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FirmWeird

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joined 2022 September 05 23:38:51 UTC

				

User ID: 757

FirmWeird

Randomly Generated Reddit Username

1 follower   follows 0 users   joined 2022 September 05 23:38:51 UTC

					

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User ID: 757

I based my claim on an article which is now paywalled and hence unable to be used as a source which claimed these were the actual motivations in question. But that said...

The Special Military Operation will work, and they'll look like naysayers

I highly doubt this will happen.

Iran will do something so horrible that you don't want to look like you were defending them

Yea, just imagine how awful it would be if they did something terrible like blow up a school full of young girls or destroyed a major petroleum stockpile in a populated residential area, causing immense ecological damage and health consequences for people forced to breathe in black rain! Who could possibly defend monsters that would commit such atrocities?

I mean if the IRGC sets off a dirty bomb in Tel Aviv, that actually makes the war a worse idea than when it was started

Speak for yourself - Tel Aviv getting blown up is one of the few positives to emerge from this conflict in my view.

Do you disagree with the more general legislative branch framing to specifically call out the democrats as evil? I imagine the "compromised by Israel and the military-industrial complex" descriptor fits the political class in America in general, rather than just the Democrats.

No, I don't disagree with this - the entire legislative branch IS corrupt and compromised (except maybe a few small outliers). The reason I called out the democrats specifically is that they are ostensibly the opposition party and are meant to put a stop to wars like this.

Furthermore, I thought the Republican base was supposed to be the ones who despise war with Iran more, as evidenced by the countless media campaigns and memes I've seen during the 2024 election season about Kamala wishing to start a war with Iran if elected, and the no-war president Donald Trump. So if any side is more duplicitous, I'd also say it's the Republicans.

The republicans have betrayed their base to an immense degree, and that base agrees - the MAGA coalition has just about disintegrated at this point. The magnitude of their betrayal is probably larger than that of the democrats, but I'm sure in the alternate reality where the DNC won they would be betraying their base just as hard.

Yet somehow the continuation of the Iran war is more evidence that the democrats are the dishonest evildoers.

I actually did have an article which made the claim that the democrats know that their base hates the war but they want to support it anyway, but as far as I can tell that article is now paywalled and I can't find it anymore. But yes, it is evidence that the democrats are dishonest evildoers - just not THE dishonest evildoers.

Talking about this being a war, it's actually a military operation. Not only does it reminds you of another military operation, this story once again underline the absolute weaksauce cowardliness of the US legislative branch in allowing this to happen. But maybe this is exactly what the American people want. Elections will certainly be spicy this midterm year.

It is actually stupider and more evil than just "weaksauce cowardliness". The democrats all want war with Iran because they're compromised by Israel and the military-industrial complex, and war with Iran serves both of those interests (or at least those interests seem to think that - who knows what will happen in the end). On the other hand, they know that their base absolutely despises the war with Iran and will refuse to vote for people who support it. That's why they're simply doing nothing and pretending that their hands are tied - because it allows them to get what they want (incredibly expensive bombs paid for by the US taxpayer blowing up schoolchildren who are in the way of Greater Israel) without having to damage their electoral support by actively supporting it.

As one of the leftists on here the only reason I'm posting less is that I'm retiring from my day job to work full time on my own creative projects. While I'm at work my employer owns the copyright to everything I create, which is why I can't work on my creative projects here. This frees up time for the motte, because I'm totally fine with my employer retaining copyright to my cancellable rants against Israel and nuclear power.

Then again I'm very atypical for leftists in that I think HBD is real and that social justice/woke culture is a counter-productive dead-end for left wing political strategy, which is probably why I have been posting here instead of whatever the real leftist forums are.

They haven't shot tens of thousands of protestors last January after being warned not to by the US.

Is there any actual evidence of this at all? I've seen numbers ranging from ten to eighty thousand, and no specifics beyond that wrestler who beheaded police officers.

There is a right answer here,

No, there really isn't - or at least not the one you're proposing. If you think that Iran announcing their complete capitulation and surrender would lead at all to a positive outcome you're fooling yourself. Do you remember what happened the last time Iran was a democracy? Do you remember why that changed, and how the Shah was installed?

There are other countries out there that Cuba can trade with.

Are you aware of how the sanctions actually work? Other countries who trade with Cuba also get penalised for violating the blockade. They've actually done remarkably well given their conditions, and even train enough doctors that they send them abroad to assist in natural disasters etc.

From my perspective, the two interpretations were you that you were wrong and/or didn't know the details of the situation, or that you were creating unnecessary ambiguity to obscure the actual argument you were making - what's the point of listing countries which were attacked and asking me to guess which of them your criteria actually apply to? I believed that the first interpretation was the more charitable.

