Okay, LJ, you are right,
I am a moron easily misled by internet grifters like Welsh, stirring me up over issues I know nothing about, and also being fooled by algorithms on Twitter and I should take your ever so subtle hints to about this.
I have been reading a lot about governmental repression of pro- Palestinian demonstrators in Germany and in Britain and in other places. Here is a list of articles about Germany at Jewish Currents. One of them I remembered reading from before Oct 7. https://jewishcurrents.org/results?query=Germany
The Guardian has an endless number of articles on this topic. Here is one. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jul/08/germany-importing-antisemitism-migrants-jewish
However, I see now that I was misled retroactively by that notorious Welsh, whose powers of deception are evidently so great they violate causality as physicists typically understand it. He may have written all those articles under various names, or perhaps it was the dreaded algorithm.
I am taking a break from this site. Being condescended to by someone who assumes I am an ignorant doofus who needs his guidance kinda gets on my nerves just a bit.
2025-07-10 16:13:08
Btw, I just looked and Welsh’s most recent posts are about Trump’s crazed tariff policies towards Brazil and the other one is about Epstein. Neither sounds rightwing. He despises Trump as vehemently as anyone here.
And regarding freezing bank accounts, do you support it without first going through a trial and convicting someone of committing a serious crime? I don’t and I think Welsh states it well here—
——-
Back when the Trucker Protest happened in Ottawa Canada I opposed freezing their accounts, even though I thought they were a bunch of fools and opposed their agenda. Why? Because it is punishment without a trial or facing a jury. It’s devastating. And I understood that if it could be done to people I disagree with, it could be done to people I do agree with.
———-
Makes sense.
To repeat, I’m not endorsing Welsh in general. Sometimes I just think he is wrong. Though his extreme pessimism about our trajectory is looking more plausible in the past six months.
2025-07-10 16:13:00
Btw, I just looked and Welsh’s most recent posts are about Trump’s crazed tariff policies towards Brazil and the other one is about Epstein. Neither sounds rightwing. He despises Trump as vehemently as anyone here.
And regarding freezing bank accounts, do you support it without first going through a trial and convicting someone of committing a serious crime? I don’t and I think Welsh states it well here—
——-
Back when the Trucker Protest happened in Ottawa Canada I opposed freezing their accounts, even though I thought they were a bunch of fools and opposed their agenda. Why? Because it is punishment without a trial or facing a jury. It’s devastating. And I understood that if it could be done to people I disagree with, it could be done to people I do agree with.
———-
Makes sense.
To repeat, I’m not endorsing Welsh in general. Sometimes I just think he is wrong. Though his extreme pessimism about our trajectory is looking more plausible in the past six months.
2025-07-10 15:54:32
“ kind of feel that the attitude that Welsh puts out is the same attitude that has someone like a Robert Kennedy or a Tulsi Gabbard effortlessly slide from left to right.”
I don’t agree with that. As for the German government, , they have been repressing pro- Palestinian voices for awhile, certainly since Oct 7. I would expect them to tread very lightly when it comes to criticizing Israel, but there is a sense that they atone for their history on the backs of Palestinians. But again, this is on the long list of things I don’t care to argue. There is more than enough hypocrisy in this country to talk about.
Regarding Welsh, this sort of conversation drives me nuts. I suppose if there is another occasion where Welsh makes a point I find valid, I will spend time looking for some mainstream source making the same point so I can avoid irrelevancies. I very quickly learned that with Chomsky decades ago. Any mention of a human rights issue that cited him as a source became about him and not the issue. I don’t honestly give a crap if ten years down the road Welsh becomes David Horowitz. Or Christopher Hitchens or Matt Taibbi. I don’t expect it though. Still, Hitchens wrote some great stuff when he was still a lefty and occasionally even afterwards.
