Mantergeistmann
No bio...
User ID: 323
Mantergeistmann
14hr ago
Is this the same Human Rights council that has condemned Israel more times than every single other country in the world combined? Or is that a different part of the UN? If so, I'm not sure they're entirely unbiased... or I'm wrong, and Israel really is worse than Iran, Russia, North Korea, China, and everyone else on the planet put together.
Mantergeistmann
15hr ago
I actually had to look up the Lutheran church I grew up attending... Evangelical Lutheran, apparently (which is, confusingly enough, not "evangelical"?)
All I know is, the pastor was insistent that nobody bring lutefisk to the smorgasbord, which always disappointed my grandmother. Dunno where that falls ecumenically.
Mantergeistmann
17hr ago
confessional Lutheran
What does that mean, in this context?
Mantergeistmann
19hr ago
Ok - what is the acceptable rate of school situated in former military barracks bombings in such a massive campaign. If the answer is zero - you put such burdensome rules of engagement that make US victory impossible. If it is one - we are right at the tolerance border.
I'd put it at "zero for the opening salvo", and then increasing over time. There's no excuse to not have a fully up to date target list for the first hour, when everything is choreographed and friction and Murphy haven't yet had a chance to really get to work.
Mantergeistmann
19hr ago
There's Iranian doctors purportedly reporting that literally every single casualty they've seen is non-civilian
I've only seen reporting going the other way, that a significant amount of the casualties are civilian. Presumably the source is also "Iran" and it's being accepted at face value, because what other sources are there at the moment, really?
Mantergeistmann
19hr ago
Nobody has presented any evidence that Iran was trying to develop a nuclear weapon
What other reason would they have for 60% enrichment? As far as I know, there were zero indications they were pursuing naval propulsion, for instance.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
That might be all that's needed, though. Declaring separation could, in theory, fracture a fragile country.
I wouldn't bet my life on it working out, but what cost Liberty, I suppose.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
Which eliminates the entire idea of inspiring fear to avoid hatred.
? I read it as not that you should inspire fear to avoid hatred (that is, the fear is a means of avoiding being hated), but that when inspiring fear (if you can't also be loved) to avoid inadvertently inspiring hatred as a side-effect of the fear.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
Conservatives were set to win in a landslide, with Liberals possibly even losing Party status, until Trump awoke the Sleeping Lion of Canadian Politics: "Not being America".
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
if Trump was considering attacking, he didn't do so when the protests were closer to their peak and he threatened intervention if people got shot
The US military makes things look very easy, but that's due to a lot of battlespace preparation, asset mobilization, and logistics. The downside is that it's very easy to make this look so easy as to think they could accomplish it on a shorter time scale.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
We could have done this much easier via diplomacy
As I understand it, Iran declared that stopping nuclear enrichment/capabilities to do so wasn't on the table. Which means no, there really wasn't a diplomatic option possible that I can see.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
The US could probably win against China (militarily; I'm not going in to civilian morale/will to fight and win), but it'd be costly.
Mantergeistmann
2d ago
Oh, I'd also be surprised. Just that minesweeping is an area where the USN knows it is a bit weak, that it's an area where an asymmetric foe can exploit, and that it hasn't solved as hoped.
Mantergeistmann
2d ago
In terms of ability, I agree with the others that the US seems to be pretty good at taking out speedboats. I'm not a military expert, but surely the US has been planning for years (and building tools) to deal with the exact situation where Iran tries to stop traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. So I think it's pretty likely that the US has enough countermeasures in place that whatever Iran tries on this score, it won't succeed long term.
Yes, but also no. Minesweeping has been a recognized weakness for a while, and the ships that were supposed to help turned out to be... bad enough many were retired early.
Mantergeistmann
2d ago
Who will bell post the cat?
Mantergeistmann
5d ago
Personally, for my own safety's sake, I'd rather we err heavily on the side of "assuming people are/protecting gullible idiots".
Mantergeistmann
5d ago
No nuclear enrichment, lift sanctions, Palestinian state, expel the Jews from the West Bank and make the West Bank part of Palestine. No Israeli presence in Syria.
Would Iran also have to publically dismantle its Doomsday Countdown Clock?
Mantergeistmann
5d ago
Just like "fuck all republicans" is like, never going to be clean and always going to be something full of animus even if people drop a "fuck" all over the place in regular conversations.
"Peg the Patriarchy" may not be calling for the specific sex act, but the sentiment is correctly understood to be very negative all the same.
Mantergeistmann
5d ago
Libya
I was unaware that Israel was a big player in the NATO intervention there.
Mantergeistmann
5d ago
But at the end of the day, it's better to be feared than to be loved.
So long as you can avoid being hated, if I recall my Machiavelli. Of course, if you expect to be hated regardless, your options do then devolve to "be not feared, dead, and hopefully eulogised pleasantly and to no longer have your corpse be hated" or "be hated, feared, and have a chance at continuing to live", well, the calculus seems clear.
Mantergeistmann
5d ago
What did we consider Tokyo Rose and Lord Haw Haw? But is it different if they're just being fooled by Iranian propaganda and reporting what they believe is the truth (and making AI videos or other art to display said "truth"), vice actively taking official marching orders from the regime?
Mantergeistmann
5d ago
It seems to have been absolutely the US, and it makes perfect sense. They bombed a half-dozen other buildings in the same complex, with the girls' school being in a walled off corner of same. But "US strike hits 7 buildings in IGRC base including semi-adjacent school" doesn't play well with anyone. The US doesn't want to talk about how they got a target wrong/out of date, and people who hate the US don't want to talk about how "yeah, this kind of thing happens in war, just like friendly fire, it sucks but it's understandable since it's not like the US is omniscient & omnipotent".
Mantergeistmann
5d ago
for what it’s worth, “death to X” is an idiomatic phrase in the Arab/Persian world that just means “down with X” or even just casually “frickin’ X,” not a literal call for everyone in a given country to be executed, in much the same way that English-language “sucks” is no longer regarded as having homophobic implications as an idiomatic usage
The thing is, I could believe that (I personally enjoy talking about people being first against the wall when the revolution comes, Sirius Cybernetics Marketing Division style), except that I assume the people excusing your excerpt would also take significant offense at similar (or lesser!) directed from the wrong people at the wrong people.
Awareness of that distinction was pretty close to zero for me as a churchgoer growing up.
More options
Context Copy link