https://mobile.twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1179935210445647882?s=20

So, from "No collusion!" to 'I have every right to collude!  It's actually what I should be doing!'

Do us and the rest of the United States of America a favor and read your old comments defending him saying he never colluded with a foreign power back when we were on the same page that colluding with another country was against the law. Do it BEFORE you try to justify this treasonous behavior.


WHAT
THE
FUCK

The President is proud of asking China (a declared enemy of the United States and a communist power that has insane human rights violations who is currently trying to crush a democracy in Hong Kong) to harass a private citizen in the United States.

I thought we didn't like them and that's why the tariffs or some bullshit about it helping the economy.

If you can't denounce behavior like this don't worry about arguing with me anymore. Like a lot of you so-called patriots, I'll understand I'm wasting my time.

Bob...do not try to teach anyone history, you simply don't know it. You are just wrong on nearly every point......again.

On 2 June 2010, (with oil at $80) President Chávez declared an "economic war" because of the increasing shortages in Venezuela.[1] The crisis intensified under the Maduro government, growing more severe as a result of low oil prices in early 2015,[12][19][20] and a drop in oil production from lack of maintenance and investment.[11] The government failed to cut spending in the face of falling oil revenues and has dealt with the crisis by denying its existence[21][22] and violently repressing opposition.[11] Political corruption, chronic shortages of food and medicine, closure of companies, unemployment, deterioration of productivity, authoritarianism, human rights violations, gross economic mismanagement and high dependence on oil have also contributed to the worsening crisis.

You should read what Trump supporting veterans say about him: Belligerent and entitled; a shame to military servicemen. No joke, in the fucking comments of the USAT article.

Some people even had the gall to say this veteran's shameful actions will harm Chili's business and that he shouldn't have fought over the meal. He should have been the bigger man and left without a free dinner, because military people don't sweat the small stuff -- you know, the small stuff, like human rights violations.

See what I'm doing? I'm breaking the influence of your echo chamber so you can hear the reasonable arguments from the Trump supporters you've been ignoring while you remain clueless talking with all your liberal friends about propaganda.

Come on, the reasonable qualities of racism are important issues largely being ignored by the left. At least listen. lolllllllllllll

@Lawdeedaw

There's so much factually wrong here, I don't know where to begin. Let's start with this:

"That rape and mutilation has been going on for centuries but was significant in the Second Sino-Japanese War, a distinct war in and of itself."

Japan was in a state of almost complete isolation from the rest of the world between the years of 1633 and 1853. Even after the period of isolation ended, Japan was too busy for decades industrializing to be rampaging through China, as you suggest.

Japan DID eventually get involved in Chinese politics and in fact went to war with them in the First Sino-Japanese War... in 1894. There are no reports of atrocities committed by the Japanese military during this conflict. In fact, quite the opposite, Japan would release Chinese prisoners of war once they promised not to take up arms against Japan again.

The subjugation of Taiwan (which was ceded to Japan at the end of the first Sino-Japanese War but resisted Japanese rule) is a different story. However, accounts of what exactly happened are sketchy and most of the information we have is anecdotal. What can be gleaned from these anecdotes is that the Formasians put up a fierce guerrilla resistance campaign and that the Japanese tortured and killed anyone suspected of aiding the resistance. Still, it doesn't appear to have been on the same scale as the massacres which occurred during the Rape of Nanking.

As you mentioned, some of the most awful abuses were done during the Second Sino-Japanese War between 1937 and 1945 (the Rape of nanking occurred during this war). The abuse ended Japan's defeat in WWII.

What you can see here by doing the math, is that Japan's military abuses in China lasted a grand total of 50 years--from the subjugation of Formosa (Taiwan) to the end of World War 2--not "centuries."

Next, let's talk about misrepresentation. You seem to be implying that Japanese textbooks don't say that Japan is the aggressor in WW2 (or previous conflicts). As I pointed out in my last post, that is flat-out wrong. There is ONE textbook that was approved for use that whitewashes the history but that book has been ignored an not used by the vast majority of schools in Japan.

If you want to criticize Japanese textbooks, you could criticize them on the grounds that though they mention the terrible things that Japanese forces did, they don't go into a whole lot of detail. See this article for more information.

