anti_dan
1d ago
I will note that the most talked about NBA conspiracy theory prior to this one was that there was a frozen envelope that guaranteed Patrick Ewing would go to New York.
From my POV that is several orders of magnitude less viable than ANY conspiracy theory regarding this trade. How can you be the GM of Dallas and not know you have the best asset in the league (minimum top 3) when you just made the freaking finals? Is he some sort of mafia boss sex slave trader? If so how does LA not know they are giving up assets for a super felon?
Luka Doncic being traded in this fashion should spur accusations of conspiracy, they are deserved.
anti_dan
2d ago
If you think we tried to colonize or patronize Afghanistan you are greatly mistaken. We gave them free money
anti_dan
2d ago
For the record, I think the US should continue to fund PEPFAR because it's apparently extremely effective so it's worth the cost even if it otherwise goes against my desire for a much smaller and less corrupt US government. I don't know why Scott didn't just say that instead of his lame attempt at a dunk.
If you are making this argument for PEPFAR, I think it is self defeating.
All these sorts of arguments are inherently utilitarian at least in part. The problem with this is that there is no evidence that PEPFAR or related programs will solve the problem and end. Any utilitarian argument for a form of welfare must chart a path to its own termination, and frankly, that is the opposite of basically every African aid program. To be frank, there is no end in sight. Africans aren't on the path to manufacture their own mosquito nets, let alone antivirals. You are keeping people alive for the purpose of the next generation of Americans to pay to keep the next generation of them alive. Repeat until the AI destroys us all or decides to dedicate its purposes to keeping them alive, despite their best efforts.
Its not like the PEPFAR enthusiasts are human slavers of any sort and have a plan to take a bunch of Africans and make them carry raw materials to build a space elevator, but without that sort of plan the program does appear to lack much justification.
anti_dan
2d ago
That is not relevant to the post you are responding to. They are saying you should feel powerful...but also should feel evil.
anti_dan
2d ago
This seems to me to be a silly distinction. Few places in history have ever executed people for acting gay. Some have enacted various punishments for penis in ass conduct.
Given that modern medicine has informed us that penises should really never be in asses, as it causes damage to the ass and spreads STDs at prolific rates, this taboo is generally correct. Most other things relating to the issue appear to indicate this is a problem of many times more significance when male penises are entering the asses of males. There is also documentation that the ass who has been penetrated is not fully capable of combat operations for a time following this penis in ass event. Meaning it is detrimental to armies.
So if you were in 200 AD in Constantinople and saw a man penetrating another mans anus with his penis you were correct in your evaluation that they were bad for the city. Or at least their conduct was. And since laws punish conduct under any rule of law system, your condemnation of the penis in ass conduct was correct.
There is also very good evidence that penis is ass conduct, particularly Male-Male is a taught (some would say groomed, I would, but that is an opinion) behavior. So elimination of such teachers has a great chance to improve all of these metrics. You have less ass-disabled soldiers, less disease, and more productive families. Sounds like a classic interest of the polity.
anti_dan
2d ago
Swimming is an inherently dangerous activity like driving. It also is a basic activity where the issues can and often are mitigated by responsible practices.
The split from something like USAID and PEPFAR is that AIDS is the result of an inherently dangerous activity, that being anal sex and "dry" sex (better know as sex with abrasives placed in the vagina) which are also easily mitigated, but those who are on the side of these charities insist that mitigation is far too burdensome, even though it is much less burdensome than getting your child a proper car seat, not driving drunk, and not letting toddlers swim on their own.
anti_dan
2d ago
I dont know what your intended point here was, but you aren't particularly wrong. White market financial institutions are so heavily regulated by the federal government that they are basically state controlled. Generally I've seen the model of nominal private control of industry but actual government control described as fascism instead of communism. But, I've generally said as well that, at least economically, the fascist is just a wise communist who realizes he can have 99% of the control in exchange for almost none of the blame by embracing this setup instead of total state control. If a government bureaucrat is the head of a bank and it fails, he gets all the blame! But if he merely regulates it into failure he gets to blame the "capitalists"! Its a win win. That is why this sort of approach is generally loved by the worldwide left/progressives in modern times, although they have not been keen to embrace the "fascist" label.
But you are entirely correct, you can't go into a Chase bank and get a loan because the loan officer thinks "oh Mihow is a good seed" because then he has to tell FDIC, DOJ, and other investigators why he denied Deehow the same loan application (hint Deehow is a bad seed). So they make up these standardized metrics which are generally very good at evaluating a person's activities in the white market. But, if you operate in the grey market or black market to any significant extent their evaluation of you will be off. But that isn't their job. If you want to buy a condo on credit using your grey market credentials, go to a grey market lender (almost none exist anymore) or a black market lender. Of course, that might be a crime, but thats the point. The government intends to control lending in the country because it is one of the commanding heights, and it does. This is not capitalism, but what is abstractly described as fascism, but modernly referred to as progressivism.
anti_dan
2d ago
That's a very confusing way to phrase things. Are you're claiming that the US military was intent on helping Hamas? Or that, in practice, that was the effect of misplaced concern? If its the latter, then you would be agreeing with:
Largely, yes the US left is intent on supporting Hamas and they were in charge of the US Military at the time.
anti_dan
3d ago
There is a simple(ish) solution to your dilemma then. You basically act in the opposite fashion that mainstream Democrats acted during the George Floyd era. If there is a policy position you are favorable to and the groups start acting like mobs with street violence, intimidation, etc you just immediately pull support from those groups and any politician that doesn't act the same as you. In other words, you are actively policing your own side the way Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy would routinely police fringe Republicans. They would primary people in red states even if they were short of crazy. They would certainly intentionally lose winnable elections in swing states just to make a point. You on the left can do this too. You don't have to wait for suburban women to have buyer's remorse about 2020 and realizing their kid's school now had more Hamas and Pride flags than American flags on display. You can help those people not have remorse.
