Recursive_Enlightenment
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User ID: 791
Recursive_Enlightenment
4d ago
My understanding is that a low level government worker who did what Trump did with classified documents would go to jail, but an important politician (e.g. Hillary, Joe Biden, Sandy Berger) likely wouldn't.
Recursive_Enlightenment
5d ago
Conservative Mike Cernovich (1.2M followers) Tweeted "Trump needs a VP that will make him assassination proof. Anyone saying otherwise has no understanding of the time we are in. Tim Scott as VP? Trump's survivability will drop to zero. It's incredible to me that more don't understand this."
How seriously should Trump take such a threat, and how seriously does Trump take such a threat? Yes, the powers-that-be truly hate Trump and if he became president and had Scott as VP many would rejoice at Trump's death. But by what mechanism might they kill him? Obviously, it creates horrible incentives if Trump believes the threat and it causes him to consider someone such as Kari Lake, Marjorie Taylor Greene, or Sarah Palin for his VP nominee. In sort-of support of Cernovich, part of the reason that Biden might be sticking with Harris as VP is to reduce the chances he gets removed from office for senility.
Recursive_Enlightenment
5d ago
Putting a 77-year-old in prison unjustly (if that is indeed what is being attempted) is on par with assassinating him.
Or "AI has two letters, my plan for alignment."
Recursive_Enlightenment
4d ago
The real games the powers-that-be care about are foreign policy and the distribution of money. The Supreme Court mainly handles the cultural wars kayfabe stuff that keeps the masses entertained.
Recursive_Enlightenment
5d ago
What they are openly trying to do to Trump is as bad as an assassination attempt, is my point.
Recursive_Enlightenment
4d ago
Trump is Tiberius Gracchus
On which of these other places would you see a comment like this implying that readers know who Tiberius Gracchus was?
Recursive_Enlightenment
5d ago
The Powers-That-Be will likely be sending Trump to prison if Trump doesn't win in the next election. Don't just look at US history, but all of human history when considering the possibility of the elites killing the guy at the top. The US has been extraordinarily lucky in nearly everything since the Civil War, so expect reversion to the mean and don't consider past US history as a good bases for your Bayesian priors.
Recursive_Enlightenment
5d ago
Trump is given a choice: Go to prison for the rest of your life or with probably P get assassinated. For what value of P is Trump indifferent? If it's for a P>.9 the two are very similar.
Recursive_Enlightenment
4d ago
Recursive_Enlightenment
5d ago
I'm imaging life in prison for a rich 77-year-old is likely a worse-than-death outcome.
Recursive_Enlightenment
5d ago
Would be too obvious, and might seriously threaten the stability of the US.
Recursive_Enlightenment
5d ago
Because Biden is more likely to beat Trump than the alternatives.
Recursive_Enlightenment
30d ago
Israel probably bombed the consulate in retaliation for what Iran's proxies did to Israel. International relations is not governed by rules treating agents symmetrically.
Recursive_Enlightenment
29d ago
If the nuclear facilities are out of reach, Iran's power generators are not and destroying all of them would significantly damage Iran's economy and hence its military capacity.
Recursive_Enlightenment
30d ago
Iran just gave Israel the option, but not the obligation, to launch a massive attack on Iran without Israel losing the support of the US.
Recursive_Enlightenment
7mo ago
Prediction: If this passes nice hotels will almost never have vacancies. They will have some rewards program that guarantees there are never vacancies because any empty room will be given to a person in the rewards program or perhaps given to a friend of a hotel employee. Or, you go to the hotel expecting to have one room, and the hotel decides to give you two as a bonus for being such a good customer.
Recursive_Enlightenment
3mo ago
A plausible ranking of what a US president does by importance is (1) Controlling Nuclear Weapons, (2) Foreign Policy, (3) Appointing Federal Judges, (4) Regulatory Policy, (5) Budgetary Stuff, (6) Other Law Making, (7) Communications. Almost everyone ignores (1) which is horrible, but that seems to be the nature of democracy. Perhaps it was mostly luck but US foreign policy went extremely well under Trump as he seemed to have deterred adversaries from making new trouble. If you are a conservative Trump did about as well with (3) and (4) as you could hope from any president especially with respect to the Covid vaccines. Washington is broken with respect to (5) and Trump didn't fix it but most likely neither would anyone else. We didn't get many bad new laws under Trump which is the best you can realistically hope for if you are a conservative. If you like Trump's style then he maxes out with (7).
Recursive_Enlightenment
8mo ago
Concerning C:
"The same complainant took issue with this statement of Peterson’s: “Well, it’s just poor children and the world has too many people on it anyways.” Rogan had replied, “You’re being facetious.”
In his communications to the college, Peterson referred to this comment. “I respectfully submit that anyone truly listening to that podcast and not merely focusing for a moment on that statement out of context (and who has bothered to familiarize themselves at all with anything else I have ever said before leveling such an accusation) would note instantly that I do not for a second believe and never have that ‘it’s just poor children’ or ‘that the world has too many people on it.’
“The comment was aimed ironically exactly at those who make such claims and I am frankly rather amazed that the ICRC [the college’s Inquiries, Complaints, and Reports Committee] would make such an error in accusing me of propagating those views.”"
Recursive_Enlightenment
5mo ago
Don't forget Haiti. The French revolutionary government, remarkably, decided to end slavery in Haiti. Napoleon tried to bring it back, causing a horrific Haitian race war that may have made US Southerners more resistant to ending slavery and more willing to fight a civil war to keep it.
Recursive_Enlightenment
4mo ago
Quillette founder Claire Lehmann Tweets about the Guardian article's author "Somewhat surprised to see that @guardianscience has known antifa associates writing for them now. (The author of this piece is pictured below behind camera, next to guy in brass knuckles). But I suppose scientific credentials are not required when the target is @realchrisrufo"
Recursive_Enlightenment
8mo ago
Imagine someone was raised in a country where the Holocaust is officially denied, and then goes to college in a country such as Finland or Germany in which denying the Holocaust is a crime. This student is genuinely uncertain if the Holocaust occurred, and starts conversations about the Holocaust with his classmates and presents arguments he was given as a child about why the Holocaust was faked by powerful interests. He is sternly told that it is a criminal offense to bring up such arguments. If he is a good Bayesian, how should this criminality cause him to update? (Of course, I don't think the Holocaust was faked.)
Recursive_Enlightenment
1mo ago
An argument that only works if Europe isn't fearful of Russia.
Recursive_Enlightenment
8mo ago
From the Wikipedia page on the proposal: "Under the endorsed design principles of the Referendum Working Group, the membership of the Voice would be selected by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities across the country, with an enforced gender balance at the national level"
I'm guessing that "gender balance" is a form of cultural imperialism and not a big part of how Australian aboriginals governed themselves before whites arrived.
That's a hard question, especially without specifying the number of people in the set called "powers-that-be". I like the term because it is clear that I am not pretending to know exactly who is in the set.
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