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Goodguy  2d ago (text post)   Edited 2d ago   9206 thread views

Midterms Megathread

Cause otherwise midterms discussion will be scattered around a bunch of separate Culture War thread posts. And it's nice to have more off-the-cuff rapid reactions in a dedicated megathread.

The first thing I've noticed so far: if the exit polls are correct, Americans are very pessimistic about AI.

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https://x.com/JDVance/status/2118004988433641835

But the real reason we lost is obvious to almost everyone.

Another pollster—one of the smartest people I know in politics, told me yesterday we’d lose the generic ballot by 13 points. I felt negative going into Tuesday, but even I was shocked by this. In his polling, he saw that a lot of Trump 2024 voters were angry and planning to vote for Democrats. He asked those voters who had abandoned us what would cause them to come back on our team. The top four answers, accounting for nearly all of the responses were:

  1. End the war
  2. Focus on cost of living/inflation
  3. Put America First
  4. Change our relationship to Israel

In the next few months, there's going to be a lot of gaslighting. Expect to hear any number of establishment politicians say the solution to our woes is amnesty. I'm open to the idea that we should change enforcement—by focusing more on businesses that hire illegal labor, for instance. But anyone pushing amnesty is lying to you.

The reason we lost is the war. The president himself said so last night.

How will the “Israel is our ally” crowd handle this admission from the VP? By the results, Israel is only the ally of the Democrats: they handed the country over to them by instigating a stupid war through the ears and advisors of Trump. They chose their own petty Middle Eastern feud over what’s good for America and American conservatism.

Joe Kent, as the Chief of Staff at the DNI in 2025 and early 2026, was one of only a dozen or so Americans with access to the totality of America’s intelligence across all 18 agencies. He knows things we have never and will never hear of. He resigned from his role in order to call out this dynamic:

Israel knew the war on Iran would not be quick or easy, they just knew they had to get President bought in by killing Ayatollah Khamenei. President Trump he was aware of all these risk factors, but he chose to listen to Benjamin Netanyahu and he chose to listen to very pro-Israel voices within his inner circle. The President was aware of it, but again, he had a very small circle around him saying, “No, no, Iran’s a paper tiger. They didn’t hit you after Operation Midnight Hammer. You were able to, you know, just slide into Venezuela, kidnap the President, There’s already protesters on the street.” This whole thing’s going to be over in three or four weeks. That’s what the Israelis told him. Meanwhile, getting him to sign on to killing the Ayatollah, The Israelis, when I would interact with them, they were always very clear-eyed. They knew that this was not going to be a quick war, but for them, getting us involved in this slog to take out the regime was always their primary objective. And they sold it to President Trump as something that was going to be very easy, knowing that all they had to do was get us bought in.

Further,

When Dubowitz says “for the next two & a half years” he is basically admitting that the initial goal of the pro Israel lobby was to get us into this war knowing that once we were in, it would be very difficult for us to get out. Dubowitz & the Israelis alway knew this would be a very long war, but lied to Trump & the admin with tales of a decapitation strike leading to a popular uprising, resulting in a quick victory. They knew this was a lie. They will continue to lie to get us to do their bidding, regardless of what it costs our nation. Rooting out foreign influence starts with cutting off access to Israeli surrogates like FDD.

And…

Traitors are people who lie and get our troops killed in needless wars that don’t serve our country. The Israeli lobby knows this war has been a disaster for public support, and they are panicking. It’s advocates are working overtime to try and justify the mess they got our country into.

Manipulating & inflating intelligence is how we got into the disastrous Iraq war—we should know better. Unfortunately, thanks to the Israeli lobby & its paid influencers, we’ve ended up in this situation yet again, this time with a much more consequential country and a war that is shaping up to be an even bigger mess.

I know a lot of people here still consider Israel an “ally” or at least a neutral country in the grand scheme of things. Do these midterm results change your opinion? Do they shift you toward seeing Israel as a dangerous “enemy within”?