And the great thing about doing this if you are on the left is you have so many built in demographic and other advantages that you can easily win by simply abandoning the terrorist wings of the big tent and focusing on doable things that don't make people cringe in the polling booth.
anti_dan
3d ago
Who flipped? I am convinced there were attempts to steal both, and there always has been from major urban metros my whole life. But that kind of steal is only so effective. AND it can be stopped/mitigated. Look at what has happened to Miami-Dade county with DeSantis' reforms and oversight. The number of suspicious ballots dropped precipitously and the Democrat advantage dropped by an equivalent amount, often reversing.
Run the Florida model in a few other big swing states and nationwide Democrats have no chance as far as I can tell.
anti_dan
3d ago
The analogy to the troubles is somewhat limited, but there is one part that is very true. The troubles largely stopped following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the flow of communist money to IRA and other terrorist groups.
If the west cut off aid and let Israel cut off the Iranian pipelines to their hearts' content, Gaza would change quite rapidly methinks.
anti_dan
3d ago
Lloyd Austin, December 2023. Whatever you think of him, that's pretty much what happened.
It really isn't though, and to the extent it is what happened, it is because of folks like Lloyd Austin who were focused on preserving the viability of Hamas tactics. In particular, they were much more concerned about the RESPONSE to putting rocket launchers in schools, than the rocket launchers in schools.
anti_dan
5d ago
Certainly a bold and speculative claim considering we don't know the risks of mutation and, just as importantly, the true effect of PREP and what "undetectable" means long term. Its entirely possible that huge swathes of those in that status ARE spreading it in a lower key fashion and by continually maintaining the virus in that state they are contributing to the problem of potential mutation, particularly in a way that would have it eventually adapt against such treatments.
I would be very confident in saying your assertion is unfounded, particularly compared to a more targeted campaign that was combined with a more traditional method of dealing with disease like quarantine. HIV is one of the most quarantine-friendly viruses of all time.
anti_dan
6d ago
Not having anal sex is better than technology at preventing the spread of STDs, as indicated by the AIDS epidemic, the recent monkeypox epidemic, and whatever one comes next.
That sodomy is bad is not an idea limited to Christians. All the big 3 Abrahamic religions are against it. Buddhism holds it violates the 3rd precept. Hinduism holds it is offense against Dharma possibly requiring being cast out into a lower caste. Confucianism states that it goes against the family, which is held as one of the highest places of honor.
I mean if you like buttsex a lot, thats your thing. But I don't think society should be compelled to subsidize that life choice as if it is as prosocial as married couples having babies (in fact the annualized cost of PREP seems to be a tad higher even than a woman getting pregnant every 2 years!).
anti_dan
6d ago
That proves too much, as it could also be applied to many other life-saving medications, such as, inter alia, anti-rejection drugs for people with organ transplants.
The domestic healthcare and health insurance industries do need to be allowed to do much more cost-benefit analysis and let people die more often as well, yes. Society gives into the pressure of tears/potential tears far too often nowadays is one of my consistent positions.
anti_dan
6d ago
Many prominent moral systems disagree with you, as does biology, considering it spreads STDs at extremely high rates.
anti_dan
7d ago
None of these programs are even aimed at eradication. They are aimed at managed control in a way that means the program needs to be funded forever unless magic happens and Africans start building pharmaceutical plants, which is unrealistic because they cant maintain roads.
anti_dan
7d ago
That’s like saying there isn’t actually a need to teach your kids to read. The free market will encourage them, right?
While some kids will teach themselves to learn to read, the most critical times to develop are when they are so young they arent reasonably given all sorts of freedoms. So parents need to be somewhat dictatorial in directing that part of development or else it can be entirely missed.
OTOH, government efforts at teaching learning have failed at nearly every level for a century ++
Now think about something more complex than merely reading. What are the chances government is good at enabling it at a wide scale?
anti_dan
7d ago
I dont see how that is a relevant xkcd. The stakes of our spending programs are generally terribly low. We know this because the first thing the complaining parties came up with to try and hammer was international free AIDS drugs. Is it possible to think of a less relevant program to a plumber in Iowa, bank teller in Virginia, or a drug dealer in Chicago? Maybe. They'd have to think hard though. REAL hard.
anti_dan
7d ago
Not to mention Nixon was so far in the past that he doesn't even map as Republican or Democrat to me, I'm broadly unfamiliar with his policies and those of his contemporaries, and just used Watergate as the most salient presidential scandal of the last 50 years. If you have an approved nonpartisan example to replace it with, I'm all ears.
If Nixon doesn't code to Trump/Republicans I am confused as to what you code things as. Nixon faced a hostile legacy media during all 3 runs. Nixon faced a hostile federal workforce when in the Oval office, particularly from intelligence agencies and the FBI/DOJ. And one of Nixon's signature issues was being tough on crime. If that isn't mapping well to Trump for you...IDK what to tell you.
anti_dan
7d ago
How is international free PREP uncontroversial? Mandates that insurance cover it for free domestically are controversial.
For someone with my position on these programs, at best they are a self-licking ice cream cone that spends money on an eternal treadmill, constantly preserving the lives of people who will almost instantly die if aid is ever cut off without any path towards independence from said aid. And, likely, keeping those populations way above stable levels, wherein they will constantly be a threat to migrate to better lands and become wards of the state there.
At worst they are direct subsidies for immoral behavior like sodomy.
Maybe. It is hard to see into the heart of a person, but I think they more object to Hamas losing.
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