Imagine spending your whole life becoming an academic expert. Then a random guy online tells you that you are wrong about your own field. And he's right. But you can never admit that. Because it would mean admitting that your life was a lie. That is the dilemma of many academics.
The stupid thing is, is that gene steratore and the refs and the announcers try to justify terrible flagrants and techs by saying “their trying to gain control of the game” but in reality they’re just making the game 10x more heated and making players leave the game for no reason
DID THE U.S. VIOLATE THE NATIONAL SOVEREIGNTY OF VENEZUELA? A REFLECTION AND SOME QUESTIONS FOR TEAM SOVEREIGNTY
I'm hearing a lot of people saying there is no basis in international law for a foreign nation to detain the head of state of another country. It is argued that each nation is "sovereign" or immune from coercive interference by foreign nations. This is used to argue against the American detention of illegally elected dictator Nicolás Maduro.
I have no principled objection to the idea of national sovereignty, and I think it is a valuable principle in international law. And I am certainly open to the argument that Trump's incursions in Venezuela may have troubling repercussions for international order, or perhaps should have been supported by a broader coalition of nations. I share people's worries about what a U.S-led "transition" might look like in practice, especially under a narcissistic figure like Trump, who seems to think he is invincible.
But I do have some honest questions for people who are appealing specifically to Venezuela's sovereignty as an argument against Trump's military incursion into Venezuela:
1. First, if you are going to appeal to national sovereignty in a situation in which the acting head of State has lost legitimacy both domestically and internationally, having engaged in well documented, systematic human rights violations including torture and imprisonment and murder of his political opponents, and having effectively created an "alternative assembly" to do his bidding when the parliament was not on his side, then you should address the question: is there any limit to the principle of national sovereignty? For example, do you believe a genocidal regime wiping out part of its population on ethnic grounds enjoys legal immunity from military intervention by external powers?
2. Second, what exactly is the philosophical rationale for the principle of national sovereignty?
Is the idea that you should respect the "self-determination" of a "people"? That hardly applies in the case of a brutal tyrant who has stolen the election and refused to produce a shred of evidence of his victory, while his opponents provide credible evidence to international authorities that they won decisively.
Or is the idea that you should respect the legitimate government of a nation? Again, even if Venezuela was a formal aristocracy, its government has forfeited all legitimacy by illegally expropriating countless citizens and businesses, and torturing and imprisoning those who question its policies.
Or is it the idea that you should respect the "integrity" of any existing political regime that has some sort of state apparatus? In that case, a Nazi regime exterminating its Jewish population, or a Mafioso regime inflicting terror on political dissenters, with some mock paraphernalia of a state ("courts," "independent police," "parliament" etc.), should enjoy special immunity from international military interventions, which hardly seems plausible.
If defenders of the national sovereignty of Venezuela can point to me a coherent doctrine of sovereignty that (a) is indifferent to the democratic will of the people of the nation in question; (b) preserves regime immunity against the background of gross and systematic human rights abuses within the nation in question, and (c) continues to insist on legal immunity even when the national government has turned democratic institutions into instruments of despotism and made a mockery of rule of law within its borders, then let's have an honest conversation about Venezuela.
I don’t get why the Spartans didn’t just let the Persians into Sparta? Think of how strong Sparta would’ve been if it was a million Persians. Think of the GDP.
My friend Ben Shapiro recently asked, “Does it really matter who shot John F. Kennedy?” My answer is “yes and no.” If the question concerns whether finding out who shot Kennedy is the most pressing issue facing our country, I concur with Ben that the answer is clearly “no.”
But the release of 80,000 previously unseen documents isn’t just about who killed JFK. It’s about a long-standing pattern of deception, manipulation, and lawlessness from the highest levels of government — and that is one of the most pressing issues facing our country today.
The moment we stop asking questions is the moment when bad actors within our institutions know they can get away with corruption.
https://t.co/P5jfdOmj20
I know this is political (even though it shouldn’t be) but why are people opposing auditing the federal government? I want to know where every dollar I send goes.
I used to work in military intelligence. My take on the Trump assassination attempt today:
The guilty parties are definitely (1) the counter-sniper(s) and spotter(s) assigned to cover these specific rooftops and (2) the team leader responsible for all event pre-planning and assigning lines of sight
There is a 0% chance that a standard sniper-spotter team tasked with covering such a critical direct LOS rooftop did not spot a man crawling for over two minutes on an exposed rooftop with a rifle. The shooter's approach was amateurish; it wouldn't even pass basic training. He was fully exposed, easily visible to the public, on a critical rooftop, and extremely slow
Drone surveillance is also standard procedure. Added to this, you have members of the public pointing out the shooter. The only reason not to spot this shooter is that it was willfully ignored by the assigned counter-sniper/spotter, or a portion of the total area to be covered was deliberately excluded by the event team leader, or sniper/spotters were misdirected
Wilful allowance is much more likely. From the video footage and the audible gunfire, it also appears that the designated counter-sniper had the shooter in his LOS but specifically waited until the first few shots were fired before neutralizing him. It was sheer luck that the shooter missed. Civilian incompetence is always the risk when passive facilitation is chosen
TLDR: The shooter was allowed to do it. Inside job
The same bureau that investigated the Las Vegas shooting and the January 6th pipe bombs is now investigating the attempted assassination of Trump.
This is also the same bureau that raided Mar-a-Lago.
I’m sure they’ll get to the bottom of this soon.
A healthy person goes to the doctor for a preventative check up.
The doctor finds a small bump and insists that the healthy person gets a biopsy to test if the bump is cancerous.
The healthy person gets the procedure and finds out that the bump is in fact cancerous.
The doctor DOES NOT ask the healthy person about their diet, lifestyle or environment.
Instead they insist that the healthy person gets chemotherapy so that they can “fight the cancer”
The healthy person declines because the treatment will cost $50,000 or more.
The doctor tells the healthy person that they will die without it.
The healthy person follows the doctor’s orders and becomes terribly sick.
The doctor tells the no longer healthy person to stay strong and keep fighting the cancer.
The no longer healthy person asks if they should change their diet or lifestyle.
The doctor tells them to not worry about that and instead eat whatever they want to be comfortable.
The no longer healthy person dies from the chemotherapy and drugs.
The doctor blames the cancer.
The persons family is brainwashed into belonging that cancer killed their loved one.
They do not realize that the doctor is a big pharma salesperson.
A new person comes to the doctor for a preventive check up
The cycle repeats.