Comments by "Digital Nomad" (@digitalnomad9985) on "Triggernometry"
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@suntzu94 It was in part thanks to the public traditions we got from Britain that we were able to part company with King George without France's reign of terror, and kept much of the common law precedent instead of having something like the Napoleonic Code. And it was the French monarchy that helped us gain independence, not the French Republic (any of them), though certainly Lafayette had general revolutionary or at least reform notions when he served in the Continental Army. It can hardly be maintained that the elimination of the French monarchy IMMEDIATELY brought about an improvement and advancement of liberty in France or in Europe, much less that it did us any tangible good. And the revolutionary government imprisoned Lafayette and Thomas Paine. While Napoleon conveniently sold us the Louisiana Purchase, he is hardly the champion of liberty he cosplayed as (when he wasn't cosplaying as emperor).
Certainly the ideas behind the US Constitution in general and the Bill of Rights in particular find their source in the traditions of the rights of Englishmen, the Magna Carta, and English common law, though I assert we helped the tradition along. If we hadn't provided a relatively benign example of representative government, the UK might well have reacted differently to the French Revolution, if any.
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@michaelhorn6029 "Are all land reform efforts Communist in nature or Communist inspired? When the major land owners in a poor country want to stop land reform they would go to the US State Department and say"
That went more often the other way. "Mao isn't a Stalinist he's an 'agrarian reformer' ". Same thing about Castro. Every new socialist authoritarian is something entirely new. We can't learn from the past because there IS NO PAST. Irrationally, we are reassured every time that there can be a benign redistributionist Socialism, and every time those who listen are fooled.
"So what was the point of overthrowing them fifty years ago?"
1. Fifty years of staving off totalitarianism. A lifetime of difference for somebody who lives a long way away from you whom you don't care about.
2. Winning the global struggle against communism.
"Is law and order restored to these places? Or were our anti-communist foreign policies only good for fighting Communism and bad in every other way."
Inefficient non-alligned authoritarianism is less odious and less stable than international Communism, and it poses less of a threat to the world at large. Sometimes when we help a country fight communism we get Guatemala, sometimes we get South Korea. Thwarting a homicidal, slandering global conspiracy against mankind is a good thing, all other things being equal. Nation building abroad is not so much. We can't force the formation of a libertarian democracy. We can sometimes keep our allies and co-belligerents from being overwhelmed by a powerful mutual enemy. You can be sure our major enemies are willing to make deals with local regimes without a litmus test of ideological purity. There is no substitute for winning.
In trying to maintain freedom against communism, global jihad, and the like we're not going to hold together a winning coalition without credibility. The nonaligned over which we are competing are often compelled to ask of us not just, "Are they a dependable ally?", but "Are they even trying to win?".
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@Royal.Grand.Majesty "Territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of the hostile army."
By that definition, Gaza was not occupied by Israel before Oct 7. Gazan destitution is a result of foreign monetary aid and supplies were diverted by Hamas, 2 3rds for preparations for attack, and the remainder squirreled away to enrich Hamas leaders, cooling their heals in Qatar in luxury hotels.
"Controlling water, food, aid, transport routes, land/air control and dictating and restricting the use of naval wharfs and airports is in right an occupation, is it not?"
It is not. The only thing they were trying to restrict is the importation of arms. An arms embargo is not an occupation, again, by the definition YOU cited.
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To place this in the broader context of Islamic conquest, as for the place in the Koran or the hadith that once mentions that you can become a martyr by killing people, we have:
Koran 4:74 "Let those fight in the way of Allah who sell the life of this world for the other. Whoso fighteth in the way of Allah, be he slain or be he victorious, on him We shall bestow a vast reward." The martyrs of Islam are unlike the early Christians, who were led meekly to the slaughter. These Muslims are killed in battle as they attempt to inflict death and destruction for the cause of Allah. This is the theological basis for today's suicide bombers. The word martyr is not used in this passage, but a death richly rewarded by God is pretty much the definition of martyrdom.
Similarly,
Sahih Bukhari 55:44 A man came to Allah's Apostle and said, "Instruct me as to such a deed as equals Jihad (in reward)." He replied, "I do not find such a deed."
