Yeah, tolerance for valid self criticism in politics is dead. The only thing people want to hear is full throated support and validation. Anything else is automatically labeled as extremism in one direction nor another.

It is fairly rare for either party to control Congress and the executive for long, so I’m not sure if that’s exactly the main pitfall we’ve run into.

I think this is mostly an unforced error on the part of neoliberalism, specifically 3rd way political ideology. In the 80s and 90s 3rd way politics grew as an idea to work around congressional gridlock.

Basically, the democratic party figured they would work across the aisle with moderate Republicans on policy they could both agree on. Hoping that this would show the American population that they were the party that could get things done.

This worked in part, Bill Clinton the main architect of American 3rd way movement became very popular. However, it had two repercussions that we are still dealing with today. It gave the policy initiative to the Republican party, allowing them to be the directors of this across aisle cooperation. It also drastically shifted the democratic party to the right.

If the DNC is rating Congress members based on criteria of Third way ideology, then the members most willing to cooperate with moderate Republicans are going to fill leadership positions. Which is why the DNC leadership is currently full of center right senior citizens conditioned to bending backwards to the whims of Republican economic policy.

Pretty hard to argue against radically different biological design between our brains.

I don’t really see the argument… For one, all mammals share fairly similar brain structures, with the main difference being the over or under development of particular regions of the brain.

However, even if we accept the claim that they are “radically different”. A mere difference in brain structure does not preclude the ability to have complex emotions.

Yes, humans can be psychopaths and sociopaths.

I’m not sure if that’s really relevant, sociopathy and psychopathy are defined by the subjects inability to conform to social mores. These terms cannot definitionally be applied to animals. However, there are plenty of examples of animals being shunned by their social groups, or animals who choose to stray from their social norms.

I’m not claiming animals share the same emotional capabilities as humans, but it’s unscientific to claim that they are incapable of complex emotions based on the evidence presumed in this thread.

Imo there’s been a bit of an overcorrection in science when it comes to trying to curb anthropomorphizing. And a lot of that is due to people like Thomas Nagel, who have a vested interest in stripping animals of terms like consciousness.

Pretty sure every human who understands the concept of death are stressed about it at some point in their life.

Right, but how does one express their anxiety over the concept of death? And if someone does not express their anxiety in a perceivable way, does that mean they do not experience it?

If we took away a person’s ability to vocalize their grievances, what kind of behavior of theirs would we attribute to an existential crisis? And how would we determine that type of anxiety from normal interaction with the external environment?

I mean, that could just be a fault in observation. The same line of thinking was utilized by people like Thomas Jefferson to validate his own use of slavery.

The language we use to describe intellect and emotions are inseparable from biased interpretation by humans. Can all humans “stress about theoretical concepts”? If a human lacks the ability to do so, do they become less human, or more animalistic?

If however a country would be prepared to cut through the red tape and have a standard design developed for say 10 plants at the same time, the price and construction time would be decreased greatly.

That’s a pretty big ask for a democratic government where half of the politicians are actively sabotaging climate initiatives…

The only countries where this is really feasible are places where federal powers can supersede the authority of local governments. A nuclear based power grid in America would require a complete reorganization of state and federal authority.

The only way anyone thinks nuclear energy is a viable option in the states is if they completely ignore the political realities of American government.

For example, is it physically possible for us to build a proper deep storage facility for nuclear waste? Yes, of course. Have we attempted to build said deep storage facility? Yes, since 1987. Are we any closer to finishing the site after +30 years…no.

Wikileaks was never really a beacon of free speech its always been more of a platform where people can leak information about goverments and other powerful individuals or organizations doing bunch of shady or downright evil stuff behind our back. These often offer rare glimpse behind the scenes allowing us to be little less blind when voting during whather elections comes next.

When WikiLeaks first came about it’s original goal was aimed at leaking information about authoritarian governments, primarily China and some countries in the Middle East. It was pretty big news at the time because assange had wrangled together a team of some pretty high profile Journalist and privacy tech people.

However, most of those people were never really involved in the organization, and were mainly utilized as a marketing scheme. The rest slowly left the organization as works in their fields within WikiLeaks stagnated, or left over security and leadership concerns.

