good ole fashioned democratic party ground n pound. It’s our greatest strength anyway. Find a couple people somewhere, and talk to them, preferably nicely. Don’t try to make them angry, try to get through to them.

If they’re religious, you can try to gently remind them of Jesus’ teachings, and how he said to pray for your enemies, to forgive others, to be kind and charitable, how the meek, not the strong shall inherit the Earth, how it’s easier to pass a camel through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God, how he whipped the Pharisees for using the temple to make money, how he sacrificed himself and not someone else to save our souls, how he asked us to follow him.

There’s so much more too. The height of irony in this day and age is how our greatest ally is actually probably the Jesus Christ of the scriptures. Sometimes you just have to meet people where they’re at. Frankly though, if you support people like Ghandi and MLK Jr, nothing Jesus says should be too strange to you. Maybe the praying stuff, he was pretty big on prayer. Philosophically he was just ahead of his time though, and honestly fits fine into the modern world as a broader philosophical alternative to materialism. He shouldn’t be blamed for what people did in his name after he died though, and his direct words are probably the only possible thing that could get through to certain sorts.

If we can remind evangelicals what it means to be a good person instead of a frightened person, though, we’ll sweep this election in a landslide. If by any chance you were raised in the church, there’s a very good use for those skills still. I know they’re still in there, even if it upsets us a little bit because of the shitty actions of various churches in the intervening 2000 years. Jesus didn’t do those things though, he just told people to play nice in a lot of different ways.

You’re ignoring most of my arguments. Why the focus on Patriot Act, when it was one of three factors I listed? Why do you keep trying to say that I’m saying his stated goals were unbelievable, when I’ve repeatedly said I’m debating the specifics of how he expected to accomplish them? It’s not a “what”, it’s a “how”.

I’ve repeatedly expressed my reasonings. I cannot help it if you don’t tell me the specific parts you disagree with or don’t understand. I won’t just keep repeating myself.

I hope they spoke very strongly, this is the time for strong language.

What part of the insurrection clause is so misunderstood?

Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

edit: I just don’t get it. It seems like very clear language to me

tbf, the entire thing where Presidents pardon their predecessor was a very bad precedent to set. There’s just not a whole lot of good that can come out of that idea.

You don’t understand how people can discuss possibilities without believing in them 100%? The world must be a very confusing place. I guess that makes more sense why you just believe a terrorist though, you have to believe someone. Something has to be true, right?

People are complicated, so we discuss possibilities, alternatives, etc and think in terms of likelihood. This is fairly common in areas where we cannot scientifically prove something, like when examining motivations.

Truths belong in holy books. I have opinions, and I am discussing them. I admit I do use fairly strong hyperbole sometimes.

Like I said, the idea that America would just give up after losing a couple skyscrapers is just pants-on-head stupid, so I feel pretty comfortable swinging with some strong language.

edit: Alright, I edited my old post to add an imo, so it was clearer I was not trying to give historical fact.

I have at no time asserted it was impossible to drive the US from the Middle East. To the contrary, sowing domestic strife and global overreaction was an excellent first step towards accomplishing that in the long run.

All I’m granting him is an assumption of rationality and long term thinking. I’m not claiming any truth or facts or anything, I cannot read a dead man’s mind. But I can look at what happened and draw conclusions with the aid of hindsight, and strongly prefer that over simply trusting his word.

Are you unable to see how we have harmed ourselves since then? How about how Israel is harming themselves right now?

I don’t think you need to be an anthropologist to figure out that attacking someone’s civilians nearly guarantees counterattack. We still needed the oil out of the region back then to boot.

I don’t disagree. Just disagree that his method was as simple and straightforward as people here seem to think, just believing what he’s spoon feeding them 100%. He was sophisticated, a leader. Not some simpleton.

As if Americans would just give him what he wants for knocking down a couple skyscrapers. Have you even seen our culture? We shoot each other in our own streets, much less foreign attackers. How people think we could just forego a chance at revenge is just utterly, hilariously wrong in every way.

Propaganda is a quantity game, it can make anywhere from no sense to complete sense, because different messages will be received differently by different people.

The Sept 11th attack was not a piece of some greater war. It was a declaration to an unsuspecting people, very few of us had any expectation that something like that would happen. I can understand when the Japanese made the mistake in 1941, but its much less understandable now. It’s certainly no Vietnam, which didn’t end until we had lost large numbers for many years. Comparing that to an expectation that a surprise attack on our civilians would have similar effects is simply ridiculous.

America is a box of hornets. It was still, and got kicked. No other possibility was even remotely likely to anybody that knows anything about us. He couldn’t have been that totally and completely ignorant.

To the contrary, it is far more likely he was an intelligent adversary that researched and understood his opponents, and struck effectively. I simply find that far more plausible than him being a fool that wanted a quicker way to get him and his organization to heaven, and otherwise failed miserably.

edit for some sloppy wording

It makes zero sense though. No people on Earth would just go “oh welp, guess we better go home now.”

Do we seem hesitant to kill people to you?

Not sure why someone would believe a fighter when they say why they fight. It’s not like propaganda is unique to western countries or something. It’s everywhere. It’s a tool that creates effects, you think he’s above using it or something?

It’s a jihadist group. It’s not about this life, it’s about the next. When you’re dealing with a zealot, everything becomes a tool to get to heaven, no matter how evil other people see it.

Look at our evangelicals bending over backwards to support Trump, who is not very Christ-like. If the Prince of Peace came down from heaven today, he would be very angry with his “followers”. Might even take his belt off and start swinging, and he didn’t get violent very often.

… Palki doesn’t usually criticize her own country and allies too harshly, she even leans slightly pro-Russian in the Russo-Ukrainian War and occasionally reports misinformation. I appreciate the willingness to report this though, that takes some courage, to report on wide-scale criminal organizations in her own country. Props for that.

First Post is a mixed bag. I mainly watch them for the China reporting, she seems to watch them very closely. I also appreciate her as a counterweight to my largely western media diet, alongside a few others like Al Jazeera.

Though every once in awhile I get a good laugh during the show. I remember they said that Russia took an “important gateway” when Marynka fell. Gateway to what, more open flat land with towns sprinkled on it? Just a blatant parroting of the Russian propaganda line with no critical thinking applied.

But then they’ll turn around and report something like this. And they’re usually promoting international cooperation and diplomacy unless they’re talking about the UK or China, where a very clear bias becomes immediately apparent. So yeah, mixed bag.

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/first-post/

To me it comes down to a strategic approach. In how many ways is it possible for Hamas to actually hurt Israel in a significant way? Not very many, even thousands of civilians dead doesn’t genuinely weaken the country much. But they can make Israel hurt themselves, by basically making them go evil and lose their allies.

Similar to how Bin Laden very much succeeded in his goals for the Sept 11th attack, by getting us to pass the Patriot Act, invade some countries and start ripping ourselves apart imo.

Regardless, arguing this position on here is going to be like trying to swim up a waterfall. Israel has gone too far, and the hate against them is too strong because of that. The middle of a war is not the time for nuance.

edit for a qualifier