As for injunctions to violence toward kaffir, apostates, and hypocrites, pretty much throughout:
Koran 2:191-193
2:216
3:151
4:76
4:89
4:95 Not equal are those of the believers who sit (at home), except those who are disabled (by injury or are blind or lame, etc.), and those who strive hard and fight in the Cause of Allah with their wealth and their lives. Allah has preferred in grades those who strive hard and fight with their wealth and their lives above those who sit (at home).Unto each, Allah has promised good (Paradise), but Allah has preferred those who strive hard and fight, above those who sit (at home) by a huge reward " This passage criticizes "peaceful" Muslims who do not join in the violence, letting them know that they are less worthy in Allah's eyes. It also demolishes the modern myth that "Jihad" doesn't mean holy war in the Quran, but rather a spiritual struggle. Not only is this Arabic word (mujahiduna) used in this passage, but it is clearly not referring to anything spiritual, since the physically disabled are given exemption. (The Hadith reveals the context of the passage to be in response to a blind man's protest that he is unable to engage in Jihad, which would not make sense if it meant an internal struggle)
This is one of the references of the "fighting with money" escape clauses for the rich which I referenced in my earlier post.
4:104
8:12
8:39
8:67
8:59-60
9:5
9:14
9:20 Those who believe, and have left their homes and striven with their wealth and their lives in Allah's way are of much greater worth in Allah's sight. These are they who are triumphant." The Arabic word interpreted as "striving" in this verse is the same root as "Jihad". The context is obviously holy war.
9:29
9:38-39
9:41
9:73
9:88
9:111
9:123
33:60-62
47:3-4
47:35
48:17
48:29
61:4
66:9
Sahih Bukhari 52:117
52:220
52:256
Abu Dawud 14:2526, 2527
And many more.
The result of the measures demanded by BDS, including "right of return", would be to place the Israelis at the mercy of the Palestinians, and any sober and objective analysis of the situation will point to genocide as the result of that. For this we have the sworn word of the Palestinians themselves with the most energetic proofs of their sincerity in deeds. For this we have the track record of the behavior of recent Islamic conquest:
Lebanon:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5-3mqDuj00
Nigeria:
https://www.vanguardngr.com/2020/01/how-christians-are-persecuted-in-nigeria-christian-group/
https://www.voanews.com/africa/christian-group-names-nigeria-hot-spot-persecution
https://www.christiantoday.com/article/over.1200.christians.killed.in.nigeria.in.first.half.of.2020.human.rights.group/135202.htm
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16349/genocide-christians-nigeria
https://www.dailysignal.com/2020/12/02/the-horrific-killing-of-christians-in-nigeria/
In Uganda a Christian administration is slowing the persecution of Christians, but it still goes on:
https://www.worldvision.org/disaster-relief-news-stories/uganda-genocide-nightmare-finally-end
https://www.opendoorsusa.org/christian-persecution/stories/how-covid-19-is-making-christian-persecution-even-worse-in-africa/
https://www.persecution.org/2019/10/03/christian-man-uganda-loses-family-attack-home/
https://www.persecution.org/2019/11/25/christian-poisoned-brothers-uganda/
https://www.persecution.org/2021/01/11/christian-convert-uganda-killed/
Experience with Islamic neighborhoods in Western nations suggest that Muslims can, as a community, hardly restrain themselves from oppressing their neighbors even when they are in the minority. And the Jews have a special place in Islamic xenophobia and eschatology:
He says it in both Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim, Islam's two most canonical hadith collections:
Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 56, Number 791:
Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 52, Number 176:
Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 52, Number 177:
Sahih Muslim, Book 041, Number 6981:
Sahih Muslim, Book 041, Number 6983:
Sahih Muslim, Book 041, Number 6984:
Sahih Muslim Book 041, Number 6985:
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@cioccolateriaveneziana
Protestantism created the modern libertarian west. We (Protestants) ended slavery; implemented religious freedom, political freedom, academic freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of the press FIRST, and thus caused the academic, scientific, technological, and material progress that followed; and most of the rest of the world hasn't caught up with it yet. John 8:32 "You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free. "Religion" is such a broad term that virtually no generalizations can be applied to the "whole".
If you want questions of fact to be settled by force (the ultimate recourse of the obscurantist), you really can't beat atheism, and its derivatives (including wokeism), it has a singularly abysmal track record. From the Jacobin Reign of Terror in the French Revolution, through the Soviet Union, the Third Reich, Communist China, and the Pol Pot regime; the result of a society based on atheism has invariably been bloodbath after bloodbath. The USSR alone murdered more of its own civilians than have ever been killed in all the inquisitions, pogroms, and purely religious wars in recorded history, and they only lasted: what? 80 or so years?
