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[penguinofhonor]

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[mainiac]

Won't say it's not possible it's different in other areas of the country

Your assessment is correct with regards to Appalacian Maryland and non-Appalacian backcountry Maryland.

The difference between Appalachia and inter-city black communities is that the entirety of the local power structure in Appalachia is controlled by the same poor people who commit all the crimes.

Your Appalachia sounds a lot more interesting then the Appalachia I know.

[penguinofhonor]

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[Zrk2]

I hope the GOP fields as many candidates as possible. A fractured republican party is, in my mind, ideal. The only downside is I really do not think that the wife of the man who signed in the housing deregulation should be president. In fact, the only democrat I'd vote for now is Liz Warren.

I, for one, welcome a One Party State^TM.

[Owlbread]

I wouldn't vote for Elizabeth Warren because she's weak. Her stance on Palestine was dreadful.

[Helgoland]

How so?

[Owlbread]

How so?

Bernie Sanders isn't much better but this is an example of her weakness.

And here's a Huffington post article on her positions re: Palestine.

She voted to keep sending money to Israel during its war with Hamas, maintains the policy of allying the USA with Israel and defended Israel's use of rockets against Palestinian hospitals and schools.

She also questioned whether to condition future U.S. funding for Israel on the halting of Israeli settlements in the West Bank. "I think there's a question of whether we should go that far," Warren said.

The school/hospital issue may be contentious but that last quote is simply a red line for me.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

You're not going to find any love for Palestine amongst American politicians. The big difference is that when Republicans are against Palestine, they put its name in air quotes.

Frankly, the only demographic with meaningful support for Palestine are left-wing college students, and they tend towards the "fuck the Jews, Palestine are innocent victims" line of thought. I may be somewhat bitter regarding this issue.

[Helgoland]

Bitter? Realistic, I'd think.

[Flying Dice]

That's just a tad bit of a simplification, MSH.

Let me lay out the range of reasons why I have issues with the U.S. supporting Israel:

1. The influence of AIPAC. They're easily one of the top-three of the most important campaign contribution organizations in the U.S., alongside the AARP, and they explicitly exist for no reason other than promoting Israeli interests. That's the biggest reason why no U.S. politician with a hope of being elected will say anything against Israel (the other main one being that the Zionists are very quick on the trigger when it comes to the anti-Semitic tar brush, more on that later).

If any other foreign state or entity had that sort of influence on our government, do you know what the shitstorm would look like?

2. Supporting a successful warmongering country. Yes, I know, we have a truly fantastic track record on that account. And yes, I know, "Six Days War was a pre-emptive attack blah blah blah" -- the point is, one of the biggest arguments in favor of military aid to Israel is this extremely widespread notion of Israel being some poor, defenseless little country surrounded by all the big, bad Arabs...

They have won, decisively, every war they ever fought. They defeated every single country with which they share a land border in less than a week... decades ago, back when the Arabs had any sort of meaningful foreign military aid. They are the sole nuclear-armed power in the region. Et-fuckin'-cetera. I'm not arguing that they were wrong, precisely, to consolidate their holdings; it was pragmatic and probably necessary back then. Now, though? They're fine. But the pro-Israel lobby is too deeply entrenched to cut military support.

3. A lot of the Zionists are utter scumbags who wave the Holocaust around like a banner and instantly brand anyone who criticizes Israel as an anti-Semite. Y'know, the Jews had a fucking terrible history in Europe. But what I have a problem with now? All these fucking right-wing scumbags using the deaths of people they didn't even know to shield their own hawkish behavior from public outrage, especially when they're practicing their own brand of ethnic cleansing.

4. Nuclear weapons. I can't fault the Israelis for building them (though lying about that was pretty transparent, hah). But the most likely scenario in my eyes for nuclear war? It ain't India and Pakistan, and it ain't the DPRK managing to build a warhead and a functional missile, it's Iran managing to build nuclear weapons when Israel still has a Likud-lead coalition government willing to launch a pre-emptive strike.


Besides, if you're looking for someone to blame for the situation and Israel and Palestine, you don't look to the Israelis forcing Arabs out of their homes back in the day, or to the decades of sniping at each other across the border, or any of that shit, you go to the same place you always go when you're dealing with the fallout of imperialism: Britain and France. It was their uncoordinated promises and land-grabs back in the late 1910s that completely fucked up the region.

[Sheb]

The way I read it, the point of MSH was not that anti-sionist are anti-semite, but that there ain't much opposition to Israel in the US, which seems about right.

[Flying Dice]

I was more going after the generalization about the "lol left-wing uni students are ignorant assholes who don't appreciate the nuances of the history of Israel and Palestine." 'cause there are damned good reasons to be opposed to supporting Israel, and just about every person I've encountered who feels that way isn't of the "OMG those poor Palestinians" stripe that you'll find on Twitbook.

[Helgoland]

Not what he was saying, FD.

[Sheb]

Well, it could have been understood that way I guess.

[Flying Dice]

Frankly, the only demographic with meaningful support for Palestine are left-wing college students, and they tend towards the "fuck the Jews, Palestine are innocent victims" line of thought.

What I was saying was, and I reiterate: "That assertion [that left-wing college students who support Palestine don't actually know what they're talking about/don't care about the nuances] is false; here is what I, as a left-wing college student think regarding the issue, which is also more-or-less an accurate summary of what other left-wing college students I've discussed this with think."

For what it's worth, I've also encountered a fair chunk of right-wing college students who don't support unilateral support for Israel, although that's somewhat different from being pro-Palestine.

There are actually surprisingly few people out there with the "fuck the Jews, poor Arabs" attitude, and most of the ones that do have it are the sort who drop the second half because they hate the Arabs too. Hence taking issue with that generalization. Apologies if I was unclear.