i'm not so much "political" as "civic-minded". at least at this point in my life. i don't like politics but regard them as necessary and try to at least do my part.

SO, i've known about the clintons since they got into national politics and i knew a little bit about her arkansas days but back in the 90s a lot of that info was coming from right-wing propagandists like rush limbaugh & drudge & etc.

e.g., what you hear about her in relation to watergate is that she was fired (complete bullshit), not that she ws gonna be a political star and chose to go to arkansas instead.

so-- the part that i didn't knwo at all was her high school and college days-- how she stood up to a senator and made the cover of time magazine or how she patched people's heads at the democratic convention, etc.

also i didn't know how the arkansans didn't like her for wearing glasses (!!) or not taking clinton's name (!!!) and how she had to go from being a smart 2nd wave feminist with a sharp mind for policy to posing as a cookie baker--this was mirrored during the clinton years and i was familiar with that, but i didn't know it was a pattern with the voters.

and you know, there are still people who won't vote for her because she's a woman. which is very troubling.

i gotta finish watching evil dead 2 right now so i can drop it in the mail before pickup time, so i'll leave this hanging here.

Wait... what?!

Are we talking about the same Russia here?

I don't think the attitude in the U.S. is actively hostile to Russia, but more hostile to Putin. And if you have an explanation regarding why this hostility is unwarranted, or perhaps to put it more accurately, unprovoked, I for one would love to hear it.

I'm not anti-Russia, but Putin is a terrifying presence in world politics, and this is due not only to the conduct of his soldiers and his alleged involvement in civilian slaughtering airstrikes in Syria, but also to the loyalty he inexplicably inspires both in Russia and in other parts of the world.

if you're really interested in getting a different pov from what is usually reported in the US media about Russia, Stephen F. Cohen in the Nation magazine has a column now and again on it. He generally feels that our stigmatizing Russia for a lot of the problems in the East is not helpful.

here's an example

https://www.thenation.com/article/wi...a-and-ukraine/

she voted for Iraq war, she was Secretary of state during a very active period for US military operations abroad, and she seems to get the personal blame for Bengazi (yet all these Republicans seem to have forgotten what happened to US troops in Lebanon during Reagan)..

im not going to waste my time outlining what is wrong with Putin's Russia. its not some Western conspiracy amplified by Western media, its a fact backed up by the past twenty years! folks can do their own HW or can wave Putin's flag not my business

while i agree that the politicizing of it all in US is distasteful again Russia and Putin certainly aren't "good guys" in the world or even in Russia. further the growing tensions between West and Russia are totally understandable from a geopolitical standpoint, its a growing rivalry for supremacy in Europe, Middle East, and Asia where Russian influence is rising. i am not saying which side is "right" or "wrong", again I'm not sure there are any "good guys" in this, but i for one if you haven't noticed have been and will continue to be very critical of both Russia AND America, period

this article was total trash, an empty political fluff piece. it offered nothing of substantive geopolitical analysis, it offered ZERO plausible scenarios, and even worse its entire premise was based on two "cease-fires" that are all empty political theater and don't actually exist on the ground in Syria or Ukraine.

Further its tone blatantly revealed its pro-Trump pro-Russia biases

THE NATION pro-trump????

i.f. stone is gonna rise from the grave and haunt you

im just interpretting the tone of the article itself as a source though true i didn't do any actual sourcing.

did you read it?

back in the 90s there was a lot of bullshit spun around vince foster's suicide in a well-known gay cruising spot, plus the x-files were on tv

the tendency is of course for republicans to paint hillary with the worst brush possible because she's a smart independent woman and a feminist and they just can't stand her

you can make up any sort of rumor and it will stick and gain support and each new rumor will be counted as a "confirmed source"

yes. it's not pro-trump. it's dovish.

false and misleading premise, as in all actuality there was never a real cease fire or any true opportunity for a coalition here.