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@bosshog8844 The Palestinians have been completely in Israel's power at least since 1967. If genocide was Israel's intent, Palestinians would be extinct. Genocide is not a body count. It is a specific thing that Israel has never done and never tried. The current libel has two buzzwords, "apartheid" and "genocide". In the defining example of the first term, blacks in South Africa during apartheid did not have the right to vote or equal protection under the law. Therefore, the term is slander. The Palestinians have been completely in Israel's power at least since the 1960s. If genocide were Israel's policy, the Palestinians would be extinct, instead of more populous than ever. If genocide where the current war policy, Israel wouldn't be issuing warnings to the Palestinian populace about future targets, granting safe corridors for flight, or committing ground troops early accepting increased casualties in their military to minimized civilian casualties. The genocide charge is also slander.
In the current conflict Israel is conducting total war by the same rules the Anglophone Allies played by in the Second World War. Those rules did not preclude civilian casualties then, and they don't now. Fortunately, at that time the adults were in charge else those very rules would by now be a relic from a banned history book.
Leftists have fondly imagined themselves using Islamic jihad as a tool to destroy the West, then taking over and stealing the revolution. Events unfolding in Europe are beginning to awaken them to the fact that they don't have what it takes to prevail against their erstwhile allies. Conservatives tolerate extreme opposing views. Islam does not. The left have systematically banished martial virtues and values deemed worth fighting for. They don't have the dynamism to stand against the threat they have unleashed. Only conservatives and holdouts for western values retain the dynamism to hold the line and resist Islam as they did in the past.
Israel stands as a front line outpost of Western values against the most autocratic major hegemonic imperialist power the world has ever known. The Communists and Nazis are pikers by comparison. A second Holocaust in the form of the "river to the sea" extirpation of Israel wouldn't obviate jihad, it would reward, empower, and encourage it and move the front toward us, as the jihadists affirm themselves. Enemies of Israel are the enemies of the very same liberal values they contort to slander Israel, as their founding and defining literature affirms. Leftists have sown and continue to sow the wind and if they get their way will reap the tornado.
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The British Christian tradition is not the same as the US religious tradition, and the latter does not reduce to fundamentalism. However, Protestantism created the modern libertarian west. We (Protestants) ended slavery; implemented religious freedom, political freedom, academic freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of the press FIRST, and thus caused the academic, scientific, technological, and material progress that followed; and most of the rest of the world hasn't caught up with it. What remains of the traditions of Western liberty abide withering as a cut flower, and cannot ultimately outlast their roots.
Even such an inveterate opponent of Christianity as Richard Dawkins, who once signed a petition to Parliament to make religious instruction of minor children by parents illegal, now has taken to calling himself a "cultural Christian" as he realizes that modern secularism doesn't have what it takes to fend off Islam. If you can't find your way back to the tradition of Christendom, then I'm sorry, son, you're buggered. Without it, the values that define the West are hanging in epistemological and pedagogical air.
Not that I would try to advocate Christianity on purely utilitarian terms. "He who would come to God must believe that He is, and that He is a Rewarder of those who diligently seek Him." If you are unfamiliar with the evidence for Christianity, it is because you haven't looked. But trying to return to the liberal traditions of the West without returning to Christ is just a contradiction of terms.
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There is no Israeli in Israel living on land which was expropriated from it's private owner by Israel. They are living on land they BOUGHT. Israel upholds private property rights and the rule of law, just the same as other nations in the Western civilizational tradition. For centuries in Islamic ruled lands, property "rights" of "dhimis" (Jews and Christians) were subject to arbitrary abbrogation. Muslims think this is their right. That is part of the program, to seize the purchased property of non-Muslims along with improvements without compensation.
In the US and most Western nations the fount of sovereign legitimacy is the "consent of the governed". Unlike any other polity in the region, the government of Israel is democratically elected. Arab, Muslim, Christian, and atheist citizens in Israel have full rights including the vote, which is unique in the region. Foreigners traveling in Israel have full protection of Israeli law which is not afforded to natives in neighboring nations.
The "Palestinian problem" is an artifact of a colonial power trying to hold on to control. The Mandate administration brought in and cultivated a criminal element to serve their private interest and subvert the Mandate. The Jews aren't squatters, the Palestinians are. There is no consistent standard whereby the Palestinians are entitled to sovereignty, and the Israelis are not, and the Palestinians won't negotiate to form a compromise which allows for the existence of Israel.
