We are all Slave now.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

We ought to be making a bigger stink of the likes of Wilbur Ross. It's pretty clear that he's just crooked to the core.

What would that accomplish?

Democrats ought to be branding the GOP with all of the corruption.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

There is a degree to which ISIS' rather gruesome and extreme tactics are a logical response, to the Shock and Awe tactics used to project American hegemony in Iraq (I think that our military is very much aware of this and does take a lot of steps, especially in the civ-ops world, to minimize it).

If the fundamental message from those dropping bombs with the goal of replacing the existing political and military structure is "if you don't concede we will visit extraordinary terrors upon you from the air and from our overwhelming military force", then someone trying to build a political leadership structure to face that Shock and Awe force needs more shock and more awe to compete, and the message of "they may kill you quickly but we will enslave you, torture you, make your loved ones suffer, and then you'll be condemned to Hell for eternity" is what you may expect back. Couple this with the Bush Administration's determination that they would completely replace the Iraqi military and leave substantially all the trained military and police fighters in Iraq unemployed, and we did a really good job of laying out the powder and the detonator. There have been some excellent articles outlining such things as the pay scale of the ISIS army compared to alternative employment, but these don't get the play the little performances by some of the cretins you favor get.

It's not all cause and effect from the US, there are plenty of other contributing factors to the likes of ISIS, but I wouldn't assume ISIS is some kind of irrational cult like American evangelicals.

I had a similar thought when writing my comment. ISIS is clearly a shock and awe reply to shock and awe. And the economic argument is compelling given the lack of jobs for uneducated young men in that region.

But as ISIS grew and became a quasi-govt, it morphed into a death cult. The rapes, rampant beheadings for frivolous violations of religious edicts, and brutal subjugation of fellow Muslims is intended to terrorize their own people, not scare foreign fighters.

It was a mix of various aims, but I think in the end it turned into a poor man’s Nazi SS, with a touch of Gehngis Khan and Idi Amin.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Ezra Klein spent a huge amount of time listening to Sam Harris say stupid things and patiently trying to engage with him, publishing the whole fucking transcript of the conversation on Vox, and you accuse him of squelching debate and censorships. LET ME REPEAT: HE PUBLISHED THE WHOLE FUCKING CONVERSATION. THAT IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF CENSORSHIP, YOU BUFFOON. I patiently try to engage with you and you accuse me of the same thing. At least you're consistent.

You keep missing the point. Klein spent hours telling Harris why he should not engage in certain discussions or, if he must, that he must do so in a manner satisfactory to Klein’s politically correct sensibilities.

Of course the debate itself could not be censorship. Political correctness doesn’t directly censor. It places certain items inside an often arbitrary and maleable sphere of deviancy chosen by the politically correct.

Klein never got to the merits of Murray. That I don’t buy Murray, that you don’t buy Murray, is irrelevant. Klein is, to use a popular word today, attempting to “shame” Harris. His aim is to cause people like Harris to cease engaging in certain controversial discussions in the future. If you don’t see what’s wrong with that, you’re either challenged, impossibly obtuse, or brainwashed.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

You can't find anything in the transcript that is remotely like what you think Klein said. As you say, bad ideas die in the light.

Lets drop the Kabuki Dance. You know how politically correct pressure indirectly precludes discourse, and you know how to read between the lines.

Correctness is a great tool. You can never be flagged for outright appeals to censorship (some loons try that, but almost always fail). You set some “rules,” then use social (that subject is offensive!) and often academic (smart scholars don’t look into these things!) pressure to marginalize what you seek to marginalize.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Klein spent hours telling Harris why he should not engage in certain discussions or, if he must, that he must do so in a manner satisfactory to Klein’s politically correct sensibilities.

If he did not do that even once. We have the transcript of their conversation. I don't know why you trust the way Klein bugged you when you listened to the podcast over WHAT IS ACTUALLY IN TEXT IN THE ACTUAL TRANSCRIPT, but WHAT YOU REMEMBER IS NOT WHAT HE SAID.

PLEASE TRY TO GET THAT THROUGH YOUR SKULL.

If there is someone in that conversation who sensibilities are delicate, it is Harris, who repeatedly impugns the motives of anyone who disagrees with him. But whatever.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Lets drop the Kabuki Dance. You know how politically correct pressure indirectly precludes discourse, and you know how to read between the lines.

Correctness is a great tool. You can never be flagged for outright appeals to censorship (some loons try that, but almost always fail). You set some “rules,” then use social (that subject is offensive!) and often academic (smart scholars don’t look into these things!) pressure to marginalize what you seek to marginalize.

It's odd that the discourse you are so worried about here is that of Murray and Harris, two affluent and successful guys with large audiences, guys with no problem getting their views heard and making a living from it. Literally no one is censoring them. Klein engages with Harris and patiently gives him a platform and publishes their conversation and you whine about censorship.

It reminds of the way Trump gets the NYT and CNN and the rest to cover his every utterance, and then complains about fake news.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Oi. Deleted the wrong thing.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Deleted because Ty has more patience than me. Oi vey.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I had a similar thought when writing my comment. ISIS is clearly a shock and awe reply to shock and awe. And the economic argument is compelling given the lack of jobs for uneducated young men in that region.