Putin is an unworthy ally and how am i wrong for reading this quote as having a proRussia tone?


ummmmm WTF? Donald Trump has openly accused the administration of "creating ISIS" in what universe is Trump promoted a joint coalition? what trump has said time and time again is more or less "Putin is right Obama is wrong" and THAT isn't a coalition, its kowtowing at its most debased.


HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA this is satire right? God help us and tell me this is satire

that article is a dove like PM Chamberlain was ;)



gee golly if only big mean America would just leave Assad alone to destroy his country and use military force against his political opposition and gosh darnit why can't Russia just be allowed to install puppet regimes all through out the nations its oil pipelines and transportation networks travel through?

also didn't Trump say "i will destroy IsIs"???

yeah that is some Dove there

well, the nation is an old-school radical left publication. it's what they do. i like them for some things.

the chamberlain comparison is at times apt, at times wrong-- it depends

e.g., christopher hitchens used to write for them but they broke it off over iraq because when it came to saddam they were dovish like chamberlain, lol

im not criticizing the publication itself, just that particular article

there have been few groups in history as definitively morally justifiable to murder as isis

sure BUT its not that easy, it implies open and ground war in several nations, requiring extensive international political support. i mean they literally martyred 21 Coptic Orthodox Christians and then 30 Ethiopian Orthodox Christians, these martyrs were added to our calendars. its not like i have no skin in the game with ISIS.

but the geopolitics of such a war are staggering, and the American experience in Iraq strongly suggests its a local problem that foreign intervention will only exasperate and complicate.

to be sure, if Assad was actually fighting Isis and not just using them as an opportunity to fight against his political opposition and inflict terror on civilian populations to intimidate them into submitting to his unpopular and possibly illegal government then i might be somewhat sympathetic to that situation. Isis are bad dudes.

BUT this war in Syria isn't about Isis at all, i mean, shit, THERE ARE ONLY 20,000 isis militiamen in the region, certainly if any military there actually WANTED to destroy them they would all be dead by now.

Assad likes Isis its a convenient boogieman to scapegoat and blame. Russia likes Isis, it is fabulous propaganda opportunity

well, yeah-- the nation tends to support a lot of pie-in-the-sky perspectives. like i said, it's what they do. i'm okay with that though, because this country needs the discussion.

while the discussion is fair what i find frankly dangerous is Trumpites thrive in this kind of environment where baseless criticism and crackpot geopolitical suggestions are normal political discourse. i have no problem with being anti-Hawk, i am a pacifist and its my strongest criticism of Obama BUT such criticism must be FACTUAL AND ACCURATE and you know, reflect REALITY.

that article is just click bait for jaded #NeverHillary leftists and "ah ha i told you so" fodder for Trumpites and white nationalists hence why i called bullshit

Really? So it's all just stuff I already knew about? By proxy shit that could be kicked at Obama (or virtually any other politician in American history) ... there's no skeleton in the closet?

She didn't, like, kill a guy with her car for instance? Just as an example of no significance?

I mean, I'm not surprised really, but I was kind of hoping there would be more to it than the above. If only because it would mean the people I've spoken to about the issue weren't lunatics.

look I do not want to sound antiwestern again, but it will sound like it because I am going to be critical.

lets forget the fact that it wasn't Russians who invaded Iraq on a lie, lets forget that it wasn't Russians who invaded Lybia on a lie and Syria via proxy terrorist armies that are just fronts for the west (suchfriendsaredangerous is getting ready I can see it), but no, left and right now: it's the Russians. and I am not saying Putin is god's gift to the world, I am not saying everything Russia does it is perfect, but what is happening here, this demonitasion of Russia and this playing out the western powers that have created such a death and mayhem in the world year after year are somehow good guys in this John Wayne good guy, bad guy way of portraing the world is a nonsense and if we don't start to see it and start to call up those politicians for the nonsense they are talking then we are going to find ourself in another global conflict, purely through ignorance and buying the official story without the question.

but green light that is where you keepcfucking up and maybe its the Russian TV you said you see just like if you get info about US from mainstream American media its going to be equally slanted.

