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I am not an American and I obviously have no right to meddle in your affairs. But only today Trump tweeted out Obama being against immigration and then from the

I am not an American and I obviously have no right to meddle in your affairs. But only today Trump tweeted out Obama being against immigration and then from their the rabbit hole went deeper and there was a video of gasp, bernie sanders calling open borders a "Koch brother" conspiracy. I'm beginning to wonder if anyone high up in America really has any integrity? I fail to see anyone who is consistent in their views and actions. Google cooperating with Chinese censors knowing fully well how China persecutes Muslims (and that is something I do get emotional over), and Schmidt talking about bifurcation of internet soundbyte to make a case when its clear that the so called bifurcation is because of language. It just all seems so staged at this point. And I don't mean to insult my America brothers here but I just want to know who actually is on the "right" side? Edit: I see that the person who replied "politics I'd cesspool of.." Has his comment deleted. I understand that this is defeatist attitude and we are all smart people but better to talk than to silence him. Silencing is the reason I never saw this 10 year old video.

alexnewman 8y ago
Politics is dirty pool and is mostly a distraction. Show me the incentives and I'll show you the result.
sheepmullet 8y ago
> but I just want to know who actually is on the "right" side? What is the “right” side? Trump is quintessentially American and a nationalist. Is that good? I guess it depends on who you are and what you want.
- orev 8y ago
  The “right” side is the one supported by evidence. There are some things maybe people can never agree on, but for the vast majority of issues, there is evidence that supports one side more than the other.
  - sheepmullet 8y ago
    > but for the vast majority of issues, there is evidence that supports one side more than the other. I’m not so sure that is true. In my experience there is propaganda everywhere and politicians are trying to build a narrative instead of trying to find the truth.
    - forapurpose 8y ago
      > there is propaganda everywhere The propagandists would love you to throw up your hands and believe this; their goal is to paralyze you, sow chaos and despair. It's like a liar saying to you, after they lie to your face for the 10th time, 'everyone lies'. It's a false attempt to justify and normalize their bad behavior. Technically yes, but it's meaningless; some people are far more trustworthy than others. The trustworthiness of information and politicians varies greatly.
      - sheepmullet 8y ago
        > The trustworthiness of information and politicians varies greatly. Yes it does - and we are hopeless at determining who is trustworthy and who isn’t. For example I am a well educated, well paid, and politically aware person and I trust Trump. Other equally educated, paid, aware, etc people distrust Trump. > throw up your hands I think we need techniques to move in a positive direction even in the face of propaganda. Techniques to ensure politicians are worse off when we the people are worse off. E.g. Salary capping for life at say 2x median state pay. Techniques that help us risk adjust decisions based on how easy it is to back out of them. E.g. It’s far easier to add more immigrants if we find out we have taken in too few than it is to kick out immigrants if we find out we have taken in too many. Techniques that ensure negative consequences of voting a particular way are felt by the voters. E.g. if you vote to ban private schools and it goes through then your kids are assigned to a bottom 25% public school. Etc.
        forapurpose 8y ago
        > we are hopeless at determining who is trustworthy and who isn’t We are not at all hopeless. We're not perfect, but we do pretty well. Just because people make mistakes sometimes doesn't at all mean that everyone is hopeless. Bad software is written, but we can produce good software. People trust the wrong person, but democracy and human rights has blossomed and spread. Your proposals about politicians are interesting in that Trump likely wouldn't agree to facing the consequences of his actions.
- forapurpose 8y ago
