Politics

kbd512 · 2024-02-25 06:49:52

RobertDyck,

The US didn't refuse to buy anything. Canada never had anything to sell, except the idea that at some indeterminate point in time in the future they might have a working interceptor.

Our government asked a very simple question of Avro:
Do you have a working weapon system?

The reply they received:
Well, no, we need another 3 years of development and guaranteed orders from America.

Our government's response was:
We really need working weapons now, so if nobody else has them, we're already spending a lot of money to develop and build them ourselves, and we need to prioritize funding for the projects that we've already started. We're perfectly willing to fund a working weapon system with purchase orders, but not a highly complex and technically risky foreign weapons development project that may not ever produce one.

Edit:
Every foreign country that has sold weapons to the US showed up with a working weapon system that passed all tests, it did better in testing than any competitor products, and that's why we bought those weapons. Every small arm in the current US arsenal is made by a foreign company, SIG or FNH, and the reason they hold all of our small arms contracts is because they produce weapons that meet all US government requirements at the lowest price on offer. It's as simple as that and always has been.

One of your own fellow Canadians is lecturing you about the real reason the Arrow was cancelled. That's not me making a claim, it's one of your own historians and an actual Arrow test pilot. You're neither of those things. Your argument over their remarks is with them, not me. I'm merely pointing out to you what other Canadians, one who was actually involved in flight testing the Arrow, said of the project.

Last edited by kbd512 (2024-02-25 06:53:44)

RobertDyck · 2024-02-25 12:19:12

An interesting fantasy. You can make stuff up, that doesn't change reality. And yes, it is you. The United States did pressure Canada to cancel the Avro Arrow. Excuse given was it could shoot down a U2 spy plane. But reality is they didn't like the fact Canada had produced a better fighter jet than any American one. The US did pressure NATO allies to not purchase it. And don't give me any fairy tale about development cycle; the US sells products that aren't completed yet. The US danded NATO allies order the F-35 when there was no completed production model, and it was several years before it would be completed. I'm not talking hear-say from just one guy, this is official documention.

kbd512 · 2024-02-25 15:05:52

What really happened with the fabled Avro Arrow? Long-secret information revealed