As far as Abe goes, what exactly has he said that is so terrible? Yes, he hangs out with revisionists. Yes, he has expressed his opinion that Japan should stop apologizing for WWII and start looking to the future instead of the past. Yes, he has said that the issue of "comfort women" should be re-examined in light of claims that some of evidence of their existence was fabricated. But these are not really radical statements by any means. And many people and newspapers do strongly and openly disagree with his statements, so this idea that Japanese people don't challenge him is completely wrong as well.

Yasukuni is a total clusterfuck of a situation. It is a shrine to ALL of Japan's war dead. This includes war criminals, but it also includes regular soldiers just doing their duty. In terms of Shinto beliefs, all of their souls now reside there. Basically, if you want to pay your respects to someone who died in military service in Japan, you have to go there to "see them."

Abe is a total dumbass (and the press let him know it) for going there because he knows already how China and Korea will perceive it, but on the other hand his going there does not mean in any way that he reveres the war criminals who are interred there. I have no idea what his personal views are but publically he has stated that he and his wife go there to remind themselves about the terrible toll war had on Japan the last time Japan engaged in it.

Finally, as for the link you provided, it was to a year-old opinion piece that lacks context. Abe made that statement at a time when it was revealed that some of the evidence of the existence of comfort women in Japan had been faked. It was later decided that the apology would not be changed. In fact, The Japan Times is reporting that it is likely that Abe will mention that "comfort women" had their human rights violated by Japan in his upcoming address on the end of WWII, so the comparison of him to Ahmadinejad is a bit far-fetched.

Another video popped up with Kristen Stewart in it about camp x-ray after watching this one. The context might have been wrong, but i can understand why @billpayer said that - it's a terrible, terrible thing of which he speaks and it can feel frustrating when you care about those things but it seems to you like most forms of mainstream media only tell a certain side.

It is frustrating, and i doubt many people disagree with you that it's a monumental injustice, but the other side of the story does get told.. and i think the noticeable weighting is indicative of what the majority of people "want" to hear/believe rather than a calculated move to revise history (i.e. more cinema tickets will be sold by a movie in which a westerner overcomes perceived terrorism than one in which a light is shone on the possible human rights violations and illegal internment of innocent victims of the west's war on terror).

I was surprised by the 'kstew' trailer, looked ....intelligent and thoughtful?

Motherfuckers still believing we're morally superior to the rest of the shitty governments of the world. Recognize you're human. Recognize your country has committed crimes against humanity since it's inception. We killed many of the natives of this land, rounded them up, and said, "Here's where you can live."

People. American people, rather -- come on! How many human rights violations does it take before you recognize your own government as the real, honest to gosh hypocrites?

We don't need any more elite anything. Join the goddamn human race.

>> ^marbles:

>> ^messenger:
I'd buy that the US and friends decided to back the rebels in Libya because they saw more financial benefit from it than, per your example, in Uganda. That doesn't mean that the Libyan people would have preferred not to have self-determination. Whatever perks they had under Gaddafi, they had only because Gaddafi himself decided they would, not because the people decided they would. And there's no reason after Gaddafi's gone that they can't still have them. The oil's still there, and it will still flow. If you're upset that this benefits the West, then OK, be upset, but don't conflate Western cynical gain with the new freedom of the Libyan people.
You're going to have to sell me on how having a dictator is better than having even a pseudo-democracy like we have.
Getting a human rights award from the UNHRC is the most cynical award possible. The council is a majority-decision court whose majority is made up of the worst human rights violators on the planet. It is dominated by countries who routinely commit gross human rights abuses against their own people, and have an understanding amongst themselves not to vote against one another, and can all avoid being held accountable.
It's called imperialism. Wall Street-London oligarchs run the world. They use mafia tactics to take and do what they want. And if a country's leader doesn't fall in line, then they are taken out.
Is that what this is, self-determination of the Libyan people? No, it's the determination of NATO using violent ideological extremist groups cultivated over the last 30 years by US and British intelligence in the eastern cities of Darnah and Benghazi.
Nothing about this benefits "the West". It benefits big oil interests, defense contractors, and megabanks.
If you don't understand how socialism is better than fascism, then this is a wasted conversation.
I don't put a lot of stock in anything the UN does or says. Nor do I think it has the authority to decide what one country can do to another. But this is were NATO supposedly got their authority to terror bomb and back the rebels in their "civil war". (Even though it violates the UN charter) Basically picking and choosing what international laws to follow when it suites your agenda is what the UN is for.
Using the US and NATO's rationale, China or some other country has the authority to bomb the US governmnet and support dissenting groups here. Are you ok with that?