  > Trump is quintessentially American I and many other strongly disagree. They might say that George Washington is quintessentially American, and Trump is similar to populist fascists in Europe such as Mussolini. A point of evidence is that he varies so greatly from every other American president and almost all other political leaders. > nationalist. ... Is that good? I guess it depends on who you are and what you want. It's not just a matter of opinion - not every option is the same - it's a very serious choice and a matter of outcomes. If nationalism leads to war, death, loss of liberty, loss of democracy, and loss of prosperity, it's bad. Many leaders during WWII, including Churchill, thought nationalism was a significant cause of it, and many have continued to think so since then.
ty_a 8y ago
This is politics in general. The power structure incentivises liars and crooks. It shouldn't be a surprise.
rdtsc 8y ago
> bernie sanders calling open borders a "Koch brother" conspiracy. Quite right. It wasn't just that Bernie disagrees with open borders, in that video he is visibly upset. He really doesn't like it. (It was the Vox interview I assume, unless you saw another one) Also if you are old enough you might remember large anti-globalization protests around G8, Bilderberg and other such meetings. It is kind of baffling how just a decade ago left groups were getting teargassed fighting globalization and now they are openly advocating it. Such is the power of propaganda. It is extremely effective and could turn pink into blue, and then yellow with some moderate effort. I suggest everyone read Chomsky and Herman's Manufacturing Consent. It was actual when it was written and just as actual even if not more today. Speaking of Chomsky, find his writings on NAFTA and globalization as well. It might also surprise you what he has to say.
- joshuamorton 8y ago
  There's a wide variety of positions between "open borders" and "forcibly take refugee children away from their families and put both in detention facilities". One can object to the latter without supporting the former.
  - sheepmullet 8y ago
    In theory - in practice though we have had decades of weak borders.
    - joshuamorton 8y ago
      Weak borders are still not open borders, and I again ask that you not conflate the two.
  - exabrial 8y ago
    Please name a crime where you are allowed to take your children with you when you're arrested.
    - joshuamorton 8y ago
tinktank 8y ago
I will sound jaded and trite when I say this but if you want to understand American decisions (corporate or government) the most accurate thing to do is to follow the money. If you remember that point, it becomes quite simple that decisions are not really inconsistent. They're actually completely consistent. It's not bad or good, it's just the way it is.
noobermin 8y ago
Conflating things like maintaining a border and detaining children of asylum seekers as a deterrent doesn't help the discussion other than to muddy the waters.
wmccullough 8y ago
I think you have a wonderful observation. I don't think so lot of people know what is right. I think most people's definition of right is totally driven by political ideology consumed via mass media and social network echo chambers. I think most of us aren't educated about this topic to know the real long-term effects of open borders or isolationism. I think all sides have to put the emotion and rhetoric down and view it through multiple lenses. What does open borders look like for our economy and form of government in 10. 25, or 50 years? Does it likely lead to a place America loses the good parts of its national identity because the amount of people coming in can't be assimilated into our philosophies in our constitution? Does isolationism lead us to a place where we aren't longer a world leader and some horrible state fills the vacuum on the world's stage? I certainly don't know. How do we define right and wrong in an era where ever issue of morality is polarized? Or where it's okay for one politician to do something but not for another politician? I think in the case of Google, they are selling their souls by providing services to a government that persecutes Muslims (and their own people), but we can't forget that they also have cooperated with the U.S. government which has committed just as many atrocities here and around the world. It's not in this moment that Google crossed the line. I think unfortunately, the great experiment of democracy is just about over. I fear it will be looked upon by historians as this emergent phenomenon that occurred between massive tyrannical empires.
- illiac_1962 8y ago
  There won't be any historians if you are right.
- forapurpose 8y ago
  > Does it likely lead to a place America loses the good parts of its national identity because the amount of people coming in can't be assimilated into our philosophies in our constitution? The people who have most challenged U.S. principles of liberty and democracy, and 'all men are created equal", have been those whose families have been in the U.S. for generations. They've supported slavery, segregation, lynching and other oppression, voter suppression, and, whether one agrees with the policies or not, the Republican Party's current policies of being anti-immigrant, voter suppression, supporting partisanship in the judiciary, and in foreign policy ignoring human rights and democracy while supporting dictators.