Imo Assange has always been a duplicitous attention seeker. However, if that were illegal, pretty much everyone involved in media would be thrown in a cell. I think his biggest failures that should tarnish his public image is his handling of the leaks. Him rushing to release information against the advise of his security experts, information that hadn’t been properly vetted to protect the whistle blowers from prosecution.

Multiple people have had their lives ruined because he didn’t take the time and effort to protect his sources. And not because they didn’t have the ability to, or lacked the proper protocols, but because Julian didn’t care so long as his name got air time.

would argue that Muslims are, by default, required by their religion to make the hajj. You make it sound as if it’s opt in, but their religion mandates it with some exceptions.

Nah dude, the vast majority of Muslims never go to mecca. It’s not a mandate anyone enforces but yourself. I think only like 9% of Muslims ever actually get to make the trip.

That’s not fair. I’m still kinda convinced Brandon Sanderson has clones, or has made a compact with the devil or something. How can someone write so much and not be in the throws of of some kind of manic breakdown? It’s just not fair to the other fantasy writers.

In the exclusive economic zone, the coastal State shall have the exclusive right to construct and to authorize and regulate the construction, operation and use of:

(a) artificial islands;

(b) installations and structures for the purposes provided for in article 56 and other economic purposes;

© installations and structures which may interfere with the exercise of the rights of the coastal State in the zone.

There no language in the EEZ article that mentions “territorial military outpost”.

According to who?

In the exclusive economic zone, the coastal State shall have the exclusive right to construct and to authorize and regulate the construction, operation and use of:

(a) artificial islands;

(b) installations and structures for the purposes provided for in article 56 and other economic purposes;

© installations and structures which may interfere with the exercise of the rights of the coastal State in the zone.

Can you link what article that falls under?

Nah, there’s pretty clear rules. It’s just that the main power in the region tends to ignore them when it suits them. Again, how is the Philippine government breaking international law?

I think that’s more plausible than China’s claim that their exclusive economic zone stretches over a thousand miles off their coast, and supercedes both Vietnams and the Philippines exclusive economic zones…

What’s your point?

You seemed to be suggesting that what the Philippines is doing is breaking the rules of unclos, but you haven’t explained how.

but flouts it at every opportunity. International law for thee but not for me.

How? They are allowed to protect the resources in their exclusive economic zone. China on the other hand is still attempting to enforce a claim that was invalidated by international courts in 2016.

Seems like you might be projecting on the behalf of China.

And how exactly does China’s claim work within unclos? The shoal is only 190nm away from the Philippines and should be part of the Philippines exclusive economic zone. If there is any questions of legitimate territorial claim it would be with Vietnam not China.

Also, stopping any navigation within your own exclusive economic zone goes against unclos, let alone stopping navigation of a country in their own exclusive economic zone.

No, it’s not socially acceptable. Yes, I wish it were.

Like, does this mean you are afraid of other people you don’t know judging you, or that you or your friends find it socially unacceptable?

Either way that seems to be more of an individual problem rather than a social one. I am physically affectionate with my friends and have never been confronted about it by a member of the public , not that I would really care if I were. People be dumb, I’m not going to let someone else’s projected homophobia dictate my friendship.

Fair enough. I think then it’s important to distinguish between what subsidies are worth tariffing and what subsidies are not. If Germany rezones an area to allow car factories to be built, is that a subsidy worth tariffing?

Eh, I don’t really have a strong opinion on tariffing. Tbh I don’t really have strong opinions about subsidizing private equity, other than they really shouldn’t really exist.

Under “free market” capitalism subsidies nor tariffs should exist by definition. And under socialism or communism, I would much prefer that the state employ the workers to do the work of the state. Subsidizing private equity just moves the people’s money into the pockets of middle men.

I think the current global regression back to an odd stage of mercantilism is the product of the moneyed class in China and the west attempting to goad political leaders into abandoning their economic principles for greater profit margins.

I mean, in this case it’s more that the developers lost money and the government gained assets sold below book value… That’s pretty good return imo. The developers’ investors got fucked, yes, but have you looked at, say, Evergrande’s ownership? Not all Chinese developers are state-owned. In fact, the distressed ones are not.