You use words you don't understand the meaning of. You argue extensively for the benefits of socialism. You point repeatedly to Libya as a great example of it. You close by arguing for this as acceptable because the alternative is western based fascism.

Mussolini described fascism as something that "should more properly be called corporatism, for it is the merger of state and corporate power". In the west, the struggle continues between the power of the state and the power of corporations. The fight as separate entities each trying to influence one another. In Libya this was done away with, and corporations powers were nationalized into part of the state's power. You call that socialism, but Mussolini literally wrote the book on fascism and called it that instead.

>> ^messenger:

I'd buy that the US and friends decided to back the rebels in Libya because they saw more financial benefit from it than, per your example, in Uganda. That doesn't mean that the Libyan people would have preferred not to have self-determination. Whatever perks they had under Gaddafi, they had only because Gaddafi himself decided they would, not because the people decided they would. And there's no reason after Gaddafi's gone that they can't still have them. The oil's still there, and it will still flow. If you're upset that this benefits the West, then OK, be upset, but don't conflate Western cynical gain with the new freedom of the Libyan people.
You're going to have to sell me on how having a dictator is better than having even a pseudo-democracy like we have.
Getting a human rights award from the UNHRC is the most cynical award possible. The council is a majority-decision court whose majority is made up of the worst human rights violators on the planet. It is dominated by countries who routinely commit gross human rights abuses against their own people, and have an understanding amongst themselves not to vote against one another, and can all avoid being held accountable.

It's called imperialism. Wall Street-London oligarchs run the world. They use mafia tactics to take and do what they want. And if a country's leader doesn't fall in line, then they are taken out.

Is that what this is, self-determination of the Libyan people? No, it's the determination of NATO using violent ideological extremist groups cultivated over the last 30 years by US and British intelligence in the eastern cities of Darnah and Benghazi.

Nothing about this benefits "the West". It benefits big oil interests, defense contractors, and megabanks.

If you don't understand how socialism is better than fascism, then this is a wasted conversation.

I don't put a lot of stock in anything the UN does or says. Nor do I think it has the authority to decide what one country can do to another. But this is were NATO supposedly got their authority to terror bomb and back the rebels in their "civil war". (Even though it violates the UN charter) Basically picking and choosing what international laws to follow when it suites your agenda is what the UN is for.

Using the US and NATO's rationale, China or some other country has the authority to bomb the US governmnet and support dissenting groups here. Are you ok with that?

I'd buy that the US and friends decided to back the rebels in Libya because they saw more financial benefit from it than, per your example, in Uganda. That doesn't mean that the Libyan people would have preferred not to have self-determination. Whatever perks they had under Gaddafi, they had only because Gaddafi himself decided they would, not because the people decided they would. And there's no reason after Gaddafi's gone that they can't still have them. The oil's still there, and it will still flow. If you're upset that this benefits the West, then OK, be upset, but don't conflate Western cynical gain with the new freedom of the Libyan people.

You're going to have to sell me on how having a dictator is better than having even a pseudo-democracy like we have.

Getting a human rights award from the UNHRC is the most cynical award possible. The council is a majority-decision court whose majority is made up of the worst human rights violators on the planet. It is dominated by countries who routinely commit gross human rights abuses against their own people, and have an understanding amongst themselves not to vote against one another, and can all avoid being held accountable.>> ^marbles:

>> ^messenger:
Yes. They now have that freedom. I don't recommend that course of action for them, but it's better than not having that freedom. Or are you saying here that living in a dictatorship is preferable if the dictator prevents you from doing some things that harm yourself, and perhaps Libyans were better off under Gaddafi?
That's a serious question BTW, not a sarcastic jab.
Or maybe you're suggesting that liberating Libya was just a cynical move on the part of the IMF to get more contributors?
Again, that's a serious question. Your hints aren't clear to me.>> ^marbles:
>> ^messenger:
Yup. And vote. And criticize government.
Freedom doesn't make us smart. It just makes us free.>> ^marbles:
http://i.imgur.com/YqXXg.jpg


And squander their wealth and independence to IMF and World Bank loan sharks.


I'm saying a dictator who's a true socialist is way better than a fascist puppet government of Wall Street-London oligarchs.