RUSSIA HAS ITS OWN HISTORY OF ILLEGAL FOREIGN INVASIONS, IN USING BLACK OPS TO INTERFERE WITH FOREIGN NATIONS, SELLS GUNS AND DRUGS IN RUSSIA AND AROUND THE WORLD, HAS A TOTALLY CORRUPTED GOVERNMENT THAT IS AN ALL OUT OLIGARCHY THAT MAKES AMERICANCORRUPTION LOOK TAME, HAS TOTALLY FRAUDULENT "ELECTIONS", AND IS OPPRESSIVE TO JOURNALISTS AND POLITICAL OPPOSITION WITHIN RUSSIA.

nothing to celebrate there

i totally understand you're being critical of the way western media and powers spin or exploit the problems with Russia to falsely aggrandize themselves while distracting people from how much their own shit actually stinks, but none of that somehow makes Putin and Russia'a shit stink any less even in comparison. shit is shit regardless of the optics

i think you missed my reply about vince foster, which was the center of massive conspiracy theories in the 90s which endure today. plus other things i noted there.

THIS!!

it's truly hilarious how many of the 90s political mud is being slung again today and indeed notice the Republicans are all cringing because THEY learned their political lessons about how much the nonsense in the 90s backfired against them

this is where I completly disagree.

while we are calling Russia and comparing them to nazis or fascist all is forgotten about the grotesque, unspeakable, mass killing of thousands of civilians by this Mr. and Ms. evil of geopolitics Britain, America and other Nato countries. it is not just right, it is so called progressives, so called left who are also supporting this ludacrisious blatantly made up and contrived narrative in terms of we must stop the Russians. well how come it was only when Russia came in that Isis and all this terrorist groups were pushed back across the Syria. it would not be done before, even though the Americans were bombing, the British were bombing and others were bombing and nothing was happening, the terrorist and Isis were closing closer and closer to Damascus. why? because they were not trying to stop them. this Isis and Al Nusra terrorist groups was being used as a proxy army to remove the Assad and then Russians comes in and do something about it and suddenly they are guilty of a war crimes. if they are guilty of a war crimes then what the heck is West guilty of..in Iraq, in Lybia, in Syria and elswhere?

suchfriends.....peace yeah? :D

again, Russia does all the same shit! i am with you on criticizing Western powers for their war bullshit, and also their hypcritical criticism against Rusoa, BUT IF WE ARE GOING TO BE CRITICAL OF WEST FOR A LAUNDRY LIST OF EVILS CERTAINLY WE MUST CRITICIZE RUSSIA WHEN THEY COMMIT THE SAME LIST OF CRIMES

also let me ask you this, if Russia and Assad were targeting Isis then how come in five years they haven't stopped Isis either?
what is hilarious is that you can't see how what Russia is doing in Ukraine and Syria is EXACTLY the very same things you criticize US for doing elsewhere.

and yeah, when Russia bombs civilians in Syria and when Russia targets Assad's domestic political opposition yeah certainly is a war crime. its a war crime if US was doing it, its a war crime if anyone is doing it. killing civilians is a no no. assassinating political opposition through military operations another no no

I guess what I want to say is not about being anti Western, what I want to point out is double standards, hypocrisy, propaganda and narrative from our side. do not know if you now what I want to say. for example we are talking about racism so much, but what about the racism of western countries continually one after the other bombing and destroying countries that are home to people overwhelmingly with brown faces. what about that racism? that imposition of the western will upon those countries, so that you can not have the leaders that we say you can not have, you must have who we say you must have. it is extraordinarily obvious racist imperialism which the British empire has being using for centuries and imposing on the world.

and now we have a situation where it got so laughable now, that the US state department's spokesman guy called John Kirby can be asked about mass killings of civilians and children in Yemen by Saudi Arabia armed by Britain and the US and he can say that is not the same what is happening in Syria with Russia. the narrative that everyone is pushing and the left and right are just following like sheep is that we demonize Russia because we want to go to war with them and we want to justify to go to war with them(?), but we also want Saudi Arabia to be bombing Yemen, so therefore it is not the same, coz one narrative suits us and the other narrative (it is not the same) suits us. fact is that what is happening in Syria and Yemen are equally same and that is what people who really care about justice and freedom and peace should be saying it, but they are not. people in power are not saying that. they are not seeing both of those things are the same. because one suits them and one doesn't. why?

