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[Dozebôm Lolumzalìs]

_{Did I leave the autopilot on? Wait, shit, where - ohh dear.}

I have had... maybe ten hours of sleep in the last two nights? Eight? Sounds about right. So I am very sleepy, which leads to basic errors like:

• Posting in a heated politics thread without actually thinking anything through or re-reading my posts before sending them
• Reading said politics thread when I'm mostly asleep, leading to irrational behavior and seeing everyone as attacking me

Behold, you have seen the Unfiltered Idiot, I'm very embarrassed and trying to fix the technical error which allowed this to happen, as well as the pasted-over underlying badlogic that has plagued my posts or something like that.

I'm probably wrong about everything I said in the last few days, could we just forget that happened? Sorry.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I swear, if some arrogant asshole tries to lecture me on how to not be smug or some shit like that, I will not even how is to be when was what?

[wierd]

recognizing when you are impaired is a skill most grownups lack. it is why drunk drivng, tired driving, and drunken brawls happen.

just be more cautious in the future.

[smjjames]

And get more sleep.

[Dozebôm Lolumzalìs]

Thanks guys, I'll get to sleep now. (If I insulted anyone, I'm sorry - I meant it, and it would be a lie to claim that I didn't, but in my mind you were the bad enemy that needed to be defeated... somehow... by insulting you tons. I know, it doesn't make much sense.)

At least now I can understand what it feels like to be a "wrongthinker" (as defined by my peers) - and more importantly, how to convince them to be more open-minded. It was a retroactive research project!

(If I had a silver thread for every silver lining that I've found, I could weave a cloak of cloudlight and electricity.)

[Loud Whispers]

And the "reality has a liberal bias" is based on how the liberals see the conservatives, they see SJWs and we see the alt-right and Conservapedia.

As a conservative how I see liberals is not based on a Conservapedia or Alt-right equivalent, I do not spend my days on tumblr or rational wiki looking for SJWS; like I said, just about everyone I know or will meet in life is liberal

Haha, you left out the "you are a smug liberal" part in the LW-quote. I was calling him a troll because he was attacking me and trying to get me riled up, then being amused by the results. Not because he disagreed. In fact, we mostly agreed, so this is just so incredibly wrong. But I suppose that the previous sentence was "too smug" so who cares anyway.

I don't know whether you were truly being insincere with your smug liberal act but I'm rather surprised that you would be offended for being called a smug liberal if you were acting one. It would be an accurate description of your act...? If I played a conspiracy theoric declaring that the eye of sauron's fall was an inside job, should I be insulted if one called me a hobbit?

*sigh* It all depends on context. If a conservative says that leftists are smug, it has an underlying message of "we're better than they are."

I once was privy to a most remarkable conversation between one of my friends, and two of her former friends. They spent 15 minutes conversing jovially and complimenting one another, I had thought them the best of friends. It was only after they parted their ways that my friend revealed to me how much they hated one another and began explaining in intricate detail how each compliment was an insult. It was rather remarkable and required excellent interpretive skills of body language, in jokes and nth dimensional wordplay, which I must say I lacked the patience or health required to decipher. I especially grew knowledgeable of such persons capable of delivering flowery praise upon another with devastating daggers hidden within, such salacious viciousness in linguistic form could only truly grow in cities of grandeur and paranoia. It made me appreciate just how many people I was friends with that spoke words that meant what they said, so every conversation held was not a battle of the minds to find the meaning behind words with acumen that would humble every Zhuge Liang or Voltaire.
Listen to the criticisms of your friends, adversaries, opponents - especially enemies, accepting them not on the basis of who speaks them, but on the validity of the criticism. Who cares why they're saying it, if it's true, the only person who can improve is yourself. If they find a source of pride in not having a flaw you have, that is their sin - they are growing arrogant, smug even, whilst you have improved yourself. It also would be rather amusing to see someone pride themselves on... Humility. It would be akin to someone going asexual for lust, or hungry for famine, something has broken horrendously to allow that.
Pretty much everything I believe in is continually assaulted in every sphere of life where I live, and it is an immense source of joy, brainy stimulation. Well, everything except my fondness for ancient texts or textiles, I rarely find anyone interested in such subjects and so am never challenged on them.