They replaced the state-owned oil company and central bank back in March, 2 days after the UN security council resolution promised ONLY to provide a no-fly zone over Libya for “humanitarian purposes”.
The war in Libya was never about protecting civilians. It has always been about stealing control of their monetary system and their nationalized oil profits.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

I'd say she has narcissistic personality disorder. If you read up on Ayn's life, she meets every single criteria. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001930/>> ^enoch:
ayn rand=sociopath



i can agree with that.
total lack of empathy,a sense of inflated importance.
many of the criteria on that list are also under sociopathy but your suggestion seems a bit more succinct.
@Fade
i dont understand what you think i am wrong on or where we may disagree.maybe you agree with her stance on palestine and if that is the case then i submit that coming to that conclusion ignores 100 yrs of occupation,deception,murder,assasination,oppression and a litany of human rights violations and war crimes perpetrated by the state of isreal.
my comment of ayn rand=sociopath is my way of stating publicly my feelings on this woman and that i regard anything she espouses in that context.
her understanding and philosophy is like that of a child and i view anything she opines about with that in mind.
it is also why i am at a loss why so many give her authority....about anything.

>> ^Krupo:

There are widespread reports of gross human rights violations in what people are calling "Torontonamo Bay" - way too many independent stories for this to be waved off by anyone. I fear for my Canada.


People are stupid and easily manipulated.

Remember that.

Remember that it's not only the 'man' that exploits that weakness, but also all the opportunists out there, like the black bloc.

The G20/G8 are always magnets for violent groups that want to sow dissension between the people and the government. From all the Toronto coverage it looks like the stereotypical mess. Swarms of peaceful and respectful protesters assemble. A few people wanting to create tension between those protesters and the police start smashing stuff and setting it on fire using the protesters as cover. The police are thus forced into the impossible situation of separating the few bad apples out from the protesters, all the while private property is being destroyed and set ablaze.

It's small scale guerrilla warfare between the violent protesters and the police, with the protesters caught in the middle.

There are widespread reports of gross human rights violations in what people are calling "Torontonamo Bay" - way too many independent stories for this to be waved off by anyone. I *fear for my Canada.

>> ^Winstonfield_Pennypacker:

Since 2001 there have been 34 deaths from Palestinian rocket attacks plus injuries and damage. Why artificially limit the rocket fatalities only to ones linked to Hamas? Who knows how many splinter groups of Palestinian militants are involved? It is ridiculous to suggest that Isreal could only blockade 'Hamas' and not all the others.
The peace process has to start with the Muslim world. The Palestinians and all Arab states & religious leaders must acknowledge Isreal as a legitimate state with the right to exist. They must condemn all violence and imprison or execute any of their people who commit acts of terror. They must stop praising the actions of violent militants. They must stop supporting terror groups with arms and material. They must stop teaching their children to hate others. Until these things happen then the Muslim world has no reasonable grounds on which to expect Isreal to ease up on their efforts to provide security to their citizens by any means necessary.


i think you took that out of the the AIPAC brochure verbatim.
yeah..palestine should just sit down,shut the fuck up and ignore the 8 ft dildo rammed up their ass and anyone who doesn't?..kill em.
HAMAS is a violent terrorist group.and?your point is?
they are also the democratically elected leadership,who just happen to not be too american friendly.
and if we are going to be sticklers on definitions..america is ALSO a terrorist nation,by definition.
your solution ignores 100 years of history,human rights violations and violent atrocities perpetrated by isreal.

how about we go back to kindergarten since we are using such banal and un-imaginative choices...
play nice with the other kids and SHARE, otherwise we are taking all your toys away.

>> ^Raaagh:

My mind implodes as I try and understand how you linked atheists to fundamentalists, until I realise you are not being fair.
Dawkins swatted away attempts to evade/sugercoat, and got a British muslim to staunchly state that Shaira law is clear - leave islam = death. And more telling, was the British muslim seemed to have no problem with human rights violations and the general hypocrisy of islam...because it was islam.
I saw an interesting exposure of islamic hypocrisy, but you became fixated with the stance Dawkins had to adopt to get the facts.
Is such a passive/"dont rock the boat" attitude really what you want?
I am by no means defending islam. it is hypocritical. but islamic nations are sovereign are they not? and as such if they wanna do fucked up shit and have that be a part of their own governmental laws fine. I'd probably lobby to get that shit stopped if only because of the gross raping of basic human rights. What i wouldnt do is what dawkins does every fucking day:

"lets make fun of religious people cuz i find them silly and absurd and lets not actually have discourse over legitimate issues and create progress lets just be completely dismissive and have pissing contests with these dark age camel jockeys"

or we could bomb em back to the stone age eh? ......oh, shit, thats not any better really