alexnewman 8y ago
Also this is not meddling. Part of being a super power is out politics is world polifics . Keep asking questions
- mohammedbin 8y ago
  Good point,thank you. No offense but I guess your politics affects ours very directly.
  - alexnewman 8y ago
    I totally agree although I now have people down voting everything I post. Bizarre
- alexnewman 8y ago
  Why was this downvoted?
illiac_1962 8y ago
You have every right to meddle in American affairs. This is the country of all people of the world. All people who value freedom and individual dignity. Decent Americans welcome everyone and want to help everyone because they realize it helps themselves to do so. It does no good for regular people to buy into these notions of separation. That notion is a tool for maintaining power. The underbelly of the world are the only ones who care about power for themselves. It's a disease.
buboard 8y ago
For context , this is the video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf-k6qOfXz0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf-k6qOfXz0 and yeah, open borders was a libertarian idea but somehow the tables have turned.
WatermelonApe 8y ago
I'm fairly right of center and I had never seen the video you mentioned until I looked it up just now. My jaw literally dropped, I could not believe it is the same person speaking just 3 years ago. I did not vote in 2016 but I would have voted for 2015 Bernie Sanders any day had I seen this interview. Of course, I would've been disappointed with where my vote ended up now that Bernie is apparently an ICE abolitionist. I always respected Bernie and figured his endorsement of Hillary was a one time act of pragmatism. But this interview is something else, replace "Koch brothers" with "Soros" and all of a sudden you have an alt right conspiracy theory. What's more surprising is that the Vox video only has 170k views after so many years of political dirt digging. We certainly live in interesting times.
AsyncAwait 8y ago
If you think putting children in cages and having open borders is the only two positions you can hold, you're delusional. Bernie wants a stronger social system in the U.S. If you want universal healthcare, you can't have open borders. But you also don't have to put children in cages. You consider each case, provide asylum if they're in danger, deport if not etc.
- pjc50 8y ago
  Yeah, "Open borders" is a pretty extreme example of "weasel words" that we would spot if it came in a set of product requirements. Does it refer to residency or just to visiting? What's the opposite of an open border, a closed border? Would a closed border with Mexico really mean no travel across it at all, like the Berlin wall? People argue about "health tourism" in the UK system of near-universal healthcare(+), and the actual hospitals point out that it would cost them far more to check everyone's immigration status than they would recover from visitors who technically aren't entitled to care. There's nothing to say you can't have a "universal" healthcare system which imposes a residency requirement for non-acute care. (+) except dental and optician services, $10 prescription co-pay applies outside Scotland
  - AsyncAwait 8y ago
    I agree, that "health tourism" isn't really a thing, however my use of the term "open-borders" was in reference to how detractors of universal healthcare, (mostly on the right), in the U.S. straw man it as meaning that it means the entire Latin America moving to the U.S. Putting aside the implied supremacy of the U.S. etc., I just wanted to point out that this is not what people like Bernie are arguing for and is therefore a total strawman.
    - 0xcde4c3db 8y ago
      Health tourism absolutely is a thing. There are even companies that specialize in arranging it. However, my understanding is that it predominantly falls into two categories, neither of which is particularly about exploiting systems like the NHS: 1) People traveling to e.g. the US or Israel to get procedures that aren't available in their home country. 2) People traveling from high-cost to low-cost countries and paying everything out-of-pocket because even forgoing insurance and adding travel costs still leaves it drastically cheaper than their home country. There are some cases of people scamming government-funded healthcare, but I think those have been sensationalized by the press.

