Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
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User ID: 373
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8d ago
PR doesn't end with just public facing statements. For example, if an organization is established to help the poor but all the workers openly hate poor people, that's a PR issue since news organizations or even just the poor people themselves would eventually realize how much the organization loathed them.
And again, Trump's loathing of illegal immigrants has never been a secret by any means.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8mo ago
Because Republicans haven't been able to find any evidence to verify it despite looking very hard for years now.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8d ago
You really seem to want to catch me with supposed double-binds and contradictions instead of actually addressing important points.
If the contradictions are true, then fair enough. Like earlier when you mentioned "hey you say Trump's restrictions didn't do much, but then say that illegal immigration exploded when Biden removed them". I could certainly see why someone would think that was a bit weird so a clarification was justified, and even with that clarification I probably wasn't giving Trump enough credit to what might have happened if he didn't do his EO's.
But this is just a nothingburger. I feel like I'm reading the following: "first you said 'immigration', then fell back to 'illegal immigration'. Aha! A concession! Then you said Trump had bad PR because of saying stuff like 'shithole countries', but he didn't say that in a televised address, meaning it wasn't public, yet PR has the word 'public' in it. A contradiction!"
To the object-level claim here, if Trump says something inflammatory to a group who all then promptly leak it to the press, then yes, that's a PR problem. The two options Trump has are either 1) get his leaky ship in order, or 2) think it but don't say it, or at least say it in ways that aren't so clearly controversial. Every time you hear the media complaining about "dogwhistling", it's just Republicans doing this. But Trump never seem to get the memo, which is why he keeps shooting himself and the cause of immigration restrictions in the foot.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8d ago
If Biden wanted to cut down on illegal immigration, he could do it now, without any additional Congressional authority.
I addressed this in the post. To summarize, yes, he could fix it now, to at least some degree. Reimplementing the Remain in Mexico would help. The problem with all of these fixes though is that they're bandaids on bullet holes that don't address fundamental issues like this bill would have.
The Obama administration began counting repeated deportations of the same immigrant as multiple deportations. This was well-known at the time and confounds a simple analysis. Moreover, you neglect to discuss DACA.
His hawkishness was specifically a reference to this chart. Yes, Obama was also more willing to give amnesty than Republicans ever were.
The "shithole countries" remark was not something Trump said in public as part of a "PR" strategy. It was something allegedly said in a closed meeting. Are you saying that Trump is responsible for rumors about him?
Multiple people referenced the exact same remark shortly after the meeting was over, so I think it's safe to assume he really said it. If you want to keep contesting that specific statement, just choose any of his other ones. His hostile rhetoric towards immigrants wasn't exactly a secret.
So what? You were arguing just a few paragraphs ago that these policies don't matter! Trump's policies didn't do anything, because Obama was better, but then Biden undoes Trump's policies, which makes everything worse!
The overarching point on Trump was that his policies were bombastic and good at catching headlines, but that they didn't do much in practice. Comparing the number of illegal immigrant border encounters during Trump's term and Obama's second term is quite similar. Biden was worse than both of them because he tried to go back to Obama's policies, but by then the asylum loophole was well known.
I can grant that in a theoretical alternate universe where Trump didn't do anything on the border, immigration could have surged far worse than it did due to exogenous factors and immigrants catching on to the loophole faster, so Trump's actions might have stopped a surge that would have happened. It's tough to know for sure, but it's plausible.
The reason he did this was as obvious as it was cynical: he didn’t want Biden to have a “win” on the issue.
This is reading Trump's mind.
Multiple senators such as Tillis said this was the reason. Trump himself motioned at the idea on Truth Social when he said he didn't want to "absolve" the Democrats on the issue.
it really makes me question your ability to digest evidence
I just think you're not very astute.
Can it the personal attacks. I enjoy debating people who disagree with me because I think it makes my arguments stronger, but I've had problems in the past with you reverting to personal attacks.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
3mo ago
There are problems in the enforcement of justice, but it's not nearly as bad as you're making it out to be. I presume you're referring to the Hunter Biden stuff? Well, that's largely symmetrical to Trump's Russia investigation: Lots of smoke, not much actual fire (at least by the president himself), yet partisans whip themselves into a frenzy over the issue since they're getting a maximally damning picture due to their filtered media consumption. Biden could very well face a frivolous impeachment trial like Trump did as well.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8mo ago
They've found evidence that Joe has taken meetings/calls with people at the request of his son, but not that anything ever came of these, or that Joe ever benefitted monetarily. Republicans have had subpoena power for years and have had a full investigation going for at least several months, and still haven't found the bribery part of the whole "bribery scandal."
