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> This is clearly false given the previous presidency. Russia's ability to project chaos and authoritarianism vastly exceeds our own. How would one establish a

> This is clearly false given the previous presidency. Russia's ability to project chaos and authoritarianism vastly exceeds our own. How would one establish a necessarily accurate cause and effect relationship here, including some measure of magnitude (do you ever notice how we talk about such things as True/False binaries, accompanied by salicious language that implies massive quantity, without making any specific quantitative claim...and then if someone asks about the quantitative aspect, they're engaging in "semantics" or "pedantry")? And, might the truth value of my speculative claim have bearing on your perception of things? For example: if there was no media coverage of "Russia's propaganda", would it have an effect on your perception of how much was going on? And yes, I do indeed know that the US (allegedly) caught them in the act at least once, but if you ever bothered to dig into the deeply nested "proofs" in popular news articles, you may have realized that most of those stories were based on metrics from Twitter that are easily spoofable. > Additionally our rhetoric (rules based international order) is clearly false given that our observable stance is rules for our enemies but not our "allies". Agree....but how many Americans believe that? And: have you ever come across any "news" from the government that may influence Americans one way or the other on the matter? Imagine how effective this could be if the US government was good at propaganda. > Domestically we are divided and conquered. Agree. > We literally had an attempted coup Despite what you may have been told, the intentions of the vast majority of the people of the people there is unknown. Thus, a simulation needs to step in, because on certain topics in the current era, it is not possible for most people to not "know", and those that discuss details with accuracy are being "pedantic". "If thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought." > Our economy is not powerful. The US still has substantial manufacturing, but I am fairly in agreement with you here. Major incompetence, and an angry public is the consequence. > Inflation is barely managed, and "greed"flation, which is inversely proportional to a markets competitive forces, is definitely un-managed. 100% agreement here! > It's worth considering how much of an effect sanctions did not have. I was surprised...but then from a geopolitical perspective, it shouldn't be surprising. Abuse other nations for decades, when the chips are down maybe they will take the opportunity for some payback. Good, I say. > The Afghanistan exit wasn't exactly confidence building. Agreed, and even worse was us being there in the first place. > Half of our government is promising obstruction and isolationism. And the other half tells better stories. They both tell wonderful, just so stories though....it's what the west runs on, we will settle for nothing less. > The Nord Stream pipeline isn't something allies build. Who do you think blew it up? > America is imploding from the inside. Good. Whenever a chance falls in my lap to give it a push to expedite the process, I will strongly consider it.

Qwertious 3y ago
>> We literally had an attempted coup >Despite what you may have been told, the intentions of the vast majority of the people of the people there is unknown. This doesn't matter - we're describing the actions and expected results, not the delusions of the pawns involved. January 6 was so objectively a coup that if you described it to people in ancient Greece, they would recognize it as a coup. To quote a blog by a doctorate professor of ancient history: >No ancient Greek would have had any trouble in understanding what happened on the 6th or that it was a serious attempt (albeit an incompetent one) to seize power. Having a leader or a political faction move with a mob (often armed, but not always so) to try to disperse the normal civic assemblies of a Greek polis and occupy their normal meeting place was a standard maneuver to try to seize power during stasis. As Dr. Roel Konijnendijk, an ancient Greek history specialist, noted in this excellent discussion on the r/AskHistorians reddit (where he posts as Iphikrates), “In the Greek world, most attempts to seize power by force tended to take the same form: the seditious party would contrive an opportunity to gather in arms while their opponents were unarmed and off-guard, and seize control of all public spaces.” Emphasis not mine. https://acoup.blog/2021/01/15/miscellanea-insurrections-ancient-and-modern-and-also-meet-the-academicats/ https://acoup.blog/2021/01/15/miscellanea-insurrections-anci... (note: the domain name has nothing to do with coups, it's just the acronym for A Collection Of Unmitigated Pedantries)

Qwertious 3y ago

>> We literally had an attempted coup >Despite what you may have been told, the intentions of the vast majority of the people of the people there is unknown. This doesn't matter - we're describing the actions and expected results, not the delusions of the pawns involved. January 6 was so objectively a coup that if you described it to people in ancient Greece, they would recognize it as a coup. To quote a blog by a doctorate professor of ancient history: >No ancient Greek would have had any trouble in understanding what happened on the 6th or that it was a serious attempt (albeit an incompetent one) to seize power. Having a leader or a political faction move with a mob (often armed, but not always so) to try to disperse the normal civic assemblies of a Greek polis and occupy their normal meeting place was a standard maneuver to try to seize power during stasis. As Dr. Roel Konijnendijk, an ancient Greek history specialist, noted in this excellent discussion on the r/AskHistorians reddit (where he posts as Iphikrates), “In the Greek world, most attempts to seize power by force tended to take the same form: the seditious party would contrive an opportunity to gather in arms while their opponents were unarmed and off-guard, and seize control of all public spaces.” Emphasis not mine. https://acoup.blog/2021/01/15/miscellanea-insurrections-ancient-and-modern-and-also-meet-the-academicats/ https://acoup.blog/2021/01/15/miscellanea-insurrections-anci... (note: the domain name has nothing to do with coups, it's just the acronym for A Collection Of Unmitigated Pedantries)