alexnewman 8y ago

Politics is dirty pool and is mostly a distraction. Show me the incentives and I'll show you the result.

sheepmullet 8y ago

> but I just want to know who actually is on the "right" side? What is the “right” side? Trump is quintessentially American and a nationalist. Is that good? I guess it depends on who you are and what you want.

orev 8y ago
The “right” side is the one supported by evidence. There are some things maybe people can never agree on, but for the vast majority of issues, there is evidence that supports one side more than the other.
- sheepmullet 8y ago
  > but for the vast majority of issues, there is evidence that supports one side more than the other. I’m not so sure that is true. In my experience there is propaganda everywhere and politicians are trying to build a narrative instead of trying to find the truth.
  - forapurpose 8y ago
    > there is propaganda everywhere The propagandists would love you to throw up your hands and believe this; their goal is to paralyze you, sow chaos and despair. It's like a liar saying to you, after they lie to your face for the 10th time, 'everyone lies'. It's a false attempt to justify and normalize their bad behavior. Technically yes, but it's meaningless; some people are far more trustworthy than others. The trustworthiness of information and politicians varies greatly.
    - sheepmullet 8y ago
      > The trustworthiness of information and politicians varies greatly. Yes it does - and we are hopeless at determining who is trustworthy and who isn’t. For example I am a well educated, well paid, and politically aware person and I trust Trump. Other equally educated, paid, aware, etc people distrust Trump. > throw up your hands I think we need techniques to move in a positive direction even in the face of propaganda. Techniques to ensure politicians are worse off when we the people are worse off. E.g. Salary capping for life at say 2x median state pay. Techniques that help us risk adjust decisions based on how easy it is to back out of them. E.g. It’s far easier to add more immigrants if we find out we have taken in too few than it is to kick out immigrants if we find out we have taken in too many. Techniques that ensure negative consequences of voting a particular way are felt by the voters. E.g. if you vote to ban private schools and it goes through then your kids are assigned to a bottom 25% public school. Etc.
      - forapurpose 8y ago
        > we are hopeless at determining who is trustworthy and who isn’t We are not at all hopeless. We're not perfect, but we do pretty well. Just because people make mistakes sometimes doesn't at all mean that everyone is hopeless. Bad software is written, but we can produce good software. People trust the wrong person, but democracy and human rights has blossomed and spread. Your proposals about politicians are interesting in that Trump likely wouldn't agree to facing the consequences of his actions.
forapurpose 8y ago
> Trump is quintessentially American I and many other strongly disagree. They might say that George Washington is quintessentially American, and Trump is similar to populist fascists in Europe such as Mussolini. A point of evidence is that he varies so greatly from every other American president and almost all other political leaders. > nationalist. ... Is that good? I guess it depends on who you are and what you want. It's not just a matter of opinion - not every option is the same - it's a very serious choice and a matter of outcomes. If nationalism leads to war, death, loss of liberty, loss of democracy, and loss of prosperity, it's bad. Many leaders during WWII, including Churchill, thought nationalism was a significant cause of it, and many have continued to think so since then.

ty_a 8y ago

This is politics in general. The power structure incentivises liars and crooks. It shouldn't be a surprise.

rdtsc 8y ago

> bernie sanders calling open borders a "Koch brother" conspiracy. Quite right. It wasn't just that Bernie disagrees with open borders, in that video he is visibly upset. He really doesn't like it. (It was the Vox interview I assume, unless you saw another one) Also if you are old enough you might remember large anti-globalization protests around G8, Bilderberg and other such meetings. It is kind of baffling how just a decade ago left groups were getting teargassed fighting globalization and now they are openly advocating it. Such is the power of propaganda. It is extremely effective and could turn pink into blue, and then yellow with some moderate effort. I suggest everyone read Chomsky and Herman's Manufacturing Consent. It was actual when it was written and just as actual even if not more today. Speaking of Chomsky, find his writings on NAFTA and globalization as well. It might also surprise you what he has to say.

joshuamorton 8y ago
There's a wide variety of positions between "open borders" and "forcibly take refugee children away from their families and put both in detention facilities". One can object to the latter without supporting the former.
- sheepmullet 8y ago
  In theory - in practice though we have had decades of weak borders.
  - joshuamorton 8y ago
    Weak borders are still not open borders, and I again ask that you not conflate the two.
- exabrial 8y ago
  Please name a crime where you are allowed to take your children with you when you're arrested.
  - joshuamorton 8y ago

tinktank 8y ago

I will sound jaded and trite when I say this but if you want to understand American decisions (corporate or government) the most accurate thing to do is to follow the money. If you remember that point, it becomes quite simple that decisions are not really inconsistent. They're actually completely consistent. It's not bad or good, it's just the way it is.

noobermin 8y ago

Conflating things like maintaining a border and detaining children of asylum seekers as a deterrent doesn't help the discussion other than to muddy the waters.

wmccullough 8y ago

I think you have a wonderful observation. I don't think so lot of people know what is right. I think most people's definition of right is totally driven by political ideology consumed via mass media and social network echo chambers. I think most of us aren't educated about this topic to know the real long-term effects of open borders or isolationism. I think all sides have to put the emotion and rhetoric down and view it through multiple lenses. What does open borders look like for our economy and form of government in 10. 25, or 50 years? Does it likely lead to a place America loses the good parts of its national identity because the amount of people coming in can't be assimilated into our philosophies in our constitution? Does isolationism lead us to a place where we aren't longer a world leader and some horrible state fills the vacuum on the world's stage? I certainly don't know. How do we define right and wrong in an era where ever issue of morality is polarized? Or where it's okay for one politician to do something but not for another politician? I think in the case of Google, they are selling their souls by providing services to a government that persecutes Muslims (and their own people), but we can't forget that they also have cooperated with the U.S. government which has committed just as many atrocities here and around the world. It's not in this moment that Google crossed the line. I think unfortunately, the great experiment of democracy is just about over. I fear it will be looked upon by historians as this emergent phenomenon that occurred between massive tyrannical empires.