At the end of WW2, disputed and other territories part of Germany and Japan before the war. were transferred to other polities. It is an established principle that the aggressor who tries to seize territory can be punished by losing territory instead when he loses.
In every sense and category, the anti-Israel zealots apply an unequal standard against her. By priority, by international law, by natural law principle, by conquest, by democratic vote, by every standard which has ever historically been recognized to convey title, Israel's current borders are legitimate. The counter-narrative is a construct of leftist enmity for the West which entails an alliance with the enemies of the West. The left has been an enemy of Israel ever since the 1960s when the Soviet Union sided with Israel's enemies. Israel's sovereignty is legitimate, Israel's survival is legitimate, and there cannot be a two state solution until Palestinians are willing to accept a two-state solution.
The current libel has two buzzwords, "apartheid" and "genocide". In the defining example of the first term, blacks in South Africa during apartheid did not have the right to vote or equal protection under the law. Therefore, the term is slander. The Palestinians have been completely in Israel's power at least since the 1960s. If genocide were Israel's policy, the Palestinians would be extinct, instead of more populous than ever. If genocide where the current war policy, Israel wouldn't be issuing warnings to the Palestinian populace about future targets, granting safe corridors for flight, or committing ground troops early accepting increased casualties in their military to minimized civilian casualties. The genocide charge is also slander.
In the current conflict Israel is conducting total war by the same rules the Anglophone Allies played by in the Second World War. Those rules did not preclude civilian casualties then, and they don't now. Fortunately, at that time the adults were in charge else those very rules would by now be a relic from a banned history book.
Leftists have fondly imagined themselves using Islamic jihad as a tool to destroy the West, then taking over and stealing the revolution. Events unfolding in Europe are beginning to awaken them to the fact that they don't have what it takes to prevail against their erstwhile allies. Conservatives tolerate extreme opposing views. Islam does not. The left have systematically banished martial virtues and values deemed worth fighting for. They don't have the dynamism to stand against the threat they have unleashed. Only conservatives and holdouts for western values retain the dynamism to hold the line and resist Islam as they did in the past.
Israel stands as a front line outpost of Western values against the most autocratic major hegemonic imperialist power the world has ever known. The Communists and Nazis are pikers by comparison. A second Holocaust in the form of the "river to the sea" extirpation of Israel wouldn't obviate jihad, it would reward, empower, and encourage it and move the front toward us, as the jihadists affirm themselves. Enemies of Israel are the enemies of the very same liberal values they contort to slander Israel, as their founding and defining literature affirms. Leftists have sown and continue to sow the wind and if they get their way will reap the tornado.
PERSONAL freedom is the only meaningful sort. "Group freedom" is invariably a smoke screen for tyranny. Taiwan votes to maintain its democracy, group freedom says mainland China owns them because they're Chinese. Northern Ireland votes to remain in the UK, group freedom says Ireland owns them because they're Irish. Many Blacks in the US vote Republican, Joe Biden and many other Democrats say the Democrat Party owns them because they're Black. (My! That sounds familiar!) Hitler says the destiny of Germany is important and Germans are being oppressed, he proceeds to steal other countries and murder racial minorities.
Legitimate political organizations group to protect personal freedom from threats. That is the lone and essential purpose of government: to FORCE people to mind their own business. Because left to themselves, THEY WILL NOT.
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@str.77 Sorry, you are both wrong. The House Committee might have made some mistakes, but McCarthy was a senator and didn't serve on House commitees. Every person HE targeted was an active handled agent of Soviet espionage. The Verona Soviet diplomatic code had been broken by J. Edgar Hoover's FBI who passed the classified info to McCarthy, so McCarthy knew who the moles were in the Federal Government before he started investigating them, he just had to get evidence that could be introduced in open court, which he did. Obviously, this could not be revealed at the time, but it has since been declassified.
Alger Hiss and all the others save one were unanimously found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of espionage by a jury of 12 of their peers. I know that Hiss, at least, had an agent traded for him and lived out his days in the Soviet Union. The one that was not convicted got off by playing to existing stereotypes, acting like a "dumb negro" in the hearings, and the Democrats played along by laughing uproariously at the minstrel show. That's not wrong, and that's not luck.
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