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PaperclipPerfector  6d ago (text post)   2637 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for March 2, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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On YouTube: youtube.com/watch?v=21Gouq6hp-0

A lot of people thought that there would be a conflict with Japan at this time. Hilariously, when I went to find a source for my recollection of “1980s fear of Japan”, the first was themotte back on Reddit: https://old.reddit.com/r/TheMotte/comments/dclpo3/understanding_1980s_american_worries_about_japan/

Another: https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/1dwju3n/was_japan_seen_as_a_economic_rival_to_the_usa_in/

STRATFOR has been called a “shadow CIA”: https://www.barrons.com/articles/SB1002927557434087960 , https://www.reuters.com/article/business/wikileaks-targets-global-risk-company-stratfor-idUSL5E8DR01/

Like mall ninjas, but for the deep state.

Coca Cola, DOW Chemical, Goldman, Nestlé, Shell are clients to STRATFOR. Yale relies on a UPenn report to advise students to aim for a job there. So they appear to be decent mall ninjas. Although, I don’t think the CIA would pass on the opportunity to make money and advise American companies at a “non-affiliated”, “totally independent” think tank. So they might just be ninja ninjas, dressed up as mall ninjas, because who would ever think the mall ninja was the real ninja all along?

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A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

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