illiac_1962 8y ago
There won't be any historians if you are right.
forapurpose 8y ago
> Does it likely lead to a place America loses the good parts of its national identity because the amount of people coming in can't be assimilated into our philosophies in our constitution? The people who have most challenged U.S. principles of liberty and democracy, and 'all men are created equal", have been those whose families have been in the U.S. for generations. They've supported slavery, segregation, lynching and other oppression, voter suppression, and, whether one agrees with the policies or not, the Republican Party's current policies of being anti-immigrant, voter suppression, supporting partisanship in the judiciary, and in foreign policy ignoring human rights and democracy while supporting dictators.

alexnewman 8y ago

Also this is not meddling. Part of being a super power is out politics is world polifics . Keep asking questions

mohammedbin 8y ago
Good point,thank you. No offense but I guess your politics affects ours very directly.
- alexnewman 8y ago
  I totally agree although I now have people down voting everything I post. Bizarre
alexnewman 8y ago
Why was this downvoted?

illiac_1962 8y ago

You have every right to meddle in American affairs. This is the country of all people of the world. All people who value freedom and individual dignity. Decent Americans welcome everyone and want to help everyone because they realize it helps themselves to do so. It does no good for regular people to buy into these notions of separation. That notion is a tool for maintaining power. The underbelly of the world are the only ones who care about power for themselves. It's a disease.

buboard 8y ago

For context , this is the video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf-k6qOfXz0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vf-k6qOfXz0 and yeah, open borders was a libertarian idea but somehow the tables have turned.

WatermelonApe 8y ago

I'm fairly right of center and I had never seen the video you mentioned until I looked it up just now. My jaw literally dropped, I could not believe it is the same person speaking just 3 years ago. I did not vote in 2016 but I would have voted for 2015 Bernie Sanders any day had I seen this interview. Of course, I would've been disappointed with where my vote ended up now that Bernie is apparently an ICE abolitionist. I always respected Bernie and figured his endorsement of Hillary was a one time act of pragmatism. But this interview is something else, replace "Koch brothers" with "Soros" and all of a sudden you have an alt right conspiracy theory. What's more surprising is that the Vox video only has 170k views after so many years of political dirt digging. We certainly live in interesting times.

AsyncAwait 8y ago

If you think putting children in cages and having open borders is the only two positions you can hold, you're delusional. Bernie wants a stronger social system in the U.S. If you want universal healthcare, you can't have open borders. But you also don't have to put children in cages. You consider each case, provide asylum if they're in danger, deport if not etc.

pjc50 8y ago
Yeah, "Open borders" is a pretty extreme example of "weasel words" that we would spot if it came in a set of product requirements. Does it refer to residency or just to visiting? What's the opposite of an open border, a closed border? Would a closed border with Mexico really mean no travel across it at all, like the Berlin wall? People argue about "health tourism" in the UK system of near-universal healthcare(+), and the actual hospitals point out that it would cost them far more to check everyone's immigration status than they would recover from visitors who technically aren't entitled to care. There's nothing to say you can't have a "universal" healthcare system which imposes a residency requirement for non-acute care. (+) except dental and optician services, $10 prescription co-pay applies outside Scotland
- AsyncAwait 8y ago
  I agree, that "health tourism" isn't really a thing, however my use of the term "open-borders" was in reference to how detractors of universal healthcare, (mostly on the right), in the U.S. straw man it as meaning that it means the entire Latin America moving to the U.S. Putting aside the implied supremacy of the U.S. etc., I just wanted to point out that this is not what people like Bernie are arguing for and is therefore a total strawman.
  - 0xcde4c3db 8y ago
    Health tourism absolutely is a thing. There are even companies that specialize in arranging it. However, my understanding is that it predominantly falls into two categories, neither of which is particularly about exploiting systems like the NHS: 1) People traveling to e.g. the US or Israel to get procedures that aren't available in their home country. 2) People traveling from high-cost to low-cost countries and paying everything out-of-pocket because even forgoing insurance and adding travel costs still leaves it drastically cheaper than their home country. There are some cases of people scamming government-funded healthcare, but I think those have been sensationalized by the press.