ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
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User ID: 2935
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
Yeah, my sense (which is admittedly based off of about two people on twitter) is that democrat voters aren't so angry because they were treated dishonestly but because the cover-up of Biden's cognitive state put the party in a much worse situation vis-a-vis the election against Trump. I don't think there's gonna be any electoral fallout for retributive reasons.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
Would that gain him any new votes or make people who generally vote D but thought Biden was too old less likely to vote for Harris?
I firmly believe that Americans are narcissists and it's to their credit here; they'll mostly vote on domestic matters that truly impact them.
Does that make them narcissists? I'm not sure why anyone should be expected to vote more on the basis of issues affecting people overseas rather than domestic concerns.
I don't think many Michigan Muslims would care about the mere fact they're Jewish.
My sense at least is that politically active and religious Muslims are generally pretty abundantly anti-semitic. And we're not talking about a guy raised secular who doesn't identify at all with his background; wikipedia describes Shapiro as an observant Conservative Jew and quotes him as saying, among other things "Israel not only has a right, they have a responsibility to rid the region of Hamas and the terror that Hamas can perpetrate".
Even without the above statements, any image of him entering a Synagogue or near an Israel flag would likely spread around hardcore Muslim communities like wildfire as proof he's a bloodsucking Yahud Zionist who they have a duty to treat as an existential fundamental enemy in their Holy War.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
The republican case is actually more noteworthy IMO, given how much of a departure from typical Republican candidates Trump represented.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
The Muslims in Michigan absolutely are.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
The example Level 3 question is literally read a table and pick the smallest number in the appropriate row. Back in 2012 less than half of 15-16 year olds in the USA were able to answer a Level 3 question correctly.
I straight up don't believe the figures for the number of people correctly solving those PISA questions given by that Unz post. If half of US adults didn't agree on which numbers were bigger than others I think there'd be much bigger societal problems than the ones America currently has to deal with.
Agreed. I always found it weird that so many people's major criticism of him is that he once gave a probability of ~30% to something that did in fact happen.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
Not much of one. If you added up the top 10 people cancelled by the Right, do you think they would reach the prominence of James Damore?
Does Bud Light count?
I think you can explain a large part of the higher visibility of LW cancel culture because progressive thought dominates so many public-facing institutions. It's hard to cancel someone if you don't have a high profile patrons like major media outlets on your side.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
I read nomenym's comment as describing the POV of the typical antifa member; that there was an implicit "in the minds of people who advocate punching a nazi" attached to the end of their first sentence. Perhaps I'm wrong.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
That's fair, but I don't think it changes my argument that most women still probably over-estimate how thin the body types that men find most attractive are. What's probably more accurate to say when it comes to the appearance of fashion models is that they're one of the causes rather than an effect of these distorted perceptions.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
Thanks! It's kind of interesting that men are more attractive while women are less attractive.
Speaking as a straight guy, I don't agree that women in the US are more attractive than in the UK. I think straight people (which I assume 2rafa is) often have a slightly distorted view of what the opposite sex actually finds attractive, which is why e.g the female-dominated fashion industry keeps hiring super-thin models, and why so many men try and get as muscular as possible.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
Probably something to do with the Jews.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
The simplest answer is that Biden's the one making that decision and he thinks he's as sharp as he's ever been. Im sure he also thinks he won the debate and the current panic is all down to a hostile media environment.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
The UN unofficially considers the dissolution of Israel to be one of its core missions. The above may have actually happened in some form, but there's no reason to consider UN reporting on anything related to Israel any more reliable than the white house's statement's on Biden's mental state.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
He's probably used to people not taking what the media says about him at face value and so isn't too worried about negative media portrayal. That appears to have been a miscalculation when it came to comments about Russia/Ukraine. Or it could be that he's simply a very honest person.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
but he didn't actually seem senile
"We finally beat medicare?"
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
Was Obama ever particularly identity-focused in his politics? Honest question, I didn't pay attention to politics during most of his presidency (and haven't paid much attention to him since then).
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
Ah I see. Unfortunately I don't have much to add to what you already said (which I largely agree with) as I just don't have a great sense of the dynamics at play, beyond the most basic ones that most people are aware of.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
Surely there's a lot of scope for policy differences besides actually deploying troops? A big factor of course is whether or not the Hamas/Hezbollah conflicts have died down, but even if they have then there are things his administration would probably do differently, such as not pressuring Israel into accepting the outlines of a two-state solution in return for a normalization agreement with SA as well as providing more diplomatic shielding for Israel and deterrence towards aggressors generally. And if the war is still on, or new wars break out, he'd likely be vastly more supportive of Israel than Biden.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
I'm not sure I understand your question? I didn't mention Ukraine.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
The one exception is probably the ME where I imagine a Trump administration will act very differently from Biden's.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
My opinion of the UN places them somewhere between people who talk in the theater and malaria,
It's lucky that they're so ineffective.
ToZanarkand
Some day the dream will end
4mo ago
They have Jewish (and now) Muslim populations, so they have reasons to care. Small numbers of dedicated people make a lot of noise.
The role that Jews play in maintaining outside interest in the region is pretty much non-existent apart from in the US (which is the only country apart from Israel to have a large enough Jewish community to matter to anyone) and even the US is involved in the region for reasons that go far beyond AIPAC.
It depends on how religious/political the Muslims in question are. If we're talking about people who are basically entirely secular, then maybe they wouldn't care. But I doubt that's the case for those seem to care strongly about Israel, which seem to be those causing headaches for the Democrats in Michigan etc. I'd be stunned if the fervour of their anti-Israel sentiment doesn't strongly correlate with outright Jew-hatred. I can't imagine, for instance, a prayer in an American Mosque for Palestinian victory in their quest to murder all Jews in the Holy Land to end with a reminder to the congregation that American non-Zionist Jews are decent people, and it's important to be nice to them.
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