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8d ago
Sure, the additional restrictions you mentioned do exist, but remember the priors here. The Border Emergency Authority is a draconian measures meant to be used sparingly for emergencies, not a "you must meet these criteria to even start deporting illegals" that Trump, Gaetz, and others painted it as. You could strip out the entire Border Emergency Authority and it would still be quite a conservative bill, adding funds for normal enforcement and closing the asylum loophole among other beneficial things. The biggest issue with the BEA is that it sunsets after 3 years so it's only really meant to be used for the current surge, but opponents of the bill keep neglecting to mention that since it screws with their narrative that the BEA is a permanent bad thing.
Despite those restrictions, under the current numbers Biden would be required to use the authority. This would have been a win-win for those who want enforcement. Either he uses the authority and gets illegal immigration under control, which would be good, or he wriggles out of using it, providing fodder for Republicans to say we need an even more draconian measure to stop illegal immigration.
OK, if you want to quibble about what "had their day in court" means, sure, my statement would be more accurate if it read as "were addressed by the courts" (before being dropped/denied/withdrawn).
I'd then turn around and say you're rewriting history by implying these cases didn't get a similar legal treatment to any other lawsuit.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
2mo ago
Agreed. This forum's meta treatment of Christianity is very goofy. You can call trans people delusional and nothing will happen. You can call people in favor of covid lockdowns delusional and nothing will happen. You can even call people you're arguing against delusional as an ad-hominem and nothing will happen. But call religious people delusional and you should absolutely expect to get warned/banned.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
5mo ago
Don't worry, I downvoted your reply as well.
it's interesting sometimes to see the tally of up and down votes. Highlights contentiousness in an interesting way
Could still be done indirectly by looking at upvotes on original post, and upvotes on the replies.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8d ago
Well there's nothing for me to really argue against here, just "I'm right and you're wrong", an ad-hominem, then "landslide for Trump in 2024!"
I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
5mo ago
Downvoted while correct. This forum should really take out the downvote button entirely since it's just a "boo outgroup" button.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8mo ago
probably the largest bribery scandal in a century.
Assuming there actually was bribery, which, again, is still very much unproven despite months of a Republican led investigation to find evidence of exactly that.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8d ago
You are not being honest when you say Trump tanked the bill.
If you're going to accuse me of lying, please don't strawman me. I never claimed there was no opposition to the bill before Trump came out against it. But whatever prospects the bill had, died when he did.
It’s far better to expose the immigration issue and pass a clean bill after the election.
This is just the double-or-nothing idea I mentioned in my post. Throwing away the biggest win on immigration in a generation, and instead banking on winning the Presidency AND the Senate AND the House AND hoping Trump actually cares about the issue enough to pass actual legislation instead of just trying EOs. Surely the last time he had a trifecta and passed no major legislation on immigration was just a fluke, right? Surely he won't be distracted by settling scores and getting revenge on his perceived enemies, right? And even if all that happens, hoping that Trump is tactful enough to actually do a (supposedly) extreme immigration bill without the Democrats freaking out and repealing it the minute they come into power.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
2mo ago
That the West is the villain in Ukraine, despite Russia being the aggressor. Russian propaganda flows freely through Western societies, while the reverse is not true. Russia is scoring more and more wins because of this fact.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
2mo ago
would legitimize China's stance against facebook and google years ago
These were already legitimized when China became the only country (barring maybe Japan) that has a tech sector that could plausibly broadly compete with that of the US. If the US doesn't do this, it's just unilateral disarmament. Democracies are losing the propaganda war badly since they're unwilling or unable to use similar tactics that dictatorships like Russia have been using.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
5mo ago
My main argument was that the gish-gallop claims were falling on their own merits. That hasn't changed.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
6mo ago
Like funding a bunch of wars or something?
Hardly a new phenomenon. The US was in Afghanistan for 20 years. Ukraine aid is ~6% of the Pentagon's budget.
Sure, I trust your explanation is more correct than my simplification.
But the important bit was that it threw gasoline on the fire in terms of money in politics. That said, I still don't think it matters all that much since people overrate the power of money in politics.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8d ago
The bill was basically a tactical retreat in a losing war.