OTTAWA -
The Diefenbaker government's 1959 decision to scrap the fabled Avro Arrow was significantly influenced by Canadian intelligence that pointed to a diminishing need for the costly aircraft in the evolving Cold War, says a new research paper based on previously secret information.
The intelligence highlighted the Soviet Union's shift away from manned bombers to long-range ballistic missiles, suggesting interceptors like the Arrow would increasingly play a smaller role in the defence of North America.
The paper makes the case that these strategic intelligence assessments -- long the "missing dimension" in the debate over the Arrow's demise -- now allow for a fuller understanding of an important episode in Canadian history.
"Arrows, Bears and Secrets: The Role of Intelligence in Decisions on the CF-105 Program," was published Tuesday in the peer-reviewed academic journal Canadian Military History.
The paper's author, researcher Alan Barnes, tells of how the sudden cancellation of the impressive delta-winged interceptor, once a symbol of Canada's high-tech future in aircraft manufacturing, remains a source of nationalistic anguish decades later.
Barnes, a former federal intelligence official who is now a senior fellow of the Centre for Security, Intelligence and Defence Studies at Carleton University, used the Access to Information Act to obtain classified records that shed fresh light on the saga.
"It has taken more than 60 years to get a more complete picture of the decisions surrounding the Avro Arrow," Barnes told The Canadian Press. "Only now can we address many of the myths about the Arrow that have grown up in those decades."
One is the notion that Canada was misled by poor U.S. intelligence. Another is that Washington deliberately manipulated the intelligence it gave Ottawa to induce Diefenbaker to cancel the Arrow. It has also been suggested that Canadian intelligence officers intentionally discounted contrary information to support a decision that had already been made by their political masters, or the government simply ignored the intelligence provided by both the Canadian and U.S. militaries.
"All of these claims cannot be true; it is possible that none of them are," Barnes writes.
In the years after the Second World War, Canada developed its ability to prepare strategic intelligence assessments on defence and foreign policy, the paper notes. It would no longer have to rely entirely on assessments from the United States and Britain.
The analytic capability allowed Canada to fully participate in preparing the assessments on the Soviet threat to North America that would underpin joint Canada-U.S. planning for continental defence, Barnes notes.
"The CF-100 Canuck, a jet interceptor developed and manufactured in Canada, was just entering service, but there were already concerns that it might soon be outclassed by newer Soviet bombers operating at higher altitudes and faster speeds."
In November 1952, the Royal Canadian Air Force called for an aircraft with a speed of Mach 2 and the ability to fly at 50,000 feet. "These demanding specifications contributed to the escalating costs and frequent delays in the CF-105 program."
The Soviets would soon display a new long-range jet bomber, the Bison, at the 1954 May Day parade in Moscow. At an airshow the following year, a fly-past of 28 Bison seemed to indicate that the bomber had entered serial production, two years earlier than predicted, the paper says. In fact, only 18 prototype aircraft participated in the airshow, flying past several times to give the impression of larger numbers.
Even so, this display, along with the appearance of a new Soviet long-range turboprop bomber, the Tu-95 (dubbed the Bear), raised fears that the Soviet Union would soon outnumber the United States in intercontinental bombers, sparking a "Bomber Gap" controversy that figured prominently in American politics, the paper says.
These developments spurred acceleration of the CF-105 program.
However, Canadian intelligence would begin to cast doubt on the degree of the Soviet threat.
A 1957 report from the federal Joint Intelligence Bureau noted that the Canadian estimate of Soviet bomber production was consistently lower than the U.S. calculation, and that the Americans were reluctant to budge even when presented with new information.
In February of that year, the Liberal government approved continuing work on the CF-105, now officially known as the Arrow, but limited the scope to just eight developmental aircraft.
"There was a growing recognition among ministers that the escalating cost of the CF-105 was becoming unsustainable, but there was no interest in cancelling the program just before an election."
The newly elected Conservative government of John Diefenbaker kept the program alive, authorizing an order for 29 pre-production aircraft.
This decision followed the first public appearance of the Arrow in October 1957.
Barnes notes the plane was rolled out for the cameras the same day the Soviet Union launched its pioneering Sputnik satellite with the help of a powerful rocket -- a demonstration of Moscow's growing ability to produce inter-continental ballistic missiles capable of striking North America.
A January 1958 assessment, "The Threat to North America, 1958-1967," by Canada's Joint Intelligence Committee, a co-ordinating body, ultimately had the greatest impact on decisions related to the Arrow, the paper says.
The assessment laid out clear judgments concerning the imminent transition from crewed bombers to ballistic missiles and described the limited size and capabilities of the Soviet bomber force, Barnes notes.
It observed that the Soviet ballistic missiles which were on the verge of being developed were likely to be markedly superior to the foreseeable defences, and concluded that missiles would progressively replace aircraft as the main threat to North America.
The assessment said this meant there would be little justification for the Soviet Union to increase the number of bombers, or to introduce new ones, after 1960.
"The (Joint Intelligence Committee)'s January 1958 assessment was correct in foreseeing Moscow's shift from bombers to missiles over the subsequent decade," Barnes writes.
He points out that following the Sputnik launch, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev came to see missiles as a panacea for a range of defence problems and as a cheaper alternative to conventional weapons. "With the Soviet bomber force now looking irrelevant and obsolete, it was relegated to a secondary position in Soviet military thinking."
Diefenbaker announced the cancellation of the Arrow in the House of Commons in February 1959, citing the changing strategic threat as the main reason.
"Diefenbaker's statement made little mention of the escalating -- and unsustainable -- cost of the CF-105 program. He likely wanted to avoid accusations by the opposition that the government was unwilling devote the necessary resources to the defence of Canada," Barnes reasons.
Skeptical opposition Liberals pressed for more details and argued the prime minister's claim was contradicted by public statements from U.S. Air Force officers in testimony to congressional committees.
Much of the information on which the Canadian assessments were based came from U.S. and other allied sources, but Canadian analysts brought their own judgment to bear to evaluate this information, reaching their own conclusions about the Soviet Union's current and likely future capabilities, Barnes found.
The Canadian forecast of the capabilities of Soviet long-range aviation in the early 1960s proved to be broadly accurate, and the lower Canadian calculation of the number of Soviet operational heavy bombers was generally closer to reality than U.S. estimates, the paper says.
"As well, the Canadian view of the significance of Moscow's imminent shift from bombers to missiles as the main means of attacking North America was essentially correct," Barnes writes.
"By the late 1950s, with the advent of U-2 reconnaissance flights over the Soviet Union, the U.S. estimates of Soviet bomber numbers were also gradually reduced and the Bomber Gap ceased to be a political issue in the United States."
From August 1958 on, the military advice to cabinet consistently stressed the Joint Intelligence Committee's estimate of the Soviet bomber threat as a primary factor in the recommendation to cancel the CF-105, the paper says.
It is not clear whether ministers saw the committee assessment itself, although the defence minister of the day likely received a copy. In any case, the assessment's main conclusions were summarized in the memoranda sent to the cabinet defence committee and to the full cabinet in August and September.
In addition, the officials in External Affairs, as Global Affairs Canada was then known, and the Privy Council Office who were involved in drafting Diefenbaker's statement to the House were aware of the committee's paper, Barnes found.
"The arguments put forward in the statement -- and some of the wording -- tracked closely with the (Joint Intelligence Committee) assessment, as did the government's references to the diminished bomber threat in the subsequent parliamentary debate," he writes. "From this it can be concluded that the Canadian intelligence assessment of the changing Soviet bomber threat to North America was an important factor in the fateful decision to cancel the Arrow."
Barnes believes the process of drawing conclusions was unnecessarily difficult.
Historians are hampered by the fact that Canada, unlike its close allies, has no process for the systematic declassification of historical government records after a certain period of time, said Barnes, who was director of the Middle East and Africa Division at the Intelligence Assessment Secretariat of the Privy Council Office from 1995 to 2011.
"Researchers therefore have to work through the cumbersome and slow access-to-information process, which was never intended to deal with quantities of historical records," he said.
"This means that Canadians do not have adequate access to their history and therefore have a poorer understanding of government decisions and actions in many areas, not just intelligence matters."

kbd512 · 2024-02-25 17:57:02

RobertDyck,

Arrows, Bears and Secrets: The Role of Intelligence in Decisions on the CF-105 Program

Start reading at Page 27.