First off, I've already noted that I saw an attack where there might not have been any, but I guess we can ignore that post, right? After all, if somebody is wrong and then realizes that this is the case, the proper solution is to KEEP BEATING THAT DEAD HORSE, it's not like that'll alienate people or anything. Right?
Second, I didn't call him a troll because he disagreed, I called him a troll because he tried to start a flame-war, or at least that's how I saw it. I read his post in a sleepy stupor and immediately switched to DANGER ATTACK INCOMING mode.

That's fair enough, I think this has been a very confusing affair overall, and I'd just like to state I am pretty certain "we're cool" as they say in America

We already have plans in place for that, incidentally. US Military Intelligence is, at it's finest, an institution that has coldly (*rimshot*) analyzed plans to invade every part of the rest of the world for any reasonable provocation, and several unreasonable ones. Logically we already have plans in place due to the Cold War making the prospect of "The USSR, but not separated from the US by miles and miles of ice, tundra, and snow" a very spooky one. It's now a lot less spooky (a lot fewer nuclear weapons are involved, although that's of little consolation to those of us still living in potential future "post-apocalyptic parking lot" locations), but a lot more real.

Where is the US fleet or icebreakers to rival Russia's? It doesn't matter if you have plans for them, they take years and shiptons of resources to produce, you need them yesterday
The USA doesn't even have a single serviceable icebreaker that can compete with the Russian arctic fleet, whilst Russia also has the largest and most advanced arctic fighting force. Even if Trump accelerated US arctic preparations now, and got elected a second term, it would be his successor that would have to continue arctic preparations before the US could compete with Russia
Shit's fucked yo

What always got me was that the rejection of Climate Change must also include the rejection of environmentalism as a whole. While I believe in global warming, my first concern is with renewable resources, less pollution, and caring about the environment because these things also have an immediate effect on us, not just long term things. But when brought up  the answer is that we shouldn't care about this is because...global warming is a hoax? Why do these things HAVE to be connected?

Reminds me of Arnold Schwarzenegger with his car analogy
He said he didn't care whether you believed in climate change or not, lock yourself in a room with a car running, the exhaust will kill you. Air pollution will fuck your shit up regardless of whether it will ultimately end the human species, environmentalism is of paramount importance in short, mid and long term. To that end most people are in concurrence

What, do you think this ideology sprouts fully-formed in the minds of children? It's not some bizarre construct which emerges ex nihilo from the ether. It's the creation of the conservative intelligentsia of the left, spread by near-total control of many forms of media. Do you think it's a coincidence that it is so prominent in modern youth when it is disseminated in new-media echo chambers which cater to them? That many adopt it either after participating in communities which espouse it or attending a university populated by the people that create it?

Pure coincidence xD
My eyes are on the post-milennial generation. In the modern world, is the traditional, the right and illiberal the future? It is if you believe polls, and as we all know polls are bullshit. However I do think the story told is a hilarious one; each generation has been in rebellion to the previous, yet when one's parents are the final frontier of the sexual revolution, believe money is made to spend money, tattoo their skin and pierce their bodies as works of modern art, fight for liberal socialism against all their past shackles, where can one possibly rebel?
Thus the future child makes money to save it for a rainy day, they remember how the promise of the future evaporated in 08. They grow up conscious of how every generation before them has eaten their fill, leaving the debts to be repaid at a later date, by a later generation. They begin taking up traditionalism or new wave leftist / rightist groups to rival the liberal world. They seek through old religions or philosophies meaning and purpose in a world where the only purpose is to fill orifices and get material goods. They admire the natural aesthetic with a fervour even the most narcissistic /fit/izen would find excessive. The future rebel shall not dye their hair green and join marches for social justice, they will don cheap suits and set out to found their own businesses to raise a family.

Nice material for a shit copypasta, but is any of it true? I can't speak for American fears, beyond how apparently everyone sees the UK as capable of simulating the USA on a smaller scale. To that end it is intriguing to me how amongst the countryfolk they are becoming more nationalist whilst in the city they are adopting fundamentalist islam - and it's not their parents teaching this them, as their parents are either secularist liberals or more moderate than them. I never thought I'd see the day when alcohol was not seen as cool - rather, the substance of waste. Even halloween is haram, this is a new world now
Alternatively it could just be that the newest generation can't afford to go to Uni where they're surrounded in our academic intelligentsia so they fallback on older institutions for purpose
Prolly all of the above and much more

[Phmcw]

LW, the US's army budget is between 40 and 50 % of the whole world military budget depending on the year. Russia's is between 4 and 5% depending on the year...
And the rest of Nato? About 25%.

