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The Trump-Russia Investigation Thread: Mueller Goes Terminator Edition

Reaction..

  • Huh?

    Votes: 2 6.3%
  • Seriously?

    Votes: 6 18.8%
  • ... are we in some crappy technothriller?

    Votes: 23 71.9%
  • WTF?

    Votes: 1 3.1%

  • Total voters
    32
Well, yes, Florida was full of fraud in 2000, but once the Supreme Court ruled an end to the recount, the mass public stopped caring. The Russian tampering, on the other hand, has remained in the public consciousness.
Or, instead of forgetting about epic fails, how about actually changing a completely obsolete system?
 
The point wasn't so much to control Trump as to damage America's faith in its own elections process.
That seems like a rather self-centred view of the world, as it is deeply rooted in American exceptionalism and its relationship to its political system. It's a slightly more sophisticated rendition of 'they hate us for our freedoms', because it implicitly requires the opponents of the US to buy into the same political mythos taught in US culture, and only consciously reject it.

It's just a plus that Trump occasionally does stuff that helps them more often than Clinton ever would have, and is so easily led and biddable.
No, I'm pretty sure things like that would be on the forefront of why Russia would prefer Trump, rather than some extra bonus. If any state-level actor cares about America's faith in its own elections without it being a means to achieve some much more concrete goals beneficial to them, I think more evidence of that level of ideological kool-aid is needed rather than simply assumed. As for Putin personally, I've haven't seem anything that indicates he's prone to ideological motivations rather than pragmatic ones. On one end, I remember how the US media was very cordial him post-911 when he was instrumental to advancing US geopolitical interests and Munich, 2007 was still a long ways off.
 
That seems like a rather self-centred view of the world, as it is deeply rooted in American exceptionalism and its relationship to its political system. It's a slightly more sophisticated rendition of 'they hate us for our freedoms', because it implicitly requires the opponents of the US to buy into the same political mythos taught in US culture, and only consciously reject it.
Yep. There is this concept flying around in US culture that the US political system is the be-all end-all goal towards which all should flock towards, à la End of History theory. The individual politicians can be doubted, but not the Constitution itself, to the point that it is an object of pride to have it remained almost unchanged in more than 200 years. Thing is, it's not, as you point out, something widely believed outside the borders since it's not based in any kind of truth.
 
Munich, 2007 was still a long ways off.
Do you happen to know why he did that? I've listened to the speech a couple of times and I get what he says, I just don't get why he said it. It was practically a declaration of war on the leading global ideology.
 
Do you happen to know why he did that? I've listened to the speech a couple of times and I get what he says, I just don't get why he said it. It was practically a declaration of war on the leading global ideology.
More on the unipolar world vision that the US had - and still has. He told them what was taking place, and how the US' vision was utterly failing:
Along with this, what is happening in today's world – and we just started to discuss this – is a tentative to introduce precisely this concept into international affairs, the concept of a unipolar world.

And with which results?

Unilateral and frequently illegitimate actions have not resolved any problems. Moreover, they have caused new human tragedies and created new centres of tension. Judge for yourselves: wars as well as local and regional conflicts have not diminished. Mr Teltschik mentioned this very gently. And no less people perish in these conflicts – even more are dying than before. Significantly more, significantly more!

Today we are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force – military force – in international relations, force that is plunging the world into an abyss of permanent conflicts. As a result we do not have sufficient strength to find a comprehensive solution to any one of these conflicts. Finding a political settlement also becomes impossible.

We are seeing a greater and greater disdain for the basic principles of international law. And independent legal norms are, as a matter of fact, coming increasingly closer to one state's legal system. One state and, of course, first and foremost the United States, has overstepped its national borders in every way. This is visible in the economic, political, cultural and educational policies it imposes on other nations. Well, who likes this? Who is happy about this?
Looks like he took action to hasten the end of the Empire. :p
Glad to see you're down with the revolution now.
Lolno. Just a proper update of the democratic system like the rest of us did after the War. The balancing between the defence of individual rights and the necessity of working together as a whole through the legitimacy of the State.
 
At this point if the dems still want 2020 they need to cease and desist on this insanity A-S-A-FUCKING-P
 
At this point if the dems still want 2020 they need to cease and desist on this insanity A-S-A-FUCKING-P
Puh-lease, we both know Trump is gonna get reelected no matter what. In the end, he just says what they all want to hear. Four more years of the sweet, sweet embrace of opioids rather than listening to the people who tell you it's time to stop right there and go on rehab. The deficit is exploding, but it doesn't matter because low unemployment. The allies are getting the fuck away but it doesn't matter because they weren't begging for a chance to go along yet another war while Kim is smiling and shaking hands, showing who is the true ally. China is taking over technologically and industrially but it doesn't matter because trade wars are good and easy to win.
 