Could you please clarify what your list actually meant then? When you said "I am unaware of any U.S. military bases or U.S. troops in several of the attacked countries" you then followed up with "To list, at least: Israel,". What, exactly, were you listing? I interpreted your post as listing countries that were attacked which lacked US military bases or US Troops, because simply listing all countries that had been attacked and implying that some of them lacked US Military bases or Troops would be ambiguous and useless in a good faith discussion. I'm not aware of any nations that Iran has attacked which didn't contribute to the attacks on them, with the exception of Lebanon (which is a difficult situation anyway, because to the best of my knowledge Iran has been attacking Israeli forces inside Lebanese territory).

The fact the Cuban economy cannot afford oil imports at market rates is a result of their mismanagement, corruption, and incompetence.

Cuban hyper-agency! Do you think that US sanctions played any role in this state of affairs?

If you shoot at me from far outside my reach, and the only people I can reach to hit back are some of your friends who happen to be very economically important to you,

It is worth pointing out that in case the "friends" are also holding the gun, helping you reload the gun and hosting a bunch of your employees who help aim and fire the gun.

unaware of any US military bases or U.S. troops

Israel

Come the fuck on. Are you even trying to participate in a good faith discussion? Are you going to seriously sit here and claim that Israel was not party to the attacks on Iran? Do you believe there's no military co-operation between Israel and the US?

Diego Garcia.

Are you for real? Did you forget a sentence or something here? If you aren't aware of any US military bases on Diego Garcia I think you need to go and do some more research before continuing to post on this topic.

attacking other nations seemingly at random

This is the Motte - please leave takes sourced from John Stewart and other talk show hosts where they belong. What they are actually doing is attacking nations which are hosting US forces and military bases, and the hotels they have been attacking were used to host American troops. They've been positively saintlike when compared to the US' blowing up of primary schools and oil depots in Tehran.

targeting infrastructure

Iran attacked a gas field after one of their gas fields was attacked and they explicitly said that was a proportional response. Even Trump chickened out from destroying their powerplants after the Iranians explained what they would blow up if he did.

My apologies for being ambiguous - I did not mean that Israel were in charge of all foreign policy decisions, but that certain decisions were made by them with zero regard for America's interests.

I believe that was the original plan, but at the same time I think they underestimated just how effective Iran's missile campaign would be. The risk of Israel being completely destroyed or rendered effectively uninhabitable for civilian life is just too high - though maybe they consider that price worth paying in the long run.

I'm also going to put my money on TACO. The consequences for anything else are just way too dire, and even though I believe the Trump 2 administration is completely compromised by a foreign power I don't think even that foreign power is suicidal enough to take this next step up the escalation ladder - at least not before they've seen how US boots on the ground fare. Destroying all that energy infrastructure would make Iran substantially less attractive to rule over, and I think we'll need to see a lot more Americans coming home in boxes before blowing up all that infrastructure becomes a worthwhile option.

I don't think there would be much direct collusion between the Trump campaign (at least, not multiple high level staffers) to begin with just because there's not too much need for it.

The problem with this entire take is that Trump actually has colluded with a foreign power and he was extremely open about it, creating an undeniable trail of evidence accompanied by corrupt outcomes which simply do not exist for Russia and Putin. The Russian connection relies on incredibly dodgy IP address connections and other bullshit, along with one of 2016 Candidate Trump's policies (get the US out of foreign wars) coinciding with one of Putin's priorities (end the Ukraine war, which was rendered substantially harder by US assistance). There's mysterious backchannels, blackmail material with sources exactly as strong as someone on 4chan saying they made it up (not joking) etc - and to top it all off, there's no real evidence that Trump acted in a corrupt fashion and helped out Russia.

But if we switch focus for a second and look at Israeli compromise, there are mountains of evidence - we can see Trump talking about how Miriam Adelson purchased his foreign policy decisions for money, we can see the pipeline from donations to pardons, we can see foreign policy decisions completely outsourced to Israel no matter how much the US suffers. This is what corruption actually looks like, and it isn't hidden at all - there IS direct collusion, there IS evidence of quid pro quo, there IS evidence of bribery. What's the point of talking about the anemic and insubstantial accusations of pro-Russian collusion when Trump openly confesses in public to being purchased by Israeli money?

Actually Iran being able to lay waste in 1500 miles is the best argument for dealing with them once and for all.

So you're going to support military action to wipe out the rogue Israeli regime and their undeclared nuclear arsenal, right? Israel is capable of causing even more damage to the region and the world, so naturally you'd support dealing with them once and for all to an even stronger degree, no? They've even made explicit threats to do so (google the Samson option), which is actually more than Iran has done.

the destruction of Israel would invite a metric arse-load of bad karma

I think it is extremely telling that this is the level of argument you have to make to support this war or the pro-Zionist position. Israel and America's interests are deeply opposed here, and to pretend otherwise forces you to descend to this honestly laughable standard of argument.