Russia shouldn't stand a chance and if it does, then the issue is not the budget.

> fight for liberal socialism against all their past shackles, where can one possibly rebel?

America is one of the most right wing country on earth, definitely far right of any European nation. You live in a weird propaganda bubble that lost contact with the rest of the world completely.


I think America will die in the next ten years. No organization can get that out of touch with reality and live.
The future either belong to China or to the EU.

[Phmcw]

Not when your budget is literally ten time higher than theirs, not even counting your allies (who are the rest of the world's best ship builders).

[McTraveller]

The only way UBI is really feasible is by starting to train people that they don't need to hoard things, then transition to a system where you start making it harder to concentrate ownership of productive capital.  All the cash dollar redistribution in the world won't help if there is nobody willing to actually produce goods and services.  You'd also have to put something in place to prevent cost of living to simply rising to the UBI level and having zero net gain.

Replacing current welfare programs with UBI is a little different, because it doesn't add any income to the system, so it shouldn't change price levels.  But as soon as you do something that tries to increase the amount of money available for "basic" income, if there isn't a corresponding effort to increase the supply of those "basic" things, the prices of basic items will inevitably rise and make it all moot.

That latter bit is what always concerns me about social programs - it is always about just giving people money and then new production appears to absorb the inflationary pressures seemingly by "magic" - I've never seen any policy proposal cover that aspect of things.

[Phmcw]

I think you underestimate the matter of scale, here.

Russia's industrial capacity is a joke now. The USSR had most of Western Europe including Eastern Germany.
Russia GDP is bellow Italy and I would be surprised if a third of their equipment is serviceable.

Saudi Arabia is flooding the Market with oil, so they don't have access to their main source of revenue,...

[Rolan7]

Ban Conversion Therapy for minors or period?

I'm way back in the thread but I didn't see this answered, and it's important:  Specifically minors, according to the HuffPost.
Which is good.  Conversion Therapy hasn't been shown to work yet, but people should have the right to try - if they can actually consent to it.
The "PENCE" name is kinda immature but the law is exactly what I'd want on a national scale.

[Loud Whispers]

Not when your budget is literally ten time higher than theirs, not even counting your allies (who are the rest of the world's best ship builders).

In WWII the British and French Empires between them controlled the vast majority of the world's wealth; they couldn't turn that wealth into fighter planes, tanks, warships and munitions, for lack of time. Ispil sums it up succinctly, it doesn't matter how much money you can throw at an arctic ship project, it's going to take a decade to complete construction of one icebreaker whilst Russia already has the world's largest fleet of icebreakers, largest and most powerful icebreaker ships and largest fleet of nuclear icebreakers. The USA needs to have a concerted arctic policy that outlasts its presidents to compete

Russia launched the world's biggest, most powerful icebreaker on Thursday in St. Petersburg.
"She is one of several new icebreakers planned for Russia's growing fleet — a fleet already bigger than all other countries, combined," Mary Louise reports.
"Russian interest in the Arctic is rising, as global warming opens up shipping routes and access to mineral resources."
In addition to launching new icebreakers, Russia is building new bases in the Arctic Circle and modernizing its nuclear submarines.

You can only buy so much time with money - and these are not just any ship, these are icebreaker ships. You need it done by people who are the pinnacle of arctic maritime and nuclear engineering, which is to say the least, a small group of people in the world

As the United States and Russia eye new shipping routes in the melting Arctic, political and military leaders in Washington are pointing to a crucial gap in the one type of vessel that can turn frozen waters into reliable lanes for commerce or national defense.
Icebreakers — the ships that smash through sea ice, opening routes for other craft and rescuing trapped vessels — are increasingly important to navigating in the far north. Russia has 40 of them, including nuclear-powered craft painted an intimidating red and black.
Meanwhile, the U.S. icebreaker fleet? Two.
 Or three, if you count the aging vessel in a Seattle drydock being cannibalized for parts.