Yes, reading this will demolish your worldview about America killing your beloved Arrow, yes you're factually incorrect, and yes it contains original source material and links to the original source materials explaining the decisions of Canada's own government. The US Air Force was perfectly happy to remain in a fictitious world of supersonic interceptors stopping a Soviet bomber threat that wasn't coming, and never did because the Soviets focused on ICBMs in the 1960s, so they did all they could to convince our Congress of the validity of their belief, sort of like you. Canada's own military and intelligence services began to question the value of the interceptor, before American recon overflights of the Soviet Union confirmed Canada's own intelligence assessment of the situation.

You're a liberal, which means you think with your heart, rather than your head. You construct your own reality in your head, then try to find anything and everything that will support your beliefs about whatever it is that you've decided you like or dislike. You will persist in falsehoods till the bitter end, because if you don't, it's a threat to your very identity.

I'm a conservative, which means I only know how to think with my head. My little boy heart says the Arrow was a big beautiful fighter jet that checks all the right boxes for little boy wonderment and admiration. All little boys like ridiculously fast jets with powerful missiles. The problem is that such things ultimately failed to serve any useful military purpose. That's why the F-106 was the last of its kind. My grown man head, which has observed how combat jets were actually used in a combat zone, knows better. It doesn't mean my heart is satisfied by the decisions that were made in my head, but my head knows the correct decisions were made. Without keeping my head about me, I know that I will be easy prey for a determined thinking enemy who is perfectly willing to use my emotions against me.

This is also why liberals don't belong in government. Government is about adherence to proven organizational principles and correct decision making, regardless of aesthetics or the personal beliefs and prejudices of those involved. Liberals prove over and over again that they can't do that. Whenever plainly observable objective reality disagrees with their belief system, they respond by protecting their belief system, rather than acquiesce to ugly reality.

Calliban · 2024-02-26 15:40:23

Why peak oil is closer than you think.
https://peakprosperity.com/off-the-cuff … you-think/

This is probably the best energy related interview I have seen in quite a while. Adam Rozencwajg talks about many things. He expects US shale production to hit a peak this year. This is essentially because the Permian basin oil output will stop growing, as tier 1 acreage is being rapidly depleted. He is bullish on uranium, bearish on renewables and EVs, due to their poor EROI and high resource requirements. Everything we have learned on this forum over tge past few years backs up this interpretation.

Adam Rosencwajg does not agree that peak demand is going to be a real thing. I am less certain on this point. If Peter Zeihan is even half right about demographics, then working age populations are going to implode in Europe and the far east. Indeed, it is happening already in China, Japan and Italy. As a rule, retired people consume less than working age people. And dead people do not consume at all. If populations in the developed world are shrinking, then it is hard to see where solud demand growth is going to come from. From India there will be some. But will that be rapid enough to compensate for falling demand due to depopulation in developed economies? I don't know. But I wonder if the peak demand crowd could end up being right for the wrong reason. It isn't energy efficiency that will save us. Jevon's Paradox ensures that improving energy efficiency, reduces the cost of energy services, which increases demand. But a shrinking population is another thing entirely.

This video is about an hour long, but is worth watching to the end if you are interested in energy related issues.

Last edited by Calliban (2024-02-26 15:53:39)

kbd512 · 2024-02-26 16:04:21

Calliban,

Rather than throw our hands up in the air and pretend there's nothing we can do, any nuclear and renewable energy we can put to good use, is probably put to its best use creating storable energy supplies that can be consumed on-demand, so that our economic and technological output doesn't fall off a cliff. It's not written in stone anywhere that we have to regress or progress towards any particular future. We are not lacking resources or energy or know-how at the present time, only willpower to do what is right by everyone.

Uranium is good stuff, but we're not building reactors fast enough due to red tape and the perverse anti-humanist element of environmentalism. I feel like the past 50 years were an astonishing lost opportunity to convert electric grids to nuclear power. Think of the insane quantities of coal and gas that would still be available, had we done that. Again, we could've licked this problem a century ago.

We absolutely need oil for aircraft, ships, and heavy vehicles, but light duty short range personal vehicles represent a tradespace with many different possible solutions.

Nobody is working on a practical short range motor vehicle that doesn't burn anything. There's been no serious effort to pursue compressed air and thermal power transfer. I feel like any car that is truly sustainable and functions like a normal car, even over 50 to 100 miles, is a technological windfall. Air, water, and CO2 can be recycled endlessly with nuclear thermal, geothermal, and solar thermal power.

Companies are starting to work on thermal energy storage for power plants, so that's encouraging.

The way I see it, there's an opportunity cost to doing nothing, pretending we don't have any problems, as well as pursuing bridges to nowhere, which is what electrification of everything has proven to be. I feel as though a singular aesthetically pleasing solution was relentlessly pursued without asking whether the results achieved bore any resemblance to the glossy marketing brochure.