On Epstein, I have no attachment to any specific conspiracy theory but I would expect, given his associates and activities, he would have attracted intelligence agencies and potential blackmailers like flies to rotting meat. Intelligence agencies are not always the most ethical bureaucracies in the world and given what they are, they would be incompetent not to look for some way to take advantage of Epstein, his associates, and the way some of them spent their time.
2025-07-10 10:11:15
LJ-
You didn’t explain what is wrong with taking on Welsh’s bias in this case. He was opposed to the Canadian government using its power in what he considers an illegitimate way against the truckers, who he does not support. Now he opposes the German government doing something similar to someone he is in sympathy with. He is saying he was right to say that people should oppose this use of government power because it is a form of tyranny that can be used against anyone.
I agree with him. The government shouldn’t use certain levers of power.
“ you need to be careful about taking on their biases.”
That applies to everyone about everything. You and I both have biases..
As for LGM, as a long time reader it has not escaped my notice that there are many posters and even more commenters. There is a certain atmosphere there, a way of acting, just as there is here and at every blog I have ever visited for any length of time. You pick up on what opinions are acceptable and which ones will induce a pile on and yes, also the topics where people within the community will rip into each other. By LGM standards I have all three types of opinions.
Which is all I will say. I limit myself on the number of arguments I am going to get into and this looks like two that I am going to drop.
Here is a third which I came to post about, but have nothing much to say except for what I sat in this paragraph. . Epstein. I have no specific theory about him, but am skeptical of the “ move along, nothing to see here” stance. https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/jeffrey-epstein-had-1000-victims
2025-07-09 11:40:04
“ bookmarked Ian Welch's blog some years ago, but rarely visit. He is not my kind of lefty. He makes my head hurt.”
I fall about halfway between him and the LGM lefties. They both irritate me in different ways. But you learn things from reading all sorts.
On the issue, I don’t think he is saying that we should exist in a strictly cash economy and if he did say that this would be dumb. But I think he is pointing to a new way for governments to crack down on dissent. Not that he is the first by any means.
2025-07-08 09:56:40
I should say I know nothing of Hüseyin Doğru— never heard of him before. But the general topic I agree with—ostensibly democratic governments have a new tool for repression.
Normally Christian fundamentalists would be screaming about this— it fits in perfectly with their fears about the mark of the beast. Maybe some are. But since their guy is in power in the US I suppose their concern will be postponed.
Nous—
That’s probably right. I hadn’t even considered LLM’s but maybe.
My theory is that there is a standard form letter for people asking for pressure for a ceasefire, using our aid as leverage. Maybe a different letter for people who support Israel’s position. I hadn’t thought of them using AI, but that just shows I am still stuck in 2023 or so in my thinking.
Supposedly it is more effective to call them in the phone but I have done that and get nervous.
On the solution, I can’t imagine it. People argue about a 1ss vs a 2ss, but it is really hard to picture the two sides in the same country and also really hard to imagine the settlers leaving or agreeing to live under Palestinian rule. No acceptable solution seems realistic for now. Just stopping the slaughter and getting surviving hostages back is about the limit of my imagination here.
2025-07-07 16:22:57
On his list of Israeli goals, numbers three and four are fantasy. In theory those are American goals but for Americans the first one was and is the one that mattered more than all others. By far. Keeping civilian deaths low would be nice, but not that important. For Netanyahu, staying out of jail and in power was the number one goal. For some others, the goal is ethnic cleansing.
So Schumer or whoever wrote this can’t really be that stupid. And from reading my email he or the actual writer knew I would think any of that was true. We need a better class of liar in DC. Or maybe even honest people.
The summary of HR 815 regarding Gaza is misleading, But too tired to rant.