When all is said and done, as much as I like Israel and want them to succeed, as much as I can justify their actions from their perspective, if they're a political liability, I'm in favor of dropping them. Their prosperity is not worth trading our own, and I don't like justifying actions we take in furtherance of their agenda to other bitter voters.

At the same time, I hope this means we drop Europe even harder, because they are far worse allies than Israel is (was?).

I hope this means we drop Europe even harder, because they are far worse allies than Israel is

Remind me, which of those shed blood and treasure when America asked them to go into Afghanistan to avenge 9/11?

That Europe is now 25 years ago and no longer exists. If you look up things like fighting men and equipment they don’t have it anymore to do 9/11 nor then political will to respond in that way again.

Yes you got old.

This is same as the Holocaust. Maybe Europeans owed Jews a debt in 1945. Now they’ve had 80 years to build and should be on their own.

Yeah, I find it amusing on how America fucks up essentially an unconditional alliance that is in reality impervious to any domestic politics in Europe (and at the very least, in relation to any alternative alliances), then proceeds to blame Europe for being a bad ally.

Think they'd do that again today? Not the same river, not the same man. And excluding Israel may have been more of a strategic decision since they are a lot closer to the conflict and get blood running hot quicker among the locals.

I understand there's a small percentage of disenfranchised right wing voters in these European countries. But it's kind of like giving aid to North Korea; you know that any alliances you build will be with the wrong people. That's democracy in action for you. It would be better for both parties if the postwar liberal order was destroyed.

Last time it went really badly, and not 25 years later Americans are calling us the worst allies ever. We’d have to be insane to do it again.

Sounds like the feeling is mutual, then. Why complain about it?

A: You're a shitty friend.

B: I helped you move house.

A: Sure, but that was weeks ago. What have you done for me lately? And anyway, you wouldn't do it again.

B: Since it got me this, I sure wouldn't.

A: See, you don't want to be my friend anyway!

You see the issue, right?

Look, from my perspective, 9/11 happened before I could even remember it, and the entire GWOT happened while I was too young to know much about it at all, and everyone hated it. The more appropriate analogy was not "you're my friend who helped me move my house last week" and more like "we were two fellow childhood delinquents who set fire to the school and now 30 years later we're both drugged-up squatters in our own houses". In this analogy, yes, the two former friends would have to be crazy to try to help each other. They can barely even help themselves.

Really, the U.K. isn't the worst of Europe, I'd say that award goes to Spain. But to me, most of Europe seems to be bloated and useless. In contrast, Israel blows people up every day, and they do it mostly face-to-face. They still do shit because they have to do shit.

I've seen you in other threads decrying anyone who wants to cut ties and break alliances. But why? What do you get out of such an alliance? That was more my point.

Look, from my perspective, 9/11 happened before I could even remember it, and the entire GWOT happened while I was too young to know much about it at all, and everyone hated it.

Wow, now I feel really old...

Basically, a huge proportion of Americans and the White House were determined to lead a punitive expedition on Afghanistan and anybody else who had hidden Osama Bin Laden. The British PM was very clear that we had to keep the Americans close no matter what (common culture with the Americans had been our most important diplomatic relationship since WW1) and so we went in to support them, with the UK government manufacturing excuses to allow it to do so.

The major complication of our military support is that, under American direction and with the goal of keeping that relationship strong, we had essentially retooled our entire army to be a support wing for the American army. We do reconnaisance, intelligence, and a few other things really well, but we don't have a full stack any more. Everything we have is either purchased from America, or was designed to be interoperable with NATO (American) supply chains and nothing else. It was a very slow thumbscrews process, essentially: we continue to get American support to project power on the global stage, as long as we retool our army and economy so that we can never act independently or ally with anyone except the Americans. Then, as with software, enshittification arrived once we had no other options. The level of influence the Americans gave us declined, the level of support we were expected to provide increased.