SpaceNut · 2024-02-26 19:50:33

Ken Buck unveils resolution calling on Cabinet to remove Biden under 25th Amendment

Will not get the 2/3 vote in the senate due to party devide.

Of course that holds just as true for the other shoe as Democrats Turn the Tables and Challenge 77-Year-Old Trump’s Mental Fitness

I really would want them both to drop out and save the problems...

Mars_B4_Moon · 2024-03-02 07:42:47

Security Officer Points Gun At US Soldier Aaron Bushnell As He Burns To Death
https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/video-s … th-5135902
A 25-year-old US Airman Aaron Bushnell, protesting against Israel's war in Gaza, set himself on fire

The Secret Service, Metropolitan Police Department, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives announced they would investigate the incident. The Metropolitan Police refused to confirm the authenticity of the livestream, and the US Air Force cited family notification policies while refusing to speak initially on the situation.

As he burned, Bushnell repeatedly shouted "Free Palestine!" while one Secret Service officer pointed a gun at him and two others attempted to extinguish him, the act was live-streamed on Twitch a video game live video social media site.

Thousands turn out to mourn Navalny, defying Putin, at funeral in Moscow
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/thou … rcna141329

Houthi rebels sink ship in Red Sea for the first time
https://apnews.com/article/yemen-houthi … 606e15d093

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2024-03-02 07:45:43)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2024-03-02 14:27:10

Woman loses $800K disability case after news report shows her winning tree-throwing competition
https://www.foxnews.com/world/mom-loses … ompetition

24 year old male who killed a 4 year old in a collision steals her memorial cross
https://www.tmj4.com/news/local-news/dr … m-memorial

7 men gang-rape Spanish tourist in India, 3 arrested
https://www.laprensalatina.com/7-men-ga … -arrested/

‘Reprehensible gun attack’: Indian embassy after dancer from Bengal is shot dead in US
https://indianexpress.com/article/world … h-9191693/

Coldwar 2 point zero, North Africa, South America, the Middle East, Ukraine, Belarus, Erdogan imam, Iran, Yemen, North Korea, China, India, Brazil, South Africa and former USSR States.

Israel may have just torched its relationship with Russia, promising to supply Ukraine with 'early-warning systems'
https://www.yahoo.com/news/israel-may-j … 23895.html

US military aircraft airdrop thousands of meals into Gaza in emergency humanitarian aid operation
https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas … 78bc70a084

Scotland and Turks

Yousaf's invitation to Erdoğan condemned by Kurdish groups
https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/240 … sh-groups/

Erdogan and the Rise of an Anatolian Foreign Policy
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-s … moved-east
A de facto embargo on U.S. weapons sales to Turkey had been in place ever since Ankara purchased Russian missile defense systems in 2017.

Senators Warily Allow F-16 Sale to Turkey as Part of NATO Expansion Agreement. 'A Deal's a Deal'
https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/ar … als-a-deal

a question asked

'Why do people in Central Asia view Russia in a positive light?'
https://politics.stackexchange.com/ques … tive-light

The irresistible rise of the civilisation-state Western liberalism has no answer to assertive powers that take pride in their cultural roots
https://unherd.com/2020/08/the-irresist … ion-state/

Calliban · 2024-03-03 15:26:42

More evidence of Biden's mental decline.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=USEVckL-K-I

I struggle to watch his appearances without cringeing. I begin to wonder if he will make it to November. Under normal circumstances, the vice president would have taken over. But that doesn't seem to be an option either.

kbd512 · 2024-03-04 14:45:56

SCOTUS rules 9-0 in President Trump's favor. His name will appear on the ballot in November.

No dissenting opinions were issued by Justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, or Ketanji Brown-Jackson.

This was a well-deserved and thoroughly appreciated rebuke of the gross abuse of power on the part of our once-great Democrat Party and their activist lackeys, who no longer respect America's founding principles, their own offices, nor the people they swore to serve.

Calliban · 2024-03-05 05:21:35

The Democrats are already looking for ways that they can use new legislation could keep Trump out of the running.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/sup … al-ballots

Left wing extremists have never respected the democratic process. They tend to view personal choice and freedom as a threat to their authority. Hence the ludicrous Russian collusion hoax. Hence the ballot harvesting operations. If these people fail to keep Trump off the ballot, what is to stop them from just cheating in November with massive vote harvesting operations like they did last time? Most blue states opted for mail in voting, because the Democrats know that their army of activists on the ground can be relied upon to 'manufacture' the vote they want. Suppose they did this again. What recourse would Trump have if the vote was engineered to keep him out? From what we have seen, this is almost certain to happen given how determined the Democrats are to stay in power.

Last edited by Calliban (2024-03-05 05:24:15)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2024-03-05 05:52:21

US Supreme Court rules Colorado cannot ban Trump from presidential ballot
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68280062.amp

Putin pardons Russian rapist who chopped off victim's hand so he can fight in Ukraine

GBNews
https://www.msn.com/

I tried linking the dailymail & headline but it triggered the filter with 404 erros

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl … -army.html

Kosovo's currency crisis with Serbia: Who will be the winner?
https://www.euronews.com/business/2024/ … the-winner

In the tumultuous Balkans, even matters of currency are transformed into instruments of political dispute.