On a positive note, I watched the hour long discussion with Brad Lander that Peter Beinart had on July 4. Lander was really impressive, a politician I could support with enthusiasm. Though I like Mamdani a lot, if I were a NYC voter I probably would have put Lander as 1 and Mamdani as 2 based on Lander’s experience. ( On Palestine Landervis a liberal Zionist unlike Mamdani, but Landercreally would be willing to pressure Israel, which is what I care about there. But I am mostly talking about his qualifications for being Mayor and all his other positions, very liberal, maybe a bit closer to achievable than what Mamdani wants. )
And he had a funny anecdote on his arrest. The two guys didn’t really like doing it. One was a Pakistani Muslim and said he would rank Lander and Mamdani as his top choices. The other said his wife wanted him to quit his ICE job because of what they were doing but he didn’t feel he could because he had a mortgage. Lander said it was funny but of course said it was also terrible.
No point linking— I think you have to subscribe to Beinart’s Substack.
2025-07-07 16:05:05
Busy yesterday and today see stuff about alien space bats. Huh.
Anyway, thought I would post a reply I got from Schumer’s back in May after I wrote Schumer’s, Gillibrand and Latimer ( my House rep) a ( polite) several paragraph long email asking them to push for a ceasefire. Gillibrand and Latimer didn’t respond. No surprise in the last case and Gillibrand prob thought I was a global jihadist or something. So I gave the Schumer office some credit for a polite response. The response, however, was nonsense. Here it is —
————
Thank you for contacting me to express your concerns regarding U.S. aid to Israel and your request for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. I share your concerns about the security and well-being of innocent Palestinians.
I've always said that Israel has 4 goals: Radically reduce Hamas' threat, free the hostages, minimize the loss of innocent Palestinian lives and maximize the amount of humanitarian aid to innocent civilians in Gaza.
Like you, I am deeply troubled by the suffering of those who have been caught in the cross fire of this conflict. My heart breaks at the loss of so many civilian lives in Gaza. I am anguished that the Israeli war campaign has killed so many innocent Palestinians. I know that my fellow Jewish Americans feel this same anguish when they see the images of dead and starving children and destroyed homes.
I agree that the current political situation has created horrible living conditions for many Palestinians living in Gaza. That is why I have been supportive of opening up additional humanitarian aid routes to Gaza and increasing U.S. humanitarian aid contributions. Just recently Congress passed H.R. 815, the Emergency National Security Supplemental aid package that includes $9.3 billion dedicated for humanitarian aid, including for innocent civilians in Gaza.
I will continue to support a strong peace process through direct negotiations and look forward to the day when the Israeli and Palestinian governments can work together to achieve a two-state solution. I am committed to doing all that I can to encourage a productive and meaningful dialogue between the two parties.
Again, thank you for contacting me. Please keep in touch with your thoughts and opinions.
Sincerely,
Charles E. Schumer
United States Senator
2025-07-05 16:58:55
“ . I almost never see anything on TikTok,”
Meaning that I almost never visit, not that there isn’t material there.
2025-07-05 16:56:48
I was wondering about Charles’s age range myself. I think I have given away my approx age once or twice.
Thanks, Gftnc. But the tone thing sort of makes my eyes roll a bit. People should get a Twitter account, ignore the crap ( I have no idea what “the algorithm” wants me to see most of the time— I know about some people and they interact with others) and read Palestinians first hand. Some over there, some here. You will get tone, all right. Some Western lefties, some antizionist Israeli and American Jews. And plenty of pro Israel people respond, I am a cuddly little teddy bear in comparison to most of that crowd. I mean the substantive ones— there are of course plenty of people who only cuss out the side they are against, but you see plenty of bigotry on both sides with those folk, so even with them you get to see what sort of sewage is out there.
Supposedly seeing things on TV helped turn people against Vietnam. I think you see vastly more on Twitter. I almost never see anything on TikTok, which is supposed to be a site that helped turn young people against Israel in Gaza.
I probably need a break.
More on ranting. I visit LGM fairly often and that entire blog is one long almost continuous rant session, but they have their own culture there and while I think I get the unwritten rules and one or two of the inside jokes, they are a different type of ranter. I wouldn’t fit. It involves how and in what manner you are supposed to criticize the Democrats. The focus is on politics along with policy but mostly how it fits with politics. Nowadays they really hate the feckless Democratic leadership. I learn things from reading them.
