• TokenBoomer@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I’ll hold my suspense until it’s not cost effective to support Israel. What does the Capital say?

    • Drusas@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      I expect they will support Israel unconditionally. They are our only strong ally in the region, giving us strength to operate in the region. I imagine that strategic advantage is more important to the White House than either the Israelis or the Palestinians are.

      • Hegar@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        strategic advantage is more important to the White House than either the Israelis or the Palestinians are

        This and always this, of every state, in every situation.

      • MindSkipperBro12@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        But of course, we may convince them to not invade Gaza, as that might just ignite this into something much more bloodier, so they’ll probably stick to bombings and call it good enough.

        For better or for worse.

      • Ktastic@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        Err, idk they seem more like an albatross. Most of the hate we get there is because we support that genocide. Id say having Israel as an ally is the reason we have the enemy’s we have there. Also how fucked up is it that 9/11 was primarily inspired by US support of Israel and they afaik, never assisted in any military shit there. All we get is “intelligence” from some chronic liars. Been trying to find concrete shit theyve done to help and cant find any.

    • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      Ryan Cooper, 2018: The fake resistance inside the Trump administration

      What a crock.

      If there were real organized resistance to Trump within the administration or the Republican Party more broadly, these people would be doing dramatically more than they are. If they really believe Trump is a danger to the nation and world — and he is — it should hardly be a mystery what to do about it.

      tl;dr:

      1. Get rid of Trump — before the 2020 election
      2. Quit and join the opposition
      3. Undermine him from the inside
  • Car@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    1 year ago

    Anybody know if there’s some sort of conscientious objector clause for the State Department?

    On one hand, anybody working for the DoS is acting in an official government capacity. That is to say it’s not about an individual’s thoughts or feelings - anybody in the job is supposed to be acting in the interests of the United States. It doesn’t really matter if you don’t like what you do. It might matter if you’re morally opposed to your tasking, but the solution to that is usually to bring it up and have somebody else to the work.

    On the other hand, the United States government, and DoS by extension, is supposed to work for the people. Here, the DoS should be taking a stance that works in the best interests of the country and its citizens. If popular opinion says that there’s a misalignment, then we need a way to fix the issues so that the organization can run in a manner consistent with the people chartering it. I’m not sure individual employees are the right people to take on this role, as there’s no consistent way to act across an organization like this.

    I’m not an expert here, but I can see reasonable arguments on both sides of this

  • generalpotato@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Biden’s definitely lost my vote with this policy. I genuinely think that he was and is doing pretty well for a first term president after the cluster fuck that was Trump and felt like America was finally coming back to form both domestically and internationally, but his stance has really disillusioned me as a voter and a supporter.

    • Uvine_Umarylis@partizle.com
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      1 year ago

      You act like he was voted in out of popularity 😂

      He was voted in because the alternative was Donald Trump

      Welcome to first past the post!!!

    • Bleeping Lobster@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I get why you feel that way. Politics is rarely black & white though, sometimes you have to pick the least worst option, so that someone doesn’t pick the worst option for you (FPTP systems)

      • generalpotato@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Sometimes, but not when a government is fucking complicit in a genocide. No amount of moral tom foolery makes this ok.

        I’d rather not vote than vote for the least evil. They candidates can jump off a bridge for all I care especially when our tax money are paying for their salaries.

        • Bleeping Lobster@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Again, I get where you’re coming from, but this is how America ended up with Trump. Many people were convinced to stay home and ‘not vote’ for Clinton. Biden, Starmer, whichever politician you want to smear as being ‘complicit in genocide’ is being quite vocal in calls for aid and a ceasefire. The reality doesn’t match with how you’re allowing people to paint it for you.

          Now more than ever, we all need to make a concerted effort not to be lead by our feels. Burned babies and tortured civvies are enraging. Cutting off water / supplies / energy is enraging. Tieing a group of children together and setting them on fire is enraging. Bombing Gaza is enraging. The hard-right Israeli government AND the Islamic fundies want us to be enraged because that’s when we make rash judgements and allow the situation to become further enflamed.

          Your voice is stronger from the inside than sitting with tape over your mouth in your house. Imo.

          • generalpotato@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Point me to an article where America has officially called for a cease fire. There’s protests across the country calling for but we’re passing multi-billion “aid” packages to Israel, which already has enough arms to fight this “war” ten times over.

            Democrats snubbed Bernie in 2016 in favor of Hillary and fucked its voter base which cost them and us their supporters the elections and unleashed 4 years of hell on this country.

            Again, I get your point, and I’m stating that there’s limits to bullshit especially when it’s coming out of our paychecks.