How to prevent another war between Armenia and Azerbaijan
https://www.diplomaticourier.com/posts/ … azerbaijan

Venezuelan migrants linked to more crimes in US, but Maduro shuts door on all deportations
https://www.foxnews.com/us/venezuela-mi … portations

A wave of violent crimes being carried out across America has been linked to Venezuelan migrants and the U.S. government cannot deport any of them, as the South American country will not take any of its citizens back.
An illegal immigrant originally from Venezuela has been charged in connection with the violent murder of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley on the University of Georgia campus on Thursday. Jose Antonio Ibarra, 26, the suspect, was released into the U.S. via parole, three ICE & DHS sources told Fox News.
In New York City, the NYPD is trying to crack down on a violent Venezuelan gang known as Tren de Aragua that it says is responsible for terrorizing residents with dozens of robberies in the Big Apple, where the group has now been blamed for scooter and moped robberies as well as retail theft.

Also notice the poor use of the English language on both 'left' and 'rightwing' news they don't call them invaders or illegals or criminals, they say its migration like an animal from nature that moves across border in winter, moves around for a few months and goes back home in their summer when its ok, or animal naturally moving when its too hot to a cooler climate and then going back like fish populations near near Samoa and Fiji, or as birds; hoofed animals do naturally.

I don't think human smuggler drug running gangs or an Iran terrorist crossing the border on an FBI watch list can be defined as 'migrant' person.

Burkina Faso bishop says ‘faith has grown’ after attacks by jihadist terrorists
https://cruxnow.com/church-in-africa/20 … terrorists

Ship Sunk by Houthi Rebels Poses Environmental Crisis in the Red Sea
https://thedeepdive.ca/ship-sunk-by-hou … e-red-sea/

Three Red Sea underwater data cables have been cut as Houthi attacks continue in the vital waterway
https://www.yahoo.com/news/three-underw … 39992.html

UN envoy says 'reasonable grounds' to believe Hamas committed sexual violence on Oct. 7
https://apnews.com/article/israel-pales … 97e397177e

Israel-Hamas war: Hamas fires ‘Soviet rockets’ at Israel from southern Lebanon
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/ … est-news2/

North Korea hacked South Korean chip equipment makers, Seoul says
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-68476035

EU fines Apple €1.8bn over App Store restrictions on music streaming
https://www.theguardian.com/business/20 … -streaming

The FBI Is Searching for an Alleged Iranian Assassin Reportedly Targeting Trump-Era Officials
https://people.com/fbi-searching-allege … ls-8603953

The agency has issued an alert regarding an Iranian official wanted in connection to a plot to assassinate current and former U.S. officials "in revenge"

older topic

https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=778

Border crossings - and Terrorism

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2024-03-05 06:24:18)

kbd512 · 2024-03-06 03:44:24

For anyone who wants to know why communism doesn't work, this is a pretty good analysis:

Why Communism is a Failed Religion - WhatIfAltHist

kbd512 · 2024-03-06 03:58:55

Here we can see why it is that the argument that nazism / fascism / authoritarianism is on the political right is such errant nonsense:

the-games-name-could-refer-to-a-political-triangle-rather-v0-2x2qt5cm5qh81.png?auto=webp&s=858c58ededd5b1b0a8cd476211909a3269e1ebe6

kbd512 · 2024-03-06 04:41:28

Republicanism works for society as a whole. Anarchy is radical right wing ideology. Republicans go too far when they become anarchists. There are no anarchist totalitarians in actual practice- you're either one or the other. You can't be both. Look at where Ron Paul is on that infographic. He's the closest thing to an actual Republican that America has had in quite some time.

Look at where a "Populist Republican" falls on that chart. President Trump has been called a populist, nationalist, Hitler, and a King by Democrats, sometimes within the same sentence. They know the people who listen to and believe the pablum they're fed, are basically stupid. If he's a populist, then he's closest to being Lenin. If he's a nationalist or totalitarian nationalist, then he's closest to being a king. If Democrat media idiocy were taken at face value, then he's all over the political map. Saying more than one thing can be true at one time is not being intellectually honest. Use a label that fits. Don't make stuff up to push a failed ideology.

Note the blue dotted triangle of "mainstream politics"- the politics that give you endless division, warfare, hatred of others, etc. These people are probably not your friends, regardless of what they claim, unless division and hatred appeals to you in some way.

That is why it's so stupid and silly to associate radical right wing ideology with nazism or totalitarianism. A bunch of people who do not believe in classes or castes, and are always highly suspicious of centralized authority held by "the state", are suddenly going to support totalitarian socialist ideology that favors one class of people over another? Maybe when pigs fly. You'd have to be a Democrat to believe such idiocy.