But as ISIS grew and became a quasi-govt, it morphed into a death cult. The rapes, rampant beheadings for frivolous violations of religious edicts, and brutal subjugation of fellow Muslims is intended to terrorize their own people, not scare foreign fighters.

It was a mix of various aims, but I think in the end it turned into a poor man’s Nazi SS, with a touch of Gehngis Khan and Idi Amin.

If you're looking at body counts in Syria, ISIS is in second place by a country mile. If you're looking at torture and enslavement, well, then they're contenders; part of the success they had in Syria was that they were a viable alternative to Assad who wasn't much better and arguably worse for many. Why do we react less strongly to Assad's crimes? Syria will now return to its regularly scheduled mass killings.

More importantly, why can't Americans see that Lebanon or Jordan, next door, are completely different environments with massively different attitudes, thought processes, and ways of dealing with and fighting this? Jordanian pilots flew a ton of missions into ISIS territory, yet are never mentioned as our allies. And Lebanon was home to over 1.5 million refugees, critical to winning those battles, in probably the greatest humanitarian effort by any one country since the post-WWII days.

And why weren't Americans prepared to provide any meaningful support to the Arab Spring?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Well, one thing it might accomplish is this:

I guess what I'm trying to say is that the Democrats don't need to go after Wilbur Ross in the hopes of trying to get him sacked, etc. They need to tar Republicans generally as being corrupt for enabling all of the Wilbur Rosses. We are getting closer to the day when Trump is no longer popular and supporting him is more of a liability than an asset.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

I guess what I'm trying to say is that the Democrats don't need to go after Wilbur Ross in the hopes of trying to get him sacked, etc. They need to tar Republicans generally as being corrupt for enabling all of the Wilbur Rosses. We are getting closer to the day when Trump is no longer popular and supporting him is more of a liability than an asset.

I think we have to keep going after the whole range of corrupt Republicans and showing how they enable each other. But that means seeing Wilber Ross held to account as one thing we need to do among many.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

It's odd that the discourse you are so worried about here is that of Murray and Harris, two affluent and successful guys with large audiences, guys with no problem getting their views heard and making a living from it. Literally no one is censoring them. Klein engages with Harris and patiently gives him a platform and publishes their conversation and you whine about censorship.

It reminds of the way Trump gets the NYT and CNN and the rest to cover his every utterance, and then complains about fake news.

I detest efforts to stop any form of speech or inquiry.

Klein is of a crowd who think they’ve the intellectual capacity and right to decide the questions society might ask.

Murray’s scholarship fails because he admits his ultimate point is that people should be taken individually, without consideration to race, sex, ethnicity (yes, that is his point). Then he goes on to run data on why people can be lumped together and assessed. The contradiction is too great. But that doesn’t mean we should crucify Harris for discussing the issue of whether there are politically correct taboos out there. Someone else may be able to take the information underpinning Murray’s flawed conclusions and reach accurate conclusions with it.

I would do this with any topic in which I see people trying to avoid inquiry. For instance, I believe Snowden is heroic. I think release of all possible info on domestic spying, and all inquiries regarding it, are valid. I want to see more, regardless of the alleged risks to national security. This is a position very much loathed by affluent men like Harris and Murray.

Free speech and inquiry are absolute. Call Harris a moron all you like. I’m fine with that. Try to define the rules of discourse to put Harris’s inquiry into the sphere of deviancy and I’ll call you out for it. You see the difference there. I know you do.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

If he did not do that even once. We have the transcript of their conversation. I don't know why you trust the way Klein bugged you when you listened to the podcast over WHAT IS ACTUALLY IN TEXT IN THE ACTUAL TRANSCRIPT, but WHAT YOU REMEMBER IS NOT WHAT HE SAID.

PLEASE TRY TO GET THAT THROUGH YOUR SKULL.

If there is someone in that conversation who sensibilities are delicate, it is Harris, who repeatedly impugns the motives of anyone who disagrees with him. But whatever.

What do you not understand about the concept of “reading between the lines”?

Of course Klein cannot directly advocate censoring Harris’s conversation with Murray. That destroys his authority and credibility. Instead, he states that Harris is trafficking in deviancy. The intended effect is the same.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Deleted because Ty has more patience than me. Oi vey.

It was also a pretty dumb comment.

As a result of listening to Harris’s podcast with that young writer, I wound up listening to his podcast with Murray, to hear what was so incendiary. There, Harris and Murray discussed a later book by Murray in which Murray argues that a white underclass is emerging via wealth inequality and assortative mating. He doesn’t come right out and say this white underclass is genetically disadvantaged, and I haven’t read the book and don’t intend to, but let’s say he did say that. Let’s say Murray posited that we’re developing a “redneck” line of genes. I’m fine with allowing that line of inquiry. (I think it’d be flawed, but what’s the harm in inquiring? Worst case, you acquire potentially useful data.) What would your view on that be? Would you view that as something offensive, dubious, or would your bourgeoise sensibilities and politics be fine with it?

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Adder

A "friend" (you know what that means) posted recently about the one year anniversary of the death of his second son, born days after his first son, who has Downs, was diagnosed with leukemia. The second was born with a heart condition that required an airlift and immediate surgery that he didn't survive.

I can't imagine the pain he and his wife have been through and, as a card carrying Minnesotan, don't have any words.

For those with full DM boxes, "friend" means person I primarily know over the internet.