Puh-lease, we both know Trump is gonna get reelected no matter what. In the end, he just says what they all want to hear. Four more years of the sweet, sweet embrace of opioids rather than listening to the people who tell you it's time to stop right there and go on rehab. The deficit is exploding, but it doesn't matter because low unemployment. The allies are getting the fuck away but it doesn't matter because they weren't begging for a chance to go along yet another war while Kim is smiling and shaking hands, showing who is the true ally. China is taking over technologically and industrially but it doesn't matter because trade wars are good and easy to win.
Probably. All the damn dems have been doing for the past several years is throw away entirely-winnable elections. Just like in 2004 when they were elected by their constituents with the demand that they stop Bush's imperialism. But what did they do? Bent over the table...
 
More on the unipolar world vision that the US had - and still has
American exceptionalism is an ideology and the unipolar world order is its manifestation, that's how I see it. But I agree that he's more after the manifestation (though I think it can be killed only by killing the ideology).
Looks like he took action to hasten the end of the Empire. :p
But why expose himself so?
And more importantly - you read Putin?? :eek:
 
American exceptionalism is an ideology and the unipolar world order is its manifestation, that's how I see it.
Pretty much. But its a sub-category of ultra-nationalism, which - like all forms of nationalism - is inherently based on stupidity and taking credit for the actions of other people.
 
American exceptionalism is an ideology and the unipolar world order is its manifestation, that's how I see it. But I agree that he's more after the manifestation (though I think it can be killed only by killing the ideology).
It's one more form of nationalism and imperialism. It usually ends after the country gets its head shoved in its own shit and is forced to sniff. That's how it kinda worked for us, at the very least.
 
That seems like a rather self-centred view of the world, as it is deeply rooted in American exceptionalism and its relationship to its political system. It's a slightly more sophisticated rendition of 'they hate us for our freedoms', because it implicitly requires the opponents of the US to buy into the same political mythos taught in US culture, and only consciously reject it.


No, I'm pretty sure things like that would be on the forefront of why Russia would prefer Trump, rather than some extra bonus. If any state-level actor cares about America's faith in its own elections without it being a means to achieve some much more concrete goals beneficial to them, I think more evidence of that level of ideological kool-aid is needed rather than simply assumed. As for Putin personally, I've haven't seem anything that indicates he's prone to ideological motivations rather than pragmatic ones. On one end, I remember how the US media was very cordial him post-911 when he was instrumental to advancing US geopolitical interests and Munich, 2007 was still a long ways off.

It's not ideological, it is pragmatic. Russia loves 'whataboutism' and that has been at the core of their response to foreign critique for quite some time, even under the USSR. The point of undermining democracy in the US (and in other countries) is to undermine democratic criticism lobbied at his government from abroad and from within Russia itself. The point is about showing the inherent failure and weakness of western Democracy.

@Rufus: Fixing the Electoral College isn't very likely. Is it broken? Abso-fucking-lutely. Should we fix it? Duh? Can we ever get enough people to agree on a replacement? Not a chance in this lifetime.

@Indy: I dunno, banging the 'Trump And Russia' Drum and going full-throated against Trump did the Dems well in 2018.
 
Probably. All the damn dems have been doing for the past several years is throw away entirely-winnable elections. Just like in 2004 when they were elected by their constituents with the demand that they stop Bush's imperialism. But what did they do? Bent over the table...
If they allow Trump to destroy what's left of Venezuela, they will create a big problem for themselves. They cannot go center - Trump will get them there the same way he did in 2016. And if they allow him to finish off Venezuela, he will use it as a tool to destroy anything left of center - "look at Venezuela, that's what socialism leads to!"
 
It's not ideological, it is pragmatic. Russia loves 'whataboutism' and that has been at the core of their response to foreign critique for quite some time, even under the USSR. The point of undermining democracy in the US (and in other countries) is to undermine democratic criticism lobbied at his government from abroad and from within Russia itself. The point is about showing the inherent failure and weakness of western Democracy.
You are completely missing his point by doing what Vorpal criticized you for, AKA analyzing everyone else's action under the criteria you use for yourself in the US. Hell, the US political system isn't the same thing as "western democracy", by very, very far, and as for the "democratic criticism" from within Russia, it isn't nearly as intense or popular as you might want to believe according to your media.

No, the worst enemy of your political system isn't a foreign threat or conspiracy: it's the innumerable failures of a system designed by slave-owners when the optical telegraph was the most advanced form of social media and when litteracy was barely double digits.
 
Do you happen to know why he did that? I've listened to the speech a couple of times and I get what he says, I just don't get why he said it. It was practically a declaration of war on the leading global ideology.
I don't know, but I suspect he expected the split be finalised soon enough anyway—that ball got rolling with the Iraq War, which made those American bases that Putin invited into Central Asia look like a not-so-good idea, and pressuring the region to get rid of them (with China, initially through SCO, IIRC) started in 2005. And in general terms, I think Putin expected some quid pro quo for his massive concessions following 911, and they didn't materialise.