2025-07-05 16:14:37
Though of course with Trump in office we have a purely random foreign policy. based on whims. Best hope for Gaza would be if Netanyahu ticks off Trump in some way,
2025-07-05 15:57:45
“ often find Donald's comments more annoying than wj's.”
Interesting. You mostly seem to agree on the war crimes thing, which is most of what I post about when ranting. In fact, that is virtually all of my rants as best I can recall.
“ anyone who agrees, but thinks there are other, more achievable, priorities is at best an utter moral dullard.”
That’s about right. Not supporting genocide is pretty low bar stuff.. You know who we lack here? Palestinian- American posters.
The pie in the sky material is in domestic policy and just keeping Trump from destroying what we have is sort of the best we can hope for.
I like Mamdani for example, but if he wins will be amazed if he can get a fraction of what he wants for nyc.
2025-07-05 10:30:26
McKT aside, we are a pretty narrow group ideologically most of the time. Wj is the token conservative and he is more centrist really. Of course things get real heated real fast when there are serious disagreements about important issues. I said this to LJ privately the other day, but the amazing thing about the hilzoy era was how she and whoever else was in charge kept things under control. I didn’t necessarily agree with her on everything, but this was one of the few places I knew about where there was a wide range of views for a few years. Of course people gradually dropped out or in a few cases were banned for being offensive. I remember a couple from the far far left like that.
The culture might also have gotten more polarized, but I am not sure about that. It was pretty polarized with Bush, esp in the early years when he was more popular, I think. Now I can’t remember when I first came here.
It would be difficult being polite with a MAGA type. I don’t think we have had any.
Weirdly,for a couple of years Rod Dreher had a wide range of views in his American Conservative blog comments. For a bit he was repentant about his Iraq War support and would sometimes critique the right. But his anti gay and anti trans mania got more and more evident and his Islamophobia came back if it ever fully left and he got super culture war paranoid and started taking like Franco was justified. I got more and more sarcastic and was eventually banned. Then he wrote his famous root wiener post and got eased out.
Okay, LJ, you are right,
I am a moron easily misled by internet grifters like Welsh, stirring me up over issues I know nothing about, and also being fooled by algorithms on Twitter and I should take your ever so subtle hints to about this.
I have been reading a lot about governmental repression of pro- Palestinian demonstrators in Germany and in Britain and in other places. Here is a list of articles about Germany at Jewish Currents. One of them I remembered reading from before Oct 7.
https://jewishcurrents.org/results?query=Germany
The Guardian has an endless number of articles on this topic. Here is one.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/jul/08/germany-importing-antisemitism-migrants-jewish
However, I see now that I was misled retroactively by that notorious Welsh, whose powers of deception are evidently so great they violate causality as physicists typically understand it. He may have written all those articles under various names, or perhaps it was the dreaded algorithm.
I am taking a break from this site. Being condescended to by someone who assumes I am an ignorant doofus who needs his guidance kinda gets on my nerves just a bit.
Btw, I just looked and Welsh’s most recent posts are about Trump’s crazed tariff policies towards Brazil and the other one is about Epstein. Neither sounds rightwing. He despises Trump as vehemently as anyone here.
And regarding freezing bank accounts, do you support it without first going through a trial and convicting someone of committing a serious crime? I don’t and I think Welsh states it well here—
——-
Back when the Trucker Protest happened in Ottawa Canada I opposed freezing their accounts, even though I thought they were a bunch of fools and opposed their agenda. Why? Because it is punishment without a trial or facing a jury. It’s devastating. And I understood that if it could be done to people I disagree with, it could be done to people I do agree with.
———-
Makes sense.
To repeat, I’m not endorsing Welsh in general. Sometimes I just think he is wrong. Though his extreme pessimism about our trajectory is looking more plausible in the past six months.
Btw, I just looked and Welsh’s most recent posts are about Trump’s crazed tariff policies towards Brazil and the other one is about Epstein. Neither sounds rightwing. He despises Trump as vehemently as anyone here.
