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[mainiac]

At one point Pakistan told us we were done with drone strikes, because of all the civilian casualties among the tribes we were causing, and we pretty much went "Heh, ok" and continued doing it.

Or to put it a different way:

At one point Pakistan government members did some public grandstanding against the drone strikes for the sake of domestic politics.  However they didn't actually take measures to change their relationship with the US.  When token concessions were offered the Pakistani government members leapt to accept them.  After Pakistan got these token concessions (more information sharing) the US government went back to attacking the enemies of the same Pakistani government politicians who made the fuss.

[nenjin]

But this is all irrelevant to the election though, because no American candidate campaigns on foreign policy; the electorate at large just doesn't give a fuck. This would probably fit better in the ISIS thread.

Despite the Republicans bringing Netanyahu over here, and everyone beating their chest about being friends of Israel or not, supporting attacking Iran or not, this has nothing do with American foreign policy as it relates to elections?

It has no impact in that both parties take the same stance, excluding some semantics.

It will be a talking point come the election, so it's going to be relevant to the discussion regardless of what the outcome is. I'd also argue the reaction to Netanyahu's visit pretty clearly shows that both parties do not take the same stance toward Israel. Yes, we all "support" Israel, and if that's where the talking stopped I'd agree with you it doesn't matter one way or another. But "support" has a different connotations beyond just continuing to provide funding. It's now whether supporting Israel means torpedoing our own diplomatic advances, or not.

I'm just going to let what NFO said lie where it lays.

At one point Pakistan told us we were done with drone strikes, because of all the civilian casualties among the tribes we were causing, and we pretty much went "Heh, ok" and continued doing it.

Or to put it a different way:

At one point Pakistan government members did some public grandstanding against the drone strikes for the sake of domestic politics.  However they didn't actually take measures to change their relationship with the US.  When token concessions were offered the Pakistani government members leapt to accept them.  After Pakistan got these token concessions (more information sharing) the US government went back to attacking the enemies of the same Pakistani government politicians who made the fuss.

So you're in the "allies don't actually care about their own constituents, they just want dat sweet US monies" camp I take it?

[mainiac]

So you're in the "allies don't actually care about their own constituents, they just want dat sweet US monies" camp I take it?

I am in the camp that for a variety of reasons the Pakistani government wanted to keep the status quo but they saw a chance to score some easy political points.  Since it cost the US nothing, the American government was happy to find an agreement that would give the Pakistanis the chest puffing they wanted.

[Zrk2]

OP checking in here. Pretty much any US political discussion, or reasonable tangents thereto, is fine. The alternative this far from the election is thread death, and there's no reason to have competing US politics threads.

Oh, fair enough then.

[Rez]

So you're in the "allies don't actually care about their own constituents, they just want dat sweet US monies" camp I take it?

Why do you think Pashtun tribesmen harboring Taliban are 'constituents' to Pakistan's junta?   Pakistan is using the US to kill malcontents that it wants dead anyway.  We don't need to bribe regressive military juntas to kill Islamic supremacists.  The US doesn't need to do anything to make regressive cultists and extant rulers want to kill each other.

[nenjin]

So you're in the "allies don't actually care about their own constituents, they just want dat sweet US monies" camp I take it?

Why do you think Pashtun tribesmen harboring Taliban are 'constituents' to Pakistan's junta?   Pakistan is using the US to kill malcontents that it wants dead anyway.  We don't need to bribe regressive military juntas to kill Islamic supremacists.  The US doesn't need to do anything to make regressive cultists and extant rulers want to kill each other.

If the formula were that simple, we wouldn't be there.

[RedKing]

So you're in the "allies don't actually care about their own constituents, they just want dat sweet US monies" camp I take it?

Why do you think Pashtun tribesmen harboring Taliban are 'constituents' to Pakistan's junta?   Pakistan is using the US to kill malcontents that it wants dead anyway.  We don't need to bribe regressive military juntas to kill Islamic supremacists.  The US doesn't need to do anything to make regressive cultists and extant rulers want to kill each other.

I think "constituents" in this regard referred more to the collateral damage rather than the targets. And saying that *all* the Pashtun in the NWFP are targets because *some* of them are aligned with the Taliban is a bit overzealous and simplistic.

Moveover some of the Taliban *are* constituents of elements of the Pakistani government, specifically the ISI. Or more specifically parts of the ISI. Nobody in that part of the world is completely an enemy or an ally. In many ways, Central Asia is one of the most pragmatic places on Earth. The downside is that pragmatism tends to manifest as "stabbing people in the back when opportune and switching sides to whoever has the upper hand".

[FearfulJesuit]

Alaska may, amazingly, have produced a politician more moronic than Sarah Palin.

[Angle]

...Well, then.

[Frumple]

... poorly chose placement, perhaps, but that looks like it was actually a pretty decent bit of hyperbole. I think Loud Whispers might have liked it -- it's specifically in reference to the (perceived, from Young's perspective) danger of cultivating a wolf population and in response to curtailing (or attempting to, anyway) Alaskan efforts to keep their wolf population suppressed.

[smjjames]

Alaska may, amazingly, have produced a politician more moronic than Sarah Palin.

Hard to tell if he's being serious or is sarcastic. In context it seems pretty sarcastic, and the article does say that he has 'a salty tougne'.

[Angle]

I hope it's sarcastic. Cause if that's serious it's the dumbest thing I've seen all week. Forget the idea that wolves would go traipsing into human population centers, let's consider for a moment the likely outcome of an encounter between wolves and homeless people. You know what I see happening? Those homeless people are having wolf for supper, that's what.

[mainiac]

Well I'd like to see your plan to solve homelessness.

[smjjames]

Not to mention that wolves wouldn't know the difference between homeless and not-homeless.

Besides, even if it does get homeless off the street, it completely ignores the cause behind the homelessness problrm.

[Bauglir]

Well I'd like to see your plan to solve homelessness.

Bears.

EDIT: To be clear, we give the homeless bear-taming lessons and free bears. Soon, they will have the strength to seize homes for themselves.