> fight for liberal socialism against all their past shackles, where can one possibly rebel?
America is one of the most right wing country on earth, definitely far right of any European nation. You live in a weird propaganda bubble that lost contact with the rest of the world completely.

Good thing I was not speaking about the nation, but the generation. Simple confusion on your part

I think America will die in the next ten years. No organization can get that out of touch with reality and live.
The future either belong to China or to the EU.

The EU has lost touch with reality and is actively in the process of disintegration, China is doing well and will continue to do well until its housing bubble crashes, the USA is incredibly hard to kill as its geographical position in the world is the envy of all civilization

[smjjames]

We already have plans in place for that, incidentally. US Military Intelligence is, at it's finest, an institution that has coldly (*rimshot*) analyzed plans to invade every part of the rest of the world for any reasonable provocation, and several unreasonable ones. Logically we already have plans in place due to the Cold War making the prospect of "The USSR, but not separated from the US by miles and miles of ice, tundra, and snow" a very spooky one. It's now a lot less spooky (a lot fewer nuclear weapons are involved, although that's of little consolation to those of us still living in potential future "post-apocalyptic parking lot" locations), but a lot more real.

Where is the US fleet or icebreakers to rival Russia's? It doesn't matter if you have plans for them, they take years and shiptons of resources to produce, you need them yesterday
The USA doesn't even have a single serviceable icebreaker that can compete with the Russian arctic fleet, whilst Russia also has the largest and most advanced arctic fighting force. Even if Trump accelerated US arctic preparations now, and got elected a second term, it would be his successor that would have to continue arctic preparations before the US could compete with Russia
Shit's fucked yo

To be fair, Russia has had WAY more incentive to build icebreakers, 80% of their coastline freezes over in the winter or for long periods of time. The US has, well, Alaska.

Even if we need the icebreaker fleet NOW, the arctic is melting, so, it seems like it would be moot by the time we get one to match Russia.

LW, the US's army budget is between 40 and 50 % of the whole world military budget depending on the year. Russia's is between 4 and 5% depending on the year...
And the rest of Nato? About 25%.

Russia shouldn't stand a chance and if it does, then the issue is not the budget.

> fight for liberal socialism against all their past shackles, where can one possibly rebel?

America is one of the most right wing country on earth, definitely far right of any European nation. You live in a weird propaganda bubble that lost contact with the rest of the world completely.


I think America will die in the next ten years. No organization can get that out of touch with reality and live.
The future either belong to China or to the EU.

Did England die when it lost it's empire? no. Even if we have some sort of fall from grace, we'll still be around as a country for a very long time.

[DJ]

Is there an actual point in building massive fleets when ships are just giant aircraft targets?

[smjjames]

Is there an actual point in building massive fleets when ships are just giant aircraft targets?

Two words, Aircraft Carriers.

Also, nice try at a strawman. By that logic, why build a navy at all? hm?

[Loud Whispers]

Is there an actual point in building massive fleets when ships are just giant aircraft targets?

Icebreakers are commercial/scientific vessels first, political vessels second, military ships third

To be fair, Russia has had WAY more incentive to build icebreakers, 80% of their coastline freezes over in the winter or for long periods of time. The US has, well, Alaska.

I'm making no moral judgements here, the USA is an Atlantic nation, Russia as an Arctic one, so obviously Russia's gonna have more incentives to have a powerful arctic force. All the same, might makes, and USA is lacking in the arctic department xD

Even if we need the icebreaker fleet NOW, the arctic is melting, so, it seems like it would be moot by the time we get one to match Russia.

By the time the ice is melted all the natural resources will be covered in Russian operations and military bases, the USA would not be able to secure them without starting WWIII. Russia would be able to eat juicy all the arctic's wealth :P
If the USA builds up a capable arctic fleet in time, it can either enforce an equitable distribution of resources between the arctic nations, or enforce serious environmental protections throughout the arctic (ensuring no one gets the resources), and of course protecting the environment

Did England die when it lost it's empire? no. Even if we have some sort of fall from grace, we'll still be around as a country for a very long time.

England is kill, long live England - USA will be fine. Probably not global superpower, but they'll still be global hegemon and world leader in most respects. China is strong but it has too many internal threats to ever fully enjoy the prosperity and stability of the USA