And regarding freezing bank accounts, do you support it without first going through a trial and convicting someone of committing a serious crime? I don’t and I think Welsh states it well here—
——-
Back when the Trucker Protest happened in Ottawa Canada I opposed freezing their accounts, even though I thought they were a bunch of fools and opposed their agenda. Why? Because it is punishment without a trial or facing a jury. It’s devastating. And I understood that if it could be done to people I disagree with, it could be done to people I do agree with.
———-
Makes sense.
To repeat, I’m not endorsing Welsh in general. Sometimes I just think he is wrong. Though his extreme pessimism about our trajectory is looking more plausible in the past six months.
“ kind of feel that the attitude that Welsh puts out is the same attitude that has someone like a Robert Kennedy or a Tulsi Gabbard effortlessly slide from left to right.”
I don’t agree with that. As for the German government, , they have been repressing pro- Palestinian voices for awhile, certainly since Oct 7. I would expect them to tread very lightly when it comes to criticizing Israel, but there is a sense that they atone for their history on the backs of Palestinians. But again, this is on the long list of things I don’t care to argue. There is more than enough hypocrisy in this country to talk about.
Regarding Welsh, this sort of conversation drives me nuts. I suppose if there is another occasion where Welsh makes a point I find valid, I will spend time looking for some mainstream source making the same point so I can avoid irrelevancies. I very quickly learned that with Chomsky decades ago. Any mention of a human rights issue that cited him as a source became about him and not the issue. I don’t honestly give a crap if ten years down the road Welsh becomes David Horowitz. Or Christopher Hitchens or Matt Taibbi. I don’t expect it though. Still, Hitchens wrote some great stuff when he was still a lefty and occasionally even afterwards.
On Epstein, I have no attachment to any specific conspiracy theory but I would expect, given his associates and activities, he would have attracted intelligence agencies and potential blackmailers like flies to rotting meat. Intelligence agencies are not always the most ethical bureaucracies in the world and given what they are, they would be incompetent not to look for some way to take advantage of Epstein, his associates, and the way some of them spent their time.
LJ-
You didn’t explain what is wrong with taking on Welsh’s bias in this case. He was opposed to the Canadian government using its power in what he considers an illegitimate way against the truckers, who he does not support. Now he opposes the German government doing something similar to someone he is in sympathy with. He is saying he was right to say that people should oppose this use of government power because it is a form of tyranny that can be used against anyone.
I agree with him. The government shouldn’t use certain levers of power.
“ you need to be careful about taking on their biases.”
That applies to everyone about everything. You and I both have biases..
As for LGM, as a long time reader it has not escaped my notice that there are many posters and even more commenters. There is a certain atmosphere there, a way of acting, just as there is here and at every blog I have ever visited for any length of time. You pick up on what opinions are acceptable and which ones will induce a pile on and yes, also the topics where people within the community will rip into each other. By LGM standards I have all three types of opinions.
Which is all I will say. I limit myself on the number of arguments I am going to get into and this looks like two that I am going to drop.
Here is a third which I came to post about, but have nothing much to say except for what I sat in this paragraph. . Epstein. I have no specific theory about him, but am skeptical of the “ move along, nothing to see here” stance.
https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/jeffrey-epstein-had-1000-victims
“ bookmarked Ian Welch's blog some years ago, but rarely visit. He is not my kind of lefty. He makes my head hurt.”
I fall about halfway between him and the LGM lefties. They both irritate me in different ways. But you learn things from reading all sorts.
On the issue, I don’t think he is saying that we should exist in a strictly cash economy and if he did say that this would be dumb. But I think he is pointing to a new way for governments to crack down on dissent. Not that he is the first by any means.
I should say I know nothing of Hüseyin Doğru— never heard of him before. But the general topic I agree with—ostensibly democratic governments have a new tool for repression.