Surely you mean a tactical victory in a losing war?
The correct play was to put the election on immigration as a major issue and try to get support to change the entire system.
How would not passing the bill come closer to that goal?
I can already see it now:
Trump: Biden has been terrible for the border!
Biden: What do you mean, I tried to fix the border but you wouldn't let me!
The result: Nobody's mind is changed. Then maybe Trump wins, he tries more executive orders, but they keep getting mutilated by the courts as they did in his first term.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
8d ago
How to square this with something like @gattsuru’s recent post (and follow-up)? He starts from the assumption that Republicans are, in fact, no longer interested in compromise
I agree, they're obviously not interested in compromise, and in some cases it's for good reasons. That said, even if this bill just added the text about amending asylum rules to the official US laws, this bill would have been worth it. Dealing with asylum stuff is something Trump struggled against for his entire presidency, and he kept failing due to the courts ruling that EO's couldn't override rules of Congress. Had this bill passed, then at least any EO's Trump would enact in his next potential administration would carry much more weight.
When you add in the rest of the bill and compare it to the paltry concessions given to Democrats, the choice to pass it should have been obvious even if the Democrats tried to stonewall it in some (or many) ways.
I suspect that relying on Trump’s branding is a strategic blunder. No, it’s relying on one man in general.
Couldn't agree more. Candidates should be avatars of the people to enact desired policies. Trump was plausibly this sort of person in 2016 which is why I voted for him then, but he's since proven that he's really not up to the task. The Republican base should have dumped him for Desantis or some other candidate in the 2020 primary. Sure, all candidates have problems, but if they didn't do what was wanted then they should have been dumped too, and the base should have kept dumping candidates until somebody actually enacted policies. Instead, the Republican party has effectively turned into a cult of personality since many Republicans' only barometer of candidate quality is "how much he makes leftists seethe".
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
1mo ago
For your first two paragraphs, I agree challenge can be fun, but I strongly disagree that the challenge I would face would be diminished if other players could opt for an easy mode. That's the crux of the debate here. From your last paragraph I feel like we probably agree on this point. An easy mode would allow more people to experience the games if the difficulty would have otherwise precluded them, and it would smash the elitist snobbery surrounding the games to a good degree.
And furthermore, because enemies are so punishing, it forces the devs to design them to be fair.
Definitely not. I've already responded to your other comment on how these games aren't fair in general. A better lens the "fair" would be "predictable and preventable" that Joseph Anderson has detailed in his video essays on the series. Games like Sekiro nail that concept, while the later bosses of Elden Ring fail horribly. Again, watch the JA critique I linked above for examples of how they do so. Elden Ring is proof that in at least some instances, FromSoft values the elitist snobbery over good game design.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
1mo ago
I wouldn't say they're bad games per se, but they're certainly overrated on their own merits barring Sekiro.
Obviously, because they are difficult
Nonsense, they occupy a large cultural space because they're needlessly exclusionary, which appeals to a lot of elitists. Difficulty isn't hard to find, just try any challenge runs or speedruns for games you already enjoy. But there's a reason why speedrunning is incredibly niche while the Souls games aren't. People like to watch speedrunners but not to actually do it themselves, while the Souls games sell millions of copies, and it's mainly because of the elitist snobbery the Souls games have wrapped themselves in.
Ben___Garrison
Voltaire's Viceroy
2mo ago
besides the dissident right
It mostly is the dissident right as you say, but you shouldn't just handwave them away. They altered the outcome. They prevented Ukraine aid from being passed. It might eventually pass, but it will come delayed and probably quite a bit less than was originally intended.
I think this forum should disable/remove the downvote button. It's a legacy holdover from Reddit but it really doesn't fit the theme of the motte. Downvoting increases the intensity of heat while doing little for light. Humans are hard-wired to care about the popularity of their ideas, even people very low on the agreeableness spectrum (which I'm sure accounts for the majority of posters here). People who are routinely downvoted are much less likely to post, intensifying the echo chamber effect.
If a post breaks the rules, reporting it is still the best solution.
If a post is just using bad logic, it's much better to refute that logic with a response than to downvote. There's nothing I find quite as aggravating as making (what I think is) a good point, only to be downvoted with no responses. This doesn't happen nearly as often on this forum as it does on Reddit, but it's still a nuisance when it does occur.
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