What's the value in discussion with someone who is going to blame the Jews every time?

If someone was criticising the actions of the Nazi regime, would you discount their critiques on the basis that there is no value in discussion with someone who is going to blame the Germans every time? How many people in the upper echelons of the Israeli government, with the ability and authority to make serious decisions, are not Jewish?

However some of the posters here are clearly just angry, hateful, and blinded by some sort of intense and specific dislike that will never make sense to me and is clearly objectively irrational despite being historically common.

What, exactly, is irrational about Coffee Enjoyer's post? Are you going to deny that Israel has nuclear weapons? Are you going to deny that they have, in the past, engaged in both espionage and direct attacks on the US? The most significant intelligence theft in US history (at least to my knowledge) was committed by an Israeli spy, Jonathan Pollard.

I've never had any significant interaction with anti-semites in person or in real life prior to this conflict and I now get while growing up the Jewish people I know just automatically assumed anyone who was anti-Israel was anti-semitic.

The kind of low-intelligence antisemitism that you're describing, the kind that belongs to people who just look for some kind of external force they can blame for the problems in their life so they don't have to do anything about, have always existed and will always exist. If it wasn't the Jews it would be the Feminists or the Man or the Illuminati etc. Those people aren't worth talking to, but I'd argue that it isn't the specific target of that kind of mental pathology that distinguishes them.

But you're doing your own thinking a great disservice by shoving every single person with an antipathy towards Israel into that rather cramped box. Have you paid any attention to the recent conflict or the actions Israel has actually taken in the Middle East? Do you think the family of Rachel Corrie are motivated by an "objectively irrational" dislike when they criticise the state of Israel? As someone on the left I can assure you that most people who criticise Israel in my circles have a gigantic list of incredibly specific grievances and problems they have with the state of Israel, and it is in fact the state of Israel which goes out of its way to conflate all criticism of it with criticism of Jews in general, and plenty of prominent organisations do the same (like the ADL).

What a coincidence! I too find people who post on the topic of Israel to be incapable of rational discussion because they fail to agree with me and my obviously correct points - just with the opposite political valence to you.

What does that have to do with the point I was making? I'm very confident that a Christian, Jewish or Taoist nation would engage in violent warfare in response to those provocations.

If Iran has the ability to "destroy the global economy" whenever they want then this conflict was coming sooner or later because the rest of the world actually can't afford to cede that power to a rogue state. It's actually the most rational war in the world.

Almost everyone has the ability to destroy the global economy. If you think that's the criteria required, you're saying that we have to go invade and destroy Israel, China, Russia, the US, etc. Iran is just the only state that has been sanctioned and removed from the global economy to the point that it won't actually have nasty consequences for them - the actual rational response is to not sanction them into oblivion so they have some skin in the game.

No no no you're not understanding how war works. War is not America plays pretend. If there's an oil pipeline somewhere that allows Iran to hold out forever -- America will bomb it!

America has not bombed that oil pipeline nor have they seized Iranian tankers - they can't afford to deprive the world of even more oil supplies.

The only reason America hasn't done that already is our charity.

Why isn't the Strait of Hormuz open? I thought America was done playing pretend, so why haven't they won yet? Hegseth is on TV talking about no quarter, no mercy and no more pesky rules against bombing schoolchildren, and yet Iran still controls the Strait.

If the only two alternatives are "Iran wrecks the Global Economy" or "The Global Economy wrecks Iran," which do we think Donald Trump is picking?

Those aren't the only two alternatives - though admittedly "The US empire's decline accelerates as they're forced out of the Middle East" isn't an option Trump is willing to pick either.

(3) Iran's leadership has prioritized building a nuclear bomb.

Israel has built a nuclear arsenal already, has been relentlessly attacking their neighbours and other countries in the area and openly proclaimed their desire to become a regional and/or global power (see Netanyahu's recent comments) - does this actually justify launching attacks against the Israeli regime?

Comparing gdp to Thailand seems a bit much, yea? Thailand isn’t run by religious nutters that fund terrorism. It’s not yelling death to America as a winning political strat. It’s just a lower middle class country.

I am extremely confident that if America had sanctioned Thailand off from the global economy, put out a document titled "Which path to Siam" which explained they needed to wipe out all of Thailand's neighbours before invading them, wiped out all of Thailand's neighbours as they explained in their openly published plan on how to invade Thailand and then blew up 150 Thai schoolgirls that Thailand would actually be yelling "Death to America" at the top of their lungs.