Communism works within the confines of a family, but never for a society. Socialism is radical left wing ideology. In practice, all socialists, from Stalin to Hitler, are also absolutist totalitarians. Communism appeals to women, losers, and those who think they're outcasts, such as the Jews. It appeals to them because there is no introspection or accountability required, and thus no incentive to improve. If you didn't succeed, then it's someone else's fault. Socialists go too far when they demand equal outcomes, regardless of inputs. If a Rhodes Scholar is forced to have philosophical debates with street thugs who flunked high school, that's a demand for equal outcomes without equal inputs. Nobody is saying the street thug can't become a philosopher, but he first has to quit acting like a thug and then start expanding his mind. He's not afforded the privilege of philosophical debates without the hard mental work to earn it.

Anyone who makes the argument that "real communism" has never been tried, has never been part of the real world. Communism has had control over at least a third of the world's population at one point in time. If it didn't produce better outcomes than capitalism did, then perhaps the ideology is to blame, rather than the people involved.

Edit:
For those who cannot read between the lines, what was meant is that it wouldn't matter who was involved, socialism and communism would still fail. When tens of millions of people all achieve equal poverty and equal destitution, that's a feature of the ideology, not a mistake. It's not because everyone who tried it was too stupid to "do communism the right way".

Last edited by kbd512 (2024-03-06 04:48:31)

Calliban · 2024-03-06 05:18:57

So an actual 'far-right' government would be a government of independants. Right-wing means valuing individual responsibility over collectivism. It is clearly a better way to live from an individuals perspective, but it requires that individuals be trusted with a high level of personal integrity and responsibility. Some people fit that requirement, most people don't. The opposite (far-left) emphasises the state over the individual and sacrifices all personal freedom in favour of the perfection of the machine. That is a horrible way to live. It destroys all personal initiative and completely devalues the individual. The paradox we must live with is that neither approach works. Humans are rough, selfish, flawed beasts and more often than not, cannot be relied upon to act in the collective good. But without freedom, there is little point being alive at all. So real systems of government have to be some compromise between the two extremes.

kbd512 · 2024-03-06 12:55:06

Calliban,

An actual group of far-right radicals wouldn't believe in any governance at all. If President Trump advocated for no government, that would make him a far right radical. That is what "far right" actually means- people who don't believe in having any government. By definition, a king or dictatorship cannot be "far right", unless it's also profoundly anti-Republican in nature, i.e. "collectivist" and / or "statist". It's a centralized authoritarian style of government. If everyone who is an actual Republican, such as myself, wants far less government, then how would we maintain "authoritarian control" over the lives of anyone, regardless of their political beliefs? The most obvious answer is that we wouldn't, because we couldn't.

Since I'm not a far right radical, I do believe some form of governance is necessary, because men and women are not angels. Despite that fact, government should have as little influence over our daily lives as is practical, without opening the door to anarchy or tyranny. This is the exact opposite of what collectivists want, which is some form of tyranny, whether it's tyranny of the majority or an actual tyrant / king making dictatorial decisions over the lives of others. Simply put, you're not going to get a tyranny from a group of people who openly despise and are highly suspicious of all-powerful central governments. We would structure government in such a way as to ensure that won't happen, which is why we're so despised by collectivist tyrants who wish to insert government into every aspect of life, from cradle to grave. That's why they label us "nazis". Ironically, nazis were just another group of their fellow collectivists, who exerted dictatorial control over the lives of others using an all-powerful central government. Essentially, that is anti-Republicanism, in the same way that any "Democratic People's Republic" is always anti-democratic and anti-Republican.

All collectivists seek to impose their will on other people. In practice this always involves using force or violence as the means to that end. That is also why societies structured that way ultimately fail. In the Soviet Union, rather than fighting against their own government, everyone sat on their hands long enough that the state imploded under its own weight. What were they going to do about that- mass murder every last person in their society because they refused to do anything at all?

A true communist / socialist would do just that, but then they no longer have a society to exploit, which is why the Soviet system ultimately fell apart. Communism would've fallen apart in China, had we not prevented tens of millions of them from starving to death, but we're not like them, we're still predominantly Christians, so we gave them foodstuffs and modern John Deere combine harvesters- a rather commonplace tool in America that ensures 1% of the population can feed the other 99%, so that the labor of the 99% can be devoted to other useful pursuits. Under capitalism, they can no longer obtain free labor or other unearned privileges at someone else's expense, because that person cannot be forced or compelled to serve their interests. Capitalism seems terrifying to these people, because exploiting someone you cannot force to do your bidding at gunpoint means you then have to figure out how to conduct voluntary interpersonal transactions with someone who trusts you at least enough to do business. Capitalism discourages some of the most destructive forms of anti-social behavior, but you have to be willing to not do business with anti-social types. That doesn't mean anti-social people don't still exist under capitalism, merely that they cannot control society without willful allowance of such.

The people who want tyranny generally believe that they'll be the tyrant in charge of everything. They think they're the most competent dictator in the room, and that typically only remains true in a very small room, quite often a room only large enough for two people, because there are 50/50 odds that the other person is either more competent or more sociopathic or more ruthless than they are. Between men and women, you'd only be correct in assuming the man was the most violent one 60% of the time, which still says nothing about the most extremely violent individuals, which would almost always be men. In practice, many of those people become the apparatus underlings for the state to use to terrorize its own people. Take someone like Stalin, for example. I'd never guess that a partially physically disabled psychopath would be the person in charge of communist utopia. He infamously murdered his childhood friend, a man who remained a loyal communist and supporter of Stalin, until his execution. He wasn't terribly smart, nor empathetic to his peoples' plight, nor was he a particularly good judge of character. He was extremely ruthless and violent. That is all.

