wraelk
9mo ago
I think the payoff is that it slightly expands the options of the Ukrainian public (that is, the portion of the country that would get to vote in the election).
They could conceivably be against the war and vote out Zelensky, an option which they don't really currently have: the press is censored and the country is under martial law, speaking out publicly to overturn Zelensky is probably pretty dangerous.
If they just vote Zelensky back in with overwhelming approval, then things end up exactly as they are with elections suspended, but we at least have the information that their heart is still in the fight, that they had the opportunity to back down in a secret ballot and chose not to take it.
Of course, this is dependent on the elections being conducted fairly, which may not be the case. But if Zelensky holds an election and rigs it/intimidates voters/whatever, that would just put him in the same position he is right now, but with the added risk of information on his actions leaking out.
If Trump managed to get himself paid $1 billion from the federal government somehow, I'm reasonably confident people wouldn't just ignore it, despite that being less than 1% of any of the numbers we're talking about.
wraelk
10mo ago
I think the "annexing canada" and the "tariff canada unless they accede to his demands" might be coming from the same place: "you're entirely dependent on the US, so get in line and work to our benefit, rather than benefiting from our largesse and then stabbing us in the back in every public forum you get into"
I think there are some other similar things in Trump's policies, like asking NATO to pay for its own defense: some of that is just cost-cutting, but some of it is the NATO countries deriding the US for being a warmonger while being completely dependent on its warfighting capability. I suspect if they were praising their benevolent protector instead of claiming they're superior because they don't need to spend money on weapons, it would be a lower priority.
Presumably this will also put pressure on Canada as a whole to produce a government that is capable of acceding to Trump's demands, and I wouldn't be surprised if that was one of his goals. If the current Cathedral bureaucracy churning along in Canada isn't going to deign to respond to someone they see as the next coming of Hitler, they can be presented with an economic collapse and associated angry mobs until they change their mind and/or are replaced.
Honestly, that might be kind of a clever approach to it: present incredibly reasonable demands like coordinating with the US's DEA on whatever fentanyl is flowing over the border, when you're ignored implement the tariffs, then when blamed for the resulting economic collapse point out the incredibly straightforward requests you had that anyone should be fine going along with. Exacerbates existing concerns with the faceless/motionless government, requires your opponents to take a pro-fentanyl stance, and hopefully resolves itself quickly enough to not do major economic damage to the US.
Musing a little further, I wonder if this is why Trump is cutting out government spending early on: he sees tariffs as a temporary financial shock that will cripple the other nations far faster than they'll cripple the US. Cut out a bunch of spending, use the resulting funds to shore up everything until your international counterpart caves, then when you need to re-add all the essential spending that would be an issue to cut out for too long, the tariffs are already back in the toolbox and the resulting economic hit was entirely hidden.
wraelk
10mo ago
While it's entirely possible Trump is absolutely excited to apply tariffs all around, my perception is that for Canada and Mexico his goals are more to use it as a "big stick" to get them in line with his goals: "your entire economy depends on us and I have the power to ruin you, so here's what I want you to do", like how he used it as a threat with the Colombian president refusing deportation flights
Canada's economic interaction with the US doesn't seem to be harmful in terms of the US's long-term economic success: "you send us oil, we refine it and sell it back to you" is actually a pretty good setup for the US. If anything, it seems to paint the Canada-US relationship similarly to the US-China relationship, where not building domestic industrial capacity leaves the former dependent on the latter.
The question then becomes whether Canada will cave sufficiently to Trump's desires, and I can see there being some pain there: Canada's tended to frame itself as "the US, but properly enlightened" and I expect that will lead to some #RESIST and trying to get Trump to cave first, and I'm reasonably confident Trump will actually pull the trigger if it comes to it.
wraelk
10mo ago
My intuition is that no would play League of Legends or chess if you only played only against bots, even bots designed as a perfect challenge, and if there were no rankings.
I played Heroes of the Storm, Blizzard's League equivalent, for a few years and I actually played entirely against bots: I really enjoyed the mechanics of MOBA games and the minute-to-minute gameplay, but I didn't want to deal with the toxicity that seems an inevitable part of those games and I didn't want to be in the endless "gotta get better" spiral that comes with skill-based matchmaking.
On the broader point, there are loads of games that are made entirely for single-player experiences, and while sometimes you get into a community discussing it there's no need to do that. I actually quit the Factorio subreddit around the time the expansion came out because I didn't want the game solved for me, and now only dip back when I'm in the mood to collect a set of random tips, I certainly don't post there for my own social validation. And while I do have friends that play Factorio now, that wasn't the case for many years.
It's pretty clear that we're saved by the father drawing us (see e.g. John 6:46 and surrounding), and it's by belief (same area, also John 3:16).
This is a good point, and I'm a little annoyed at myself for forgetting arguably the most quoted bible verse.
I'll note that John kind of goes off in a very different direction than the rest of the Gospels and that casts some suspicion, but that inevitably descends into a haze of "what did Jesus actually say/do" that gets us nowhere. I'm not nearly a good enough theological scholar to usefully continue here, I'm afraid.
I appreciate the discussion!
Perhaps you're excepting John, but it's pretty clear in John.
I do think John deviates a bit from the other three to a suspicious extent, but what specifically are you talking about? I poked around in there but I didn't see anything that was particularly clear on salvation through grace.
Jesus also forgives sins in the gospels.
Sure, but there's a big difference between "I forgive this particular act" and "mere belief in me automatically erases all acts"
I don't think Jesus actually intended every person to do every thing he spoke of. For example, he probably didn't intend for everyone to be gauging out their eyes.
Sure, maybe he's being metaphorical with some of this, but "he actually meant this unrelated and almost directly contradictory thing" should at least raise some eyebrows.
"And if your eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell." probably doesn't mean "don't worry about it, your sins don't matter as long as you believe"
wraelk
11mo ago
For example, the idea of salvation through grace isn't really something Jesus really talked much about himself, that's mostly a creation of post Gospel books.
When Jesus talked about getting into heaven, he was pretty consistently telling people to do specific things to make it in: sell all your possessions, give up your life to follow him, help the poor.
The idea that just believing in him would guarantee you a place in heaven regardless of your actions was basically all added after.
The question is whether you're training a Smithing (exceedingly powerful applications to combat) or a Lockpicking (slight improvements to things you could already do just fine).
More options
Context Copy link