U.S. Presidential Election 2020 Discussion - Politics & Religion

19loveless91
mag. druž. inf

BARDAMU wrote:

Tell that to the people of Venezuela after Biden drops a coup on their asses. Unlike Trump, who was a disaster, Biden won't drop the ball on that kind of shit. Undeniably Korean reunification is now totally off the table as I'm sure Biden will recommit to alienating North Korea, probably beefing up sanctions, etc. But we can all sleep peacefully because at least tyranny abroad isn't tyranny at home, right?

So like, extrajudicial killing of Soleimani, stepping away from the nuclear deal, supporting Bolivian coup, supporting Guaido and imposing sanctions on Venezuela, moving the embassy to Jerusalem, increasing military spending ... is not tyranny abroad?

(and no I'm not that guy)

RoundTheBend
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Thank you intelligent people for speaking up.

BARDAMU

19loveless91 wrote:

So like, extrajudicial killing of Soleimani, stepping away from the nuclear deal, supporting Bolivian coup, supporting Guaido and imposing sanctions on Venezuela, moving the embassy to Jerusalem, increasing military spending ... is not tyranny abroad?

(and no I'm not that guy)

The difference is Biden won't drop the ball on Bolivia, Venezuela the way Trump did. And Biden certainly won't be the sort of guy to ease the sanctions Trump imposed. Trump being a huge PR disaster for the American empire is the only reason why a Biden presidency won't outdo Trump in the sanctions dept.

BARDAMU

baystateoftheart wrote:

Within the Obama White House, Clinton was in favor of more interventionism and Biden was opposed, while Obama came down in the middle of the two.

Biden's transition team doesn't leave me optimistic.

baystateoftheart wrote:

And "alienating North Korea" is tyranny? Lol

How many people do you think America's sanctions on North Korea have killed?

baystateoftheart
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BARDAMU wrote:

How many people do you think America's sanctions on North Korea have killed?

Pretty convenient to absolve the brutal dictatorship of any responsibility for those deaths and instead blame America for levying sanctions. Apart from capitulation, sanctions are the most pacifist tool in the toolbox for dealing with despots who mass murder and severely oppress their people while serially reneging on agreements with other countries.
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BARDAMU

baystateoftheart wrote:

Pretty convenient to absolve the brutal dictatorship of any responsibility for those deaths and instead blame America for levying sanctions. Apart from capitulation, sanctions are the most pacifist tool in the toolbox for dealing with despots who mass murder and severely oppress their people while serially reneging on agreements with other countries.

lmao what gives America the right to judge who does or doesn't commit mass murder or severely oppress their people? The sanctions on DPRK have nothing to do with tyranny. If they did, where are the American sanctions on Saudi Arabia? Honduras? Israel? I know you're smarter than that, man, c'mon.

American sanctions on North Korea have been extremely destructive, as have the ones on Venezuela, Syria, Cuba, the list goes on. Can you really call something that's killed 40,000 Venezuelans -- that's more than thirteen 9/11s, by the way -- a "pacifist tool"?

baystateoftheart
Neil Young as a butternut squash

Age: 29
Location: Massachusetts

BARDAMU wrote:

lmao what gives America the right to judge who does or doesn't commit mass murder or severely oppress their people? The sanctions on DPRK have nothing to do with tyranny. If they did, where are the American sanctions on Saudi Arabia? Honduras? Israel? I know you're smarter than that, man, c'mon.

American sanctions on North Korea have been extremely destructive, as have the ones on Venezuela, Syria, Cuba, the list goes on. Can you really call something that's killed 40,000 Venezuelans -- that's more than thirteen 9/11s, by the way -- a "pacifist tool"?

Do you disagree that 21st-century North Korea mass murders and severely oppresses its people? Or do you agree that they do, but believe that 21st-century America does both equally or worse?

Yes, tyranny is an element in sanctions when the administration is run by liberal institutionalists. When they're in charge, the US doesn't sanction just any nation that is in opposition to its material interests or just any nation that is tyrannical. When they're in charge, it generally levies new sanctions on nations that are both at the same time. Of course, liberal institutionalists haven't been in charge for four years. By and large, foreign policy under Trump has been neo-conservative.

For the record, I don't agree with all of America's decisions on whether to levy sanctions on other nations. And nowhere did I say that sanctions were inherently a pacifist tool. I said sanctions were less warlike than other policy options in the case of North Korea.

The CEPR report on Venezuela was interesting/informative. Do you have a similarly credible source for North Korea?

Anyway, I think as far as the primary dispute, this argument isn't going anywhere, so this will be my last post. You're not going to convince me that Biden/Harris could possibly be worse overall than Trump/Pence, and I doubt I'll convince you that they couldn't.
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BARDAMU

baystateoftheart wrote:

Do you disagree that 21st-century North Korea mass murders and severely oppresses its people?

I don't know that we can really make any definitive claims about what life in North Korea is like. South Korea's over $800,000 bounty on information on North Korea from defectors skews a lot of the info, so it's no surprise that a ton of North Korean defector stories are later confirmed to be lies. I can't imagine the situation in North Korea is particularly great, but I also imagine that however bad it is is likely greatly exacerbated by destructive sanctions. We can't know how many people these sanctions have killed because of course accurate information on North Korea is hard to come by. However bad it is, the veil of obscurity will always make it seem worse. What complicates matters more is how many North Korean defectors actually want to go back home.

baystateoftheart wrote:

For the record, I don't agree with all of America's decisions on whether to levy sanctions on other nations.

Fair, I misunderstood the intention of your comment.

Skinny
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BARDAMU wrote:

What complicates matters more is how many North Korean defectors actually want to go back home.

I don't necessarily disagree with anything you've written, but this article doesn't mention anything about how many defectors want to return home at all; it could be dozens or it could be thousands. All this says is that half of all defectors feel that they've faced some form of discrimination, which would be true of immigrants in most countries worldwide. It offers anecdotal evidence, but only from a couple of sources, and family seems to be one of the driving forces for those people, which doesn't really tell us anything about life in North Korea, and which would be true (again) of most people who leave home. It's an interesting read, and I don't doubt that many defectors regret their decision, nor that the West exaggerates the state of living conditions in North Korea, but this article doesn't offer up anything substantial to back up your point, in my opinion.
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PurpleHazel wrote:

Biden's a moderate Democrat, but if he wins, history's probably going to force him to be one of the most progressive presidents we've had.

How are those cabinet positions making you feel?