The Frankish Reich

I'm not disagreeing, but I am asking: why? If use of force to expel to Maduro regime in Venezuela is a bad idea or not in the U.S. interest, is use of force anywhere no longer a good idea? Is it a Colin Powell "you break it, you own it" thing? Fear of Russia/China? It's 550 miles to San Juan, kind of classic TR/Monroe Doctrine stuff.

It seems to me that the recognition of the Guaido government was the precursor to an anticipated (or at least considered) stepped-up enforcement. The OAS was on board, offering the international organizational support necessary for use of force to eject Maduro. Some day we may know what happened there. Maybe the Intel was just bad; the idea that the Venezuelan armed forces would back Guaido was just plain wrong or wishful thinking. Maybe - I'd say probably - there was a fallback plan for use of force (under OAS approval) by some manner of pan-American military action. Maybe that fell apart through lack of US resolve/not wanting to get involved in another conflict/concerns about repercussions with Maduro supporters (Russia). Maybe it was lack of resolve of other key OAS members. Who knows. All I know is that the Guaido moment (and it lasted a good year or more) offered the international law justification for intervention at the request of the legitimate government of Venezuela, but for whatever reason that fizzled. We are now in a weaker place with Guaido out of the picture.

The Cubans certainly have. How's that gone? And so where will they go? Will we negotiate with Maduro to "take them back?" Maybe upon his promise not to persecute them? Foist them on Mexico or some other country? The mess will only be resolved through Maduro giving up or being evicted from power. You said we've lacked leadership. We've shown leadership. We've shown resolve. But resolve to do what? To encourage him to voluntarily relinquish power. And again, no signs of that working anytime soon.

Well, if "leadership" means "building an international consensus," Trump kind of did that by recognizing the Guaido "government." But again, it didn't even come close to working. So it's not so much lack of leadership as lack of considering more aggressive options?

Yep, I saw that. But I can't believe it's an actual thing rather than a momentary blip or a noisy poll. One constant is that he never, ever gets past 47 or so.

I'm not suggesting we should take military action against Maduro. I'm just saying that traditionally we would have. Is it anything more than Panama with oil? It would shock me to find out there wasn't some kind of covert action already, probably trying to get the military behind Juan Guaido's opposition in 2018-20. Obviously that didn't work. So we live with it? The flow of migrants has to slow if only because so many have already left. But it remains a huge destabilizing force in the region.

Good story. And still kind of stunning even though I know it happens. What happened here (this clip) is a DOS press officer knowing that he's in a bind - he's not authorized to state the U.S. position because there is no U.S. position. So it's better to say "I am not authorized to speak to that" rather than "I'm not a lawyer." Because of course raping a detainee is a war crime (although I don't know that that has been proven)

As we've seen before, the generic ballot (do you prefer Republicans or Democrats to control the government/congress?) has remained pretty consistent even as Biden individually cratered. So substituting "generic Democrat" Harris for Biden brought things back into balance right away. This is why Team Trump is laser focused on trying to knock down Harris in any possible way. Don't believe polls showing that Trump can approach 50+ percent approval; those were a function of having nowhere else to go when people refused to vote for Biden.

It does prove your point. CNN settled with the kid because they defamed him. That is, broadcast lies in reckless disregard for what the truth is. The kid is vindicated. Fox settled with Dominion because they defamed Dominion. That is, they broadcast lies about it in reckless disregard for what the truth is. Dominion is vindicated. Meaning that the first wave of "election fraud" claims in November 2020 - the one focused on Dominion software "changing the votes" - was utter crap. I don't know about you, but when someone's initial claim is revealed to be utter crap, I tend to disbelieve their fallback claims (vote harvesting! fake ballots!). As I do here.

So ... what are we going to do with Venezuela? It is a destabilizing force in the entire hemisphere. We see that in the migrant flows not just to the USA, but to the rest of South America too. Traditionally, the answer would have been "put together a military operation to forcibly depose Maduro and his henchmen." Nobody seems to want to do that anymore. Trump tried giving recognition to the political opposition. That was a miserable failure. Blockade so they can't export oil, their only real source of revenue? That would jack up oil prices, which is not gonna happen in an election year, or maybe in any year. So ... what?