Unfortunately, that's the sort of idiocy that communism breeds, because that's what communism rewards. It's a system of, by, and for abject idiots- people who are too ignorant and/or feeble to exist in a world without someone or something to coddle them throughout the course of their entire lives. IIRC, both Hitler and Stalin were tormented during their childhood, and neither were good students. That means they learned all the wrong lessons about how to interact with people. Hitler would've been infinitely more terrifying with the Jewish Germans on his side, who considered themselves loyal Germans, and would've given him "the bomb", along with every other conceivable weapon of war. Hitler so resented his own Jewish mother that he lead his society to commit unspeakable atrocities against the Jews, Gypsies, and anyone else he thought was beneath him.

In the end, Hitler's national socialism was the penultimate byproduct of toxic femininity, with communism being the ultimate expression of toxic feminine ideology- loving someone so much that you suffocate them like an overbearing mother. Toxic masculinity would result in anarchy- loving someone so little that you throw them to the wolves so that only the strongest / most cunning / most ruthless survive. The two are different sides of the same coin, and both are corrosive and destructive to civilized society. If there is no balance between feminine and masculine nature, then societal cohesion fails. The nuclear family unit is the antidote to the nature of humanity, which is always a mix of good and bad.

True change and uncertainty terrifies people who buy into toxic ideology, to the point where the warm embrace of a psychopath who would kill them, just to watch them die, seems preferable to the cold and unforgiving world of self-determination, where there are no guarantees of anything. Freedom is not for the faint of heart. There are a lot of terrible things that can happen with enough freedom, but for various reasons, the most terrible fates always seem to actually happen when there is an utter lack of personal freedom.

Oddly enough, there is no comparison between the number of people who have literally starved to death under capitalism vs communism and other forms of authoritarian central governments. You'd think all-powerful centrally planned governments would know and accept that all people die without food, thus you have far fewer people left to do your bidding, unless what that central authority actually wants is to kill most of them. That means people living under governments with near total control over the national economy, regardless of what they allow or disallow in the way of economic activities, cannot even feed their own people. There is no socialist / communist regime, present or historical, wherein a significant percentage of the population didn't starve to death. Christians saved these atheist communists from themselves in all cases where they were finally permitted to do so, because the central government became more terrified of the people doing to them, that which they did do to their own people.

Nobody starves to death in America, except by choice, or as the captive of a psychopath / socialist / communist. That's not a dumb accident. It's not because something was stolen from someone else, or any other nonsense excuse. It's not because Americans are so privileged and righteous, nor because everybody who lives under communism is so downtrodden or evil. Failures to correctly prioritize are one of the central features of communism. Ironically, the least empathetic, and frequently least capable if we judge by results, but most psychotic and ruthless people, end up attaining positions of dictatorial authority over the entire society, under communism. If they cannot guarantee that their people have food to eat, then it's because they don't particularly value them in their priorities list.

clark · 2024-03-07 02:12:11

Where do I begin? Why do i begin?

My friend Kbd, Texas strong, Trump "yeah whatever", proletariat of the taxed underdog, screams what? a party exploits a segment, a class. versus what? another party that exploits a segment and a class?

I look upon you all and your class based political segmentation for moral superiority and see the basic failure that "mars" portends. You all scrape in America nationalism. What of NATO? This place is a joke.

If any of you actually dreamed of Mars you would put word to mouth to arm to action. You would encourage your local social group (or start one) to advocate with their local representation, You would start podcasts. You would email your counselor. You would put yourself out there in the way that clearly says, yes, I think people should live on an alien planet in a vacumn with a curtailed life outcome involving cancer. But that aint dreamy.

clark · 2024-03-07 02:21:03

kbd512"Communism appeals to women, losers, and those who think they're outcasts, such as the Jews. It appeals to them because there is no introspection or accountability required, and thus no incentive to improve."

Kbd512, you should find a way to quietly remove yourself from society. You are a pig.

All those who see this, examine your own values as you continue to engage. You debase yourself if you engage further.

Calliban · 2024-03-07 04:46:09

Clark, why don't you make some meaningful contributions to the many topics on this board? We have thousands. Pick something you are interested in and stop trolling people.

kbd512 · 2024-03-07 04:55:38

clark,

President Trump is Bill Clinton with a different letter next to his name. We differ on this, obviously. You apply emotion, whereas I look at what he actually did in office. If you don't like what he says, then do what I do and don't listen to him talk. I don't listen to President Biden talk, either. In his case, that's mostly because he can no longer speak English sentences, but everyone has their problems.

If you despise America that much, then where else would you go that's so much better than America?