Right, but the developers are way over leveraged meaning that it’s not really their money but the banks. The banks/government is making the best out of a bad situation, but they are still loosing substantial amounts of capital. One of the reasons this kicked off in the first place was the government trying to get a handle on private equity borrowing more than their company is worth. That’s not really not criticism on the government action, it’s best to pull that bandaid off as soon as possible, but it still hurts. I think it’s mainly the fault of local banks who have probably been either careless or fraudulent in their reporting to the central bank.

Do you know how China imputes rent for their GDP calculations? It’s the construction cost depreciated linearly over the life of the building. Think about that for a second, then come back to me. I can explain it to you, but when I realized what it meant it shook me to the core so maybe it’ll have the same effect on you lol. For reference, the US imputes rent by asking “what would the homeowner have paid if they had to rent.”

Again, this just isn’t something I really care about much. GDP and how it’s calculated is mostly legal fiction, utilized primarily for international bragging rights and as a way to lull investments from foreign capital.

It sounds like China utilizes user cost approach, and the west utilizes the comparison approach. China’s approach makes sense for a more centralized lending apparatus, as it can help prevent the boom and bust cycle so common in western real estate market. But it’s still susceptible to market collapse if you miscalculated building cost or depreciation values, and makes it harder to sustain value in real estate investments unless you are constantly building more and more.

I think in the end it just creates two different types of problems. In the west the comparison approach provides less motivation for developers to build an adequate amount of housing. In China, it creates too much incentive for developers to overdevelop housing to the point where it devalues the very concept of individual investments in housing.

I think a better solution would be to consider affordable housing development to be a natural monopoly that is provided by the government without the input of private capital. But that would be a blow to GDP for both systems, and I think we both know how the capital class of both China and the west would respond to that.

Your claim that surveillance flights are not considered an action worth intercepting in inside EEZ is disproven by the actions of basically every country on the planet.

I didn’t claim that, as I already said there are specified clauses within unclos that delineate between military and commercial aircraft that limit the freedoms of travel for military aircraft.

Which is why it doesn’t make sense to assume a delineation of “military action” vs navigation at sea. If they really wanted to limit navigation for military vessels they would have specified so, as they did with military aircraft.

Again, I’m not saying this is fair or reasonable. Laws of the Sea were originally developed by nations that could enforce them with a strong navy, mainly to maintain a monopoly of that power. It doesn’t make any sense for these nations to ratify a system of rules that strip those powers away from them. The goal is to maintain the hierarchy of power, making the laws just reasonable enough for other nations to sign, as opposed to fighting a stronger naval power.

Japan is still a fairly insular nation, especially in regards to the topic of history. During the Meiji restoration they basically rewrote their own history, which also kinda requires you to ignore or reshape everyone else’s history to suit your perspective. As a result, I doubt world history is very well covered in their public education.

Land management. In the same way that changing zoning is not a subsidy, changing land management rules is not a subsidy. It’s government support, agreed, but to call it a subsidy…?

I think I prefaced the statement with it depended on what you consider a subsidy. I admit it isn’t semantic, but I really consider any government assistance to private equity a subsidy. Mainly because it in truth and investment in which the government is hoping for a return.

Subsidizing low income housing. This has been a new policy used to seize distressed assets and make sure they don’t sit… Well, distressed. The central bank is an arm of the government, and the government is achieving it’s goals of housing access. At the end of the day, your claims on profit detract from the actual benefits of public housing.

Right, but this is a reclamation action. It’s not what the original investment was meant for, and surely they aren’t getting the same monetary return they originally hoped for.

I support governments subsidizing affordable housing, this is another thing I think western states need to realize. However, it doesn’t seem like they needed to focus on that much housing at the moment, and it doesn’t seem like that was their original intention.

By your arguments, public transit is robbing Peter to pay nobody, because the government sure as hell doesn’t recover operating costs from fares. That’s never been the point of public infrastructure.

I think the government’s entire existence should evolve around fulfilling their public’s needs, including adequate public transportation. The key word there is need. The Chinese government didn’t need to throw billions of dollars to private equity to build more homes than necessary. They did it because they wanted to maintain their gdp, so they could flaunt their economic vanity alongside the US on the international stage.