On globalisation trends specifically, there are various internal ones, but one high-profile episode is regarding Sakhalin-II in 2006, a foreign-owned enterprise operating since 1999 (and its predecessor since 1994). Putin's initial proposal was to swap 25% of shares of Sakhalin-II for shares various Gazprom projects, which was accepted. The catch was that immediately afterward, Royal Dutch Shell declared Sakhalin-II costs as increasing from $12B to $20B, which is very significant because by contract, Russia would see no profits until all expenses are paid in full, despite the fact that oil was already produced there for years.

Whatever the underlying reasons, the message received was very clear: it is not for the metropolia to share with the colonies. Not even indirectly, because also by contract, 75% of labour and resources should come from Russia, a figure Sakhalin-II never remote approached beforehand. .. So the result was a study that suddenly found that the ecological damages of Sakhalain-II could be as large as $50B, followed by a rather interesting meeting (has some English translation; the onscreen text however is untranslated and represents an interpretation of the underlying message behind what's being said). So perhaps what Putin said in Munich was because that was already the way the wind was blowing, so he had little to lose and potential allies to gain.

...

But perhaps instead of being a world game over control of resources and some of the largest enterprises in the world, it is actually about scoring talking points. Perhaps things like e.g. Deripaska and RUSAL is nothing more than principled justice, rather than anything to do with joint US/UK manoeuvring to get its Board of Directors to be dominated by Anglo-Americans and Russian manoeuvring to move the company from UK to Russia, which they were strangely both successful at, IIRC. Though more seriously, if one considered exactly why so many of Russia's companies became foreign offshores, one might come closer to understanding a few things that actually motivate the Russian state (by no means exclusively, of course). From their POV, it is simply a modern form of a colonial tax, and they're the colony.
 
You are completely missing his point by doing what Vorpal criticized you for, AKA analyzing everyone else's action under the criteria you use for yourself in the US. Hell, the US political system isn't the same thing as "western democracy", by very, very far, and as for the "democratic criticism" from within Russia, it isn't nearly as intense or popular as you might want to believe according to your media.

No, the worst enemy of your political system isn't a foreign threat or conspiracy: it's the innumerable failures of a system designed by slave-owners when the optical telegraph was the most advanced form of social media and when litteracy was barely double digits.
For many people in the world, the US is a standard bearer for Western Democracy. And it isn't as if Putin hasn't tried to meddle in the elections of most countries in Europe (Russians meddled In Brexit, after all))

I know it's easy to act like you're superior to the American, but you're not, especially not in this case.
 
For many people in the world, the US is a standard bearer for Western Democracy. And it isn't as if Putin hasn't tried to meddle in the elections of most countries in Europe (Russians meddled In Brexit, after all))

I know it's easy to act like you're superior to the American, but you're not, especially not in this case.

Suddenly I appreciate why Lee Kuan Yew and Mahathir, bitter rivals that they are both said 'Western Democracy' is not suitable for Asians.
 
For many people in the world, the US is a standard bearer for Western Democracy.
Suddenly I appreciate why Lee Kuan Yew and Mahathir, bitter rivals that they are both said 'Western Democracy' is not suitable for Asians.
Democracy, since it's dependent on the people, is dependent on the culture those people have created. That means that in different parts of the world, democracy must be different. There's nothing wrong with that. To most Europeans, US "democracy" is more of a plutocracy. There will never be "western democracy" in Iraq, no matter how many Iraqis the US kills. Some European countries have had for 50+ years (some for 200 years) a couple of established parties that rotate in power, other countries have 5 new political parties in every election. As long as the people are OK with their own brand of democracy, nobody else has the right to criticize it, because outside influence by definition makes it not a democracy.
 
Democracy, since it's dependent on the people, is dependent on the culture those people have created. That means that in different parts of the world, democracy must be different. There's nothing wrong with that. To most Europeans, US "democracy" is more of a plutocracy. There will never be "western democracy" in Iraq, no matter how many Iraqis the US kills. Some European countries have had for 50+ years (some for 200 years) a couple of established parties that rotate in power, other countries have 5 new political parties in every election. As long as the people are OK with their own brand of democracy, nobody else has the right to criticize it, because outside influence by definition makes it not a democracy.
For there to be a 'Western Democracy', you'd need for a 'West' to exist first.
 
Holy fuck this thread deteriorated with a quickness
 
We have a conspiracy nuts who sees Russia's hand absolutely everywhere, and the thread "deteriorates" when non-US people explain to US ones that, no, the US political system isn't the shining city on the hill that all good people seek to emulate while bad people try to destroy it.
........When have I ever defended this asinine political "system" that is the equivalent of a clown car filled with raccoons on PCP I could best describe it as?
 
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