Normally Christian fundamentalists would be screaming about this— it fits in perfectly with their fears about the mark of the beast. Maybe some are. But since their guy is in power in the US I suppose their concern will be postponed.
Another topic. I know Ian Welsh is not a favorite here. I sometimes think he goes too far or is wrong. . But this piece about the authoritarian use of a cashless economy seems correct to me.
https://www.ianwelsh.net/the-end-of-cash-the-rise-of-the-non-person/
Nous—
That’s probably right. I hadn’t even considered LLM’s but maybe.
My theory is that there is a standard form letter for people asking for pressure for a ceasefire, using our aid as leverage. Maybe a different letter for people who support Israel’s position. I hadn’t thought of them using AI, but that just shows I am still stuck in 2023 or so in my thinking.
Supposedly it is more effective to call them in the phone but I have done that and get nervous.
On the solution, I can’t imagine it. People argue about a 1ss vs a 2ss, but it is really hard to picture the two sides in the same country and also really hard to imagine the settlers leaving or agreeing to live under Palestinian rule. No acceptable solution seems realistic for now. Just stopping the slaughter and getting surviving hostages back is about the limit of my imagination here.
On his list of Israeli goals, numbers three and four are fantasy. In theory those are American goals but for Americans the first one was and is the one that mattered more than all others. By far. Keeping civilian deaths low would be nice, but not that important. For Netanyahu, staying out of jail and in power was the number one goal. For some others, the goal is ethnic cleansing.
So Schumer or whoever wrote this can’t really be that stupid. And from reading my email he or the actual writer knew I would think any of that was true. We need a better class of liar in DC. Or maybe even honest people.
The summary of HR 815 regarding Gaza is misleading, But too tired to rant.
On a positive note, I watched the hour long discussion with Brad Lander that Peter Beinart had on July 4. Lander was really impressive, a politician I could support with enthusiasm. Though I like Mamdani a lot, if I were a NYC voter I probably would have put Lander as 1 and Mamdani as 2 based on Lander’s experience. ( On Palestine Landervis a liberal Zionist unlike Mamdani, but Landercreally would be willing to pressure Israel, which is what I care about there. But I am mostly talking about his qualifications for being Mayor and all his other positions, very liberal, maybe a bit closer to achievable than what Mamdani wants. )
And he had a funny anecdote on his arrest. The two guys didn’t really like doing it. One was a Pakistani Muslim and said he would rank Lander and Mamdani as his top choices. The other said his wife wanted him to quit his ICE job because of what they were doing but he didn’t feel he could because he had a mortgage. Lander said it was funny but of course said it was also terrible.
No point linking— I think you have to subscribe to Beinart’s Substack.
Busy yesterday and today see stuff about alien space bats. Huh.
Anyway, thought I would post a reply I got from Schumer’s back in May after I wrote Schumer’s, Gillibrand and Latimer ( my House rep) a ( polite) several paragraph long email asking them to push for a ceasefire. Gillibrand and Latimer didn’t respond. No surprise in the last case and Gillibrand prob thought I was a global jihadist or something. So I gave the Schumer office some credit for a polite response. The response, however, was nonsense. Here it is —
————
Thank you for contacting me to express your concerns regarding U.S. aid to Israel and your request for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. I share your concerns about the security and well-being of innocent Palestinians.
I've always said that Israel has 4 goals: Radically reduce Hamas' threat, free the hostages, minimize the loss of innocent Palestinian lives and maximize the amount of humanitarian aid to innocent civilians in Gaza.
Like you, I am deeply troubled by the suffering of those who have been caught in the cross fire of this conflict. My heart breaks at the loss of so many civilian lives in Gaza. I am anguished that the Israeli war campaign has killed so many innocent Palestinians. I know that my fellow Jewish Americans feel this same anguish when they see the images of dead and starving children and destroyed homes.