NATO was intended to fight communism and the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union died a natural death. Communist China would've followed, but some idiots over here decided that they needed our help to continue being communists, and that in so doing, they would somehow "become less communist". Oddly enough, that didn't happen. So... If we're going to fight communism, then that probably means fighting an actual communist country, like China, rather than some tin pot dictator like Putin with third-rate military. Russia has proven to be more of a danger to Russia than anyone else. If Putin invades a NATO country, then we'll fight his little green men. Until he does, it looks pretty bad if we go looking to pick a fight with him. We've been "not fighting" fighting the Russians since WWII ended. Some of us want to get the show on the road, or to quit pretending that we're doing what we're not actually doing.

Communism appeals to women because anything that takes on the superficial appearance of treating everyone the way children are typically treated is generally appealing to them. This is obviously not universal, but common enough that a generalization can be made. Mothers will typically feed all of their children, regardless of whether or not one is behaving well and the other is misbehaving. This obviously doesn't apply to every woman everywhere across all of time, but in general mothers apply communism in the home. Communism works within the family unit. It's not that hard to figure out why it appeals to them, because it appeals to their sense of how they would want their children treated.

Communism appeals to losers because this or that or the nebulous "other" is why they didn't succeed in life. They played no role in their success or failure. Even Solzhenitsyn held himself more personally responsible for his actions than any of these silly college kiddos calling themselves communists. American college kids, the most privileged group of people on this planet, think the reason someone didn't drop a $100K job on their plate has nothing whatsoever to do with their own behavior. I consider a person handed everything in life on a silver platter, who still refuses to do the bare minimum, yet is totally shocked when success in life doesn't "just happen to them", to be a loser. Refusing to do better and developing a giant chip on your shoulder is a choice.

Communism appeals to Jewish people because they feel rejected by society, and at times they have been. They hold a fanciful notion that communism will protect and provide, so communism is therefore very appealing to them. Sadly for them, the Russians frequently expressed their hated towards them, just the same as the Germans, hence all the pogroms where Russians murdered Jews for the horrendous crime of "being Jewish". The only difference between Russia and Germany, is that in Russia the concentration camps were rated "E" for "Everyone". I guess that made it all better. The Jewish people who survived communism have a very different opinion of it.

All those who see this, examine your own values as you continue to engage. You debase yourself if you engage further.

Others are allowed to express opinions you disagree with. That's going to happen during the course of your life. Nobody is forcing you to come here. Calling people every name under the Sun only lets everyone else know that you have no actual arguments to make. Put your big boy pants on, and try being a big boy again. I believe in you. Big boy clark was way more interesting to converse with.

clark · 2024-03-18 01:03:49

Trump will not give any of us what we seek, unless we happen to be billionaires that are funding the fight.

I cannot summarize 100 years of geo-political experience that resulted in the UN and NATO. I cannot explain the last 75 years of Great Power Politics that makes it clear why an active international engagement policy is better than entrenchment. Read your US history; when we disengage the aftermath is worse.

And communism doesn't appeal to "Jewish people"; you saying so just tells everyone you are a racist garbage person. Find another way to express your ignorance. I say this as a Jewish person, so if you have a problem with the feedback, look into your soul and eat sh*t.

kbd512 · 2024-03-18 04:09:46

clark,

President Trump is a giant middle finger to both parties. That's what makes him an acceptable alternative to a re-run of Dumb (Republicans) and Dumber (Democrats). Since Bill Clinton held office, Democrats have been more committed to the destruction of the ideals of America than most of the Bible thumpers I've met are committed to either saving me from hell or damning me to it. Republicans have only helped that process along by being feckless enablers. I'm sick of all of them.

There aren't enough people alive today who remember WWII, so WWIII is inevitable. It's a cycle. If you've read through the last 100 years of geopolitics and US history, then hopefully you know that much. We have 800 overseas military bases. We're actively fighting in Ukraine, various countries in the Middle East and Africa, and we're about to start exchanging ordnance with China. I'm not sure how much more engagement you think is necessary, but it sounds like you want to preemptively start WWIII. Have a little patience. War is a process.

I've heard enough Jewish people say to me, exactly what I restated to you. I think about a dozen different people, some from Israel, some from Europe or Russia, and a couple from America, is enough to figure out what they found appealing about communism. Their answers were not remarkably different from what non-Jewish Russians have told me about communism. Unless all them were lying to me, race had nothing to do with their reasons. I say this to you as an American person who could not possibly care any less about whatever religion you have or don't have. If you have a problem with my feedback, then get over yourself already.

Calliban · 2024-03-18 08:45:48

The safety of commercial aircraft appears to be slipping. Are company Diversity, Inclusion & Equity (DIE) programmes part of the problem? Hiring people because of who they are, rather than what they can do. This guy thinks so.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=K-oiWJe87ug&pp

I think additionally, we have problems associated with a shrinking workforce as boomers retire. There just aren't as many people to go round as there used to be. Experienced people are retiring and we aren't replacing their expertise. Socialist DIE programmes that fail to prioritise the best candidates will make this problem even worse, if it ends up degrading the quality of people recruited. Anyone that sits around obsessing over their gender and the injustice of society, isn't someone I would wan't monitoring metal fatigue on an aircraft that I am flying on. That needs to be someone that is good at his job. It is only a matter of time before this sort of metrosexual nonsense leads to a disaster that costs hundreds of lives.

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