The main thing that we really needed to get out of an alliance in this specific case was aid in 2016. A post-Brexit softball trade deal for 20 years would have given us a roaring start, shown confidence in us, and allowed us to negotiate much better terms with the EU. But we didn't get that support when we needed it for internal political reasons:

  1. Obama hated us for Empire, and was attached to the EU.
  2. Trump liked us and wanted to support us in theory, but cared way more for looking hardball on trade deals. (We also utterly sabotaged that relationship with TDS, exacerbated by UK Remainers wanting to prevent a trade deal in order to tie us back to the EU, but Trump was never going to produce a trade deal that didn't exploit our weak position rather than shoring it up.)
  3. Biden hated us because of Ireland.

So basically our military and economic support for America has resulted in hamstringing our military and letting us down in the moment we really needed it. You say that this is good reason to break up, and in theory I agree with you, but I can't help feeling that the balance of support is very much in our favour and it would be appropriate to bring it back to equal before that. Also, the UK government and civil service (and anyone over 40) just isn't emotionally ready for that.

We should not have gone, and we should not have asked you to go.

We cannot be your allies, because there is no "we", and because there is nothing to offer you, no basis for cooperation. What did our previous cooperation secure? What accomplishment stands as the great testament to what a unified West can achieve?

If "the West" includes western-aligned Asian countries, then 5nm chips.

If "the West" just means the US and western Europe, then a Boeing jet with Rolls-Royce or Safran engines, or an Airbus jet with GE or Pratt & Whitney engines. (Although I notice that the newest variants of the A350 and 777 have only same-side-of-Pond engine options - Rolls-Royce for the A350 and GE for the 777).

What accomplishment stands as the great testament to what a unified West can achieve?

Arguably Ukraine. CIA sure helped when everyone thought that country would fold in 3 days.

Think they'd do that again today?

When is Israel going to do it for the first time? And when will it be held against them that they haven't yet?

Also, how many of your ships have we sunk?

Why would I hold it against them? There were already good reasons for them to stay out, as I just said, and the GWOT was a miserable failure anyway. New enemy's China, and most of Europe is flirting with China. I could hold that against Israel if you showed me that.

Israel also isn't ruining itself as fast as Europe. If we're gonna be married (aligned), do you have to get all those facial piercings and tattoos (foreigners) and refuse to do housework (pay your NATO fees)?

Frankly, I don't even know what you want. Do you like NATO? Do you like liberalism? Why, when it's brought you such eternal rewards? Not wanting to be cut loose is wanting all those eternal rewards.

Why would I hold it against them?

Just seems fair if you hold against us not repeating it in a hypothetical future.

If we're gonna be married (aligned), do you have to get all those facial piercings and tattoos (foreigners)

You're the one to talk!

and refuse to do housework (pay your NATO fees)?

Hey! Some of us are paying them!

Do you like NATO?

Sure.

Do you like liberalism?

Not so much anymore, but I'm not going to stick my nose into what you do at home.

Why, when it's brought you such eternal rewards? Not wanting to be cut loose is wanting all those eternal rewards.

Honestly, going our own ways is fine too. No hard feelings on my side.

NATO doesn't have fees.

No, but it has expectations which involve some costs. You know what seething_spendcel meant.

The argument that the US pays for Europe's defence is stupid because American defence spending mostly goes towards fighting its own pointless wars. Europe would be no less safe if the US hadn't started the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and most recently Iran. Europeans wouldn't object if the US were to halve its defence spending, bringing it in line with Europe, with the savings being found in not starting pointless wars.

When Europe actually had to step up to fund Ukraine, it did. It has sent more aid to Ukraine than the US.

There was that weird incident in the Gulf War (1993) where Iraq was launching missiles at Israel trying to goad them into the war, on the basis that their involvement would make all the (closer) Gulf State members of the Coalition nope out of fighting on the same side as The Jews.

Things get weird sometimes.

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