            And here’s the counter and complicity of America. The fucking nerve of us to “open up humanitarian corridors”:

            https://news.un.org/en/story/2023/10/1142507

            https://www.aljazeera.com/program/newsfeed/2023/10/18/biden-visits-israel-and-reaffirms-support-for-war-in-gaza

            https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/10/20/biden-asks-us-congress-for-105bn-in-assistance-for-israel-and-ukraine

            • Bleeping Lobster@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Democrats snubbed Bernie in 2016 in favor of Hillary and fucked its voter base which cost them and us their supporters the elections and unleashed 4 years of hell on this country

              Agreed. But, after that happened, you had an unpalatable choice between ‘holding your nose’ to vote for a candidate who wasn’t fucking insane, or staying home. That might not be the choice you wanted but it’s still a choice that enabled the election of Trump.

              You’re right, I cannot find any recent articles of Biden personally calling for ceasefire (though I can find historical articles of him calling for ceasefires last time this conflict flared up). I can however find lots and lots of articles re progressive dems calling for ceasefire and putting pressure on him to do likewise. This is what I meant by ‘stronger voice from inside’. You have no voice on the outside.

              • generalpotato@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                I think we’re talking past each other. Elected representatives, including Biden, are servants of the people. Their job is to represent the will of the people. Democrats should have been held accountable for Trump, as much as Trump is being held accountable, rightfully so, for all of his fuck-ups.

                Justice should be served equally, regardless of party or affiliation. We cannot let our elected representatives get away with mea culpas of such massive proportions every single time.

                I did vote for Biden in 2020 and would have voted again for him in 2024, had he not pulled this bullshit and played with human life in a bid to save his popularity at home and/or upset the status quo.

                Not voting for either party is as powerful a message as a vote since each vote is counted and voter turnout is a very telling sign. It demonstrates that the party needs to do better to understand the needs of the people putting them in power. We don’t HAVE to choose between two shit options, we can instead send a message that the party needs to do better and listen to it’s base and form policies in line with them to preserve their precious seats otherwise they risk losing their position and have to fight for it all over again. If they don’t like it, great, some other candidate from the party will be sure to unseat them.

                I get your point about change from the inside, but here’s what happened with people that tried it this time as American was bending over backwards for Israel:

                https://www.huffpost.com/entry/state-department-resignation-gaza_n_65306079e4b00565b622b1fb

                https://www.huffpost.com/entry/biden-administration-gaza-dissent_n_652f42b0e4b0da897ab5c8a6

                There’s only 13 officials drafting up a bill that calls for a ceasefire. 13. There isn’t going to be a Gaza left in a month’s time and we would have ethnically cleansed it all by them.

                The reason why it’s close to home is because I have Palestinian friends that are looking at pictures of their ancestral homes completely demolished in Gaza. Go to Al Jazeera and scroll their feed for a bit to see pictures of dead children and tell me that I still need to vote and partake in the circus that is our political system right now.

                Edit: To add, elected officials getting away with bullshit,“because you have to choose between two shit choices” is the exact kind of complacent/negligent bs I’m not ok with. It also enables an elected official to do whatever they want by holding us hostage to a shitty choice and that is not ok. Look at how democrats lined up when Trump was in power because they fucked up and they knew it. Let them feel like they fucked up now if the country and worldwide protests calling for ceasefire aren’t enough.

                • Bleeping Lobster@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  I think we’re talking past each other.

                  Sorry if it’s devolved to that! It’s not me downvoting your replies btw. As far as I’m concerned this is an interesting conversation not an argument, we both clearly feel strongly / passionately about our viewpoint and imo are being fairly cogent / non-combative with each other.

                  Re Al Jazeera, I’ve found their reporting difficult to trust for a while, and their current reporting imo is very strongly biased against Israel. EG the hospital blast, which many indie sources are now saying is almost certainly not due to an IDF strike (which they still haven’t retracted), or the ‘church destroyed’ which turned out to be a compound that Hamas had setup in next door, with one church wall being destroyed (and obv the compound next door). Though it begs the question, where can we turn right now for genuinely independant reporting on this? Israeli sources are going to slant heavily towards Israel / IDF, Palestinian sources are going to slant heavily towards Palestine / Hamas. Which goes back to my earlier point about taking a breath and trying, somehow, to remain objective in the face of rage-inducing content.

                  Not voting for either party is as powerful a message as a vote since each vote is counted and voter turnout is a very telling sign

                  Not sure exactly how it works in USA compared to UK, but I encourage everyone who genuinely doesn’t want to vote (I say genuinely because many simply can’t be bothered to engage, which I also understand when people are fatigued after a hard day’s work) to spoil their ballot rather than not voting. That way your non-engagement is directly observed and counted. Though ensure you do it properly, one guy here last election drew a dick on the ballot paper, but because the helmet strayed into a box, that was taken as his vote.