Yes, I believe it is a coverup of incompetence of gigantic proportions. Actually not a "coverup," but a scene of any and everyone in a position of authority trying to cover their respective behinds.

https://www.vox.com/2016/5/27/11798470/peter-thiel-donald-trump-gawker A bit old now, but well worth reading regarding Thiel's political philosophy. It is anti-democratic, and actually anti-republican (small r) too. And make no mistake about this — Thiel wrote in 2009: “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible,” because a system of universal suffrage subjects capitalists “to the unthinking demos that guides so-called ‘social democracy.’” “The fate of our world,” he wrote “may depend on the effort of a single person who builds or propagates the machinery of freedom that makes the world safe for capitalism.” At the time he was referring to Patri Friedman’s ridiculous plan to build an offshore utopia composed of boats that would be free from the long arm of the state. Thiel’s decision to serve as a Trump delegate at the forthcoming Republican convention in Cleveland seems to suggest that he’s turned away from that turn away from politics and has now embraced a new Great Leader to make the world safe for capitalism: Trump.

This is correct. There's a whole Silicon Valley based intellectual subculture that believes that democracy is the problem, and that we (somehow; they don't really say) need to find our own semi-benevolent dictator. That they seem to be thinking that Trump-Vance is the best they can realistically do is not comforting. I've poked around these rabbit holes before. Warning: it will take you to some dark places. First Derek Carr, now JD Vance. Thank God Mr. Trump hasn't gone the eyeliner route. At least there's one real man left, the one with the Bronx Color makeup on his face and the bad dye job on his transplanted coif.

I saw somewhere that Trump flubbed this line. I have no idea how it was supposed to come out. But being Trump, he's gonna run with it.

Trying to apply today's understandings of "Republican" and "Democrat" in a historical context is a fool's errand. Eugenics: the most famous statement is the of the lion of Massachusetts, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes - "three generations of imbeciles is enough." Holmes was appointed by Teddy Roosevelt, a Republican, and was, of course, a New England Republican himself. The case was Buck v. Bell, which came out of Virginia, then very much a Democratic controlled southern state. You're just not going to find any modern day type distinction between "Democratic" and "Republican" positions. It's not that different than what we see in foreign/military policy. Pre-WW2: Republican isolationism, Democratic projection of U.S. military force. Post-Nixon: Republican Cold Warriors and Neocons, Democratic skepticism of the use of the U.S. military abroad. Post-Trump: roles reversed again. I might as well say "don't vote for Trump unless you think Republican military adventurism in Iraq was a good idea."

As I said, that was then; this is now. New reality, baby!

Makes sense. Silver had Biden bottoming out at about a 28% chance of winning the electoral college right before he withdrew. So Harris made immediate and substantial gains, and is now back in the familiar Democratic position of a likely comfortable win in the popular vote. (The Republicans have won the popular vote exactly once in this century.) The likelihood of a repeat of the inside straight pulled off by Biden in 2020 is pretty low (MI-WI-PA-GA-NV-AZ), but there's still a very reasonable (approaching 4 in 10 chance) of pulling off the PA-MI-WI trio and grabbing a close electoral college win too.

Does that include findings of digital penetration in a changing room that were finally proved in 2024?

"At times he couldn't operate a cell phone." https://www.thebulwark.com/p/meet-trumps-human-printer-natalie-harp Sorry, Tucker, just one old man who can't operate technology left in this race.

^^ effin weird to cite to "grateful Calvin" as if anyone but nuts knows who this is. For all I know "grateful Calvin" is your alter ego on some other weird board. Like the truly weird experience of having a man who is obviously Donald Trump call into a radio show as "John Barron, Donald Trump's publicist." Like the man said: Weird.

Tell Ben it'll be an epic battle of the reversers! - End Obamacare X - Cut Medicare and Social Security X - Federal Abortion Bans X - Some kind of punishment for women who have abortions X - Rein-in "made out of thin air" cryptocurrency X - Make Mexico Pay X - Do something to legalize the Dreamers X - Ban TikTok X

Now that's the old fashioned kind of Appeal to Authority B-Man is known for! Copy/pasting "Grateful Calvin." So much stronger than just saying it himself!

After some comments about Gab learning about an account disclosure request "30 minutes ago." They covered up something before they learned about it. Riiight.

So what's your point? Or "Antoninus's" point? That "disinformation should be policed?" You mean like it was here? The Community Notes thing seems to be working reasonably well as a crowd-sourced policeman.

OK now, who led you to the Wash Post link. We know you'd never pay a dollar a month for that commie crap that somehow manages to print an op-ed piece that is critical of the commies. Fair and balanced! You mean don't pass the latest version of Federalist Society Law Prof Stephen Calabresi's Supreme Court reform plan?