I agree that the current political situation has created horrible living conditions for many Palestinians living in Gaza. That is why I have been supportive of opening up additional humanitarian aid routes to Gaza and increasing U.S. humanitarian aid contributions. Just recently Congress passed H.R. 815, the Emergency National Security Supplemental aid package that includes $9.3 billion dedicated for humanitarian aid, including for innocent civilians in Gaza.
I will continue to support a strong peace process through direct negotiations and look forward to the day when the Israeli and Palestinian governments can work together to achieve a two-state solution. I am committed to doing all that I can to encourage a productive and meaningful dialogue between the two parties.
Again, thank you for contacting me. Please keep in touch with your thoughts and opinions.
Sincerely,
Charles E. Schumer
United States Senator
“ . I almost never see anything on TikTok,”
Meaning that I almost never visit, not that there isn’t material there.
I was wondering about Charles’s age range myself. I think I have given away my approx age once or twice.
Thanks, Gftnc. But the tone thing sort of makes my eyes roll a bit. People should get a Twitter account, ignore the crap ( I have no idea what “the algorithm” wants me to see most of the time— I know about some people and they interact with others) and read Palestinians first hand. Some over there, some here. You will get tone, all right. Some Western lefties, some antizionist Israeli and American Jews. And plenty of pro Israel people respond, I am a cuddly little teddy bear in comparison to most of that crowd. I mean the substantive ones— there are of course plenty of people who only cuss out the side they are against, but you see plenty of bigotry on both sides with those folk, so even with them you get to see what sort of sewage is out there.
Supposedly seeing things on TV helped turn people against Vietnam. I think you see vastly more on Twitter. I almost never see anything on TikTok, which is supposed to be a site that helped turn young people against Israel in Gaza.
I probably need a break.
More on ranting. I visit LGM fairly often and that entire blog is one long almost continuous rant session, but they have their own culture there and while I think I get the unwritten rules and one or two of the inside jokes, they are a different type of ranter. I wouldn’t fit. It involves how and in what manner you are supposed to criticize the Democrats. The focus is on politics along with policy but mostly how it fits with politics. Nowadays they really hate the feckless Democratic leadership. I learn things from reading them.
Though of course with Trump in office we have a purely random foreign policy. based on whims. Best hope for Gaza would be if Netanyahu ticks off Trump in some way,
“ often find Donald's comments more annoying than wj's.”
Interesting. You mostly seem to agree on the war crimes thing, which is most of what I post about when ranting. In fact, that is virtually all of my rants as best I can recall.
“ anyone who agrees, but thinks there are other, more achievable, priorities is at best an utter moral dullard.”
That’s about right. Not supporting genocide is pretty low bar stuff.. You know who we lack here? Palestinian- American posters.
The pie in the sky material is in domestic policy and just keeping Trump from destroying what we have is sort of the best we can hope for.
I like Mamdani for example, but if he wins will be amazed if he can get a fraction of what he wants for nyc.
McKT aside, we are a pretty narrow group ideologically most of the time. Wj is the token conservative and he is more centrist really. Of course things get real heated real fast when there are serious disagreements about important issues. I said this to LJ privately the other day, but the amazing thing about the hilzoy era was how she and whoever else was in charge kept things under control. I didn’t necessarily agree with her on everything, but this was one of the few places I knew about where there was a wide range of views for a few years. Of course people gradually dropped out or in a few cases were banned for being offensive. I remember a couple from the far far left like that.
The culture might also have gotten more polarized, but I am not sure about that. It was pretty polarized with Bush, esp in the early years when he was more popular, I think. Now I can’t remember when I first came here.
It would be difficult being polite with a MAGA type. I don’t think we have had any.
Weirdly,for a couple of years Rod Dreher had a wide range of views in his American Conservative blog comments. For a bit he was repentant about his Iraq War support and would sometimes critique the right. But his anti gay and anti trans mania got more and more evident and his Islamophobia came back if it ever fully left and he got super culture war paranoid and started taking like Franco was justified. I got more and more sarcastic and was eventually banned. Then he wrote his famous root wiener post and got eased out.