+ why there is apparently som many contradictions in what these people say in different situations?

you are aware that Allepo is splitted in two parts, one hold by government and one by so called opposition who are shelling civilians and children too but it is not being mentioned in media at all.

I thought Russian military intervention in Syrian Civil War started in Sept. of 2015.

lets have a debate about Ukraine later (and not fight about different opinions on it) :rolleyes:

agree

cool. i also use caps not to express anger or "shouting" but rather emphasis

the Syrian war has been since 2011, Syrian military has been supposedly fighting Isis since then, Russia provided military support before getting directly involved more recently. the point remains, if the war in Syria is supposedly about Isis, how come Syrian govt hasn't stopped Isis? more importantly, why does Syrian government expend so much military effort against non-Isis political targets?

see you insinuating America allowed Isis, that might very well be true, but that exact same logic suggests we need to have the same level of skepticism and scrutiny against Syrian government itself and its Russian ally
the war is bigger than Aleppo

that is a totally fair and indeed NECESSARY point to make.


i had exact same thoughts seeing this in news this week on my twitter feed..


i agree with you there, hypocrisy is astounding, BUT then shouldnt we be critical all around?

me, i am critical of the hawks and corruption in US, Europe, Russia, China, Africa, South America.. whereever.. its the ISSUES that are important here, not the spin neither the optics

fundamentally the truth is that the west is as murderous as hell and we all know it but most dont want to or will do anything to deny it, but at least in the west those in power are not murdering each other so there is some kind of stability. but trump wants to throw his opponent in jail and tries to incite his supporters to murder her. trump is the one who crosses the line here and he is one of the worst pieces of shit in our entire political history. i mean this man really is a contemptible piece of utter trash - a criminal and a liar and a user of humans. he really is a piece of utter fucking shit and he strains the limits of any sane persons tolerance to put it mildly.

btw in the west we can at least just about point out the murderousness of our own society in some spaces such as this one without getting murdered ourselves. i mean we all know we'll be censored/shouted down etc. if we do it in public or people will have a competition to see how they can shut us up with sneering nihilist indifference - like daring us to point out more corruption and responding that they know but don't care and hate us more for irrational reasons.

the appeal of trump is also a kind of burn out fatigue with liberalism which has to oscilliate back a bit because its universal aspirations are just not credible for a society that is fighting multiple wars and an existential threat from isis. all this mostly bs talk about "political correctness" like if we called muslims out more then the situation would somehow be less volatile - its mostly being made by idiots, racists and fantasists who think magic trump will solve their problems by calling things by their proper names. dipshits.

but the regressive left is definitely real and isis doesnt care about your safe space and in fact the immigrants who join it get on a basic level that anti racists libs want to treat them as kids with no agency because anti racists are mostly just as hostile to the existence of the other as racists - only they want to erase it like the borg rather than erase it in concentration camps.

but hilary wanted to drone assange and bragged about having gaddafi killed.

i thought we at least PRETENDED we were better than that? no? not anymore?

my thinking is that in advanced technological societies the means to murder becomes so detached from direct bodily experience that ethics becomes a kind of derealized farce to a certain extent. we are enticed by this and want to master it and its exhilarating and terrifying because it really threatens to sever any basis for a moral obligation to the other. or so we hope. corruption gets punished in the end.

its chaos for sure.

@SEVERIAN et. a.

just finished reading this so i thought i'd share it before i fuck off

THE HILLARY HATERS

Few figures in American political life have inspired such deep and decades-long contempt. But why?

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_a..._the_most.html

eta: bonus:

http://crooksandliars.com/2016/08/wh...lary-meet-your