You say that and yet the nightmare scenario of Tucker Carlson winning the GOP nomination on an anti-isreal platform (sincere or not) inches closer and closer. The DNC is going to prove to be more rigidly Zionist than the Republicans .

They want to prosecute peope in open court so using the NSA to id people would be inconvenient (but not impossible).

That would actually be massive escalation in more than the obvious ways. Gulf states are the ones buying up most US debt (which is piling up extremely quickly). This is a large part of their leverage to secure continues US military protection. Should the US Navy be used to block the straight to enforce some kind of all-or-nothing approach, it’s going to be cause a lot of knock on effects in the bond market. We do be living in interesting times!

Neither of those things has anything to do with this. You can eliminate the NASA budget and you still won’t have healthcare lol. You have to actually fight for that.

Even if that weren’t true, the idea that this type of open corruption is grounds for firing in a Trump admin is laughable. Trump himself is far more corrupt, and hegseth being corrupt just goes further to ensure his loyalty. He can always have Bondi do a selective prosecution of this should he step out of line.

It’s basically kompromat that only Trump (through control of the DOJ through Bondi) can use.

We all said rightly that the president doesn’t control gas prices, at least those of us who had half a clue how economics worked did.

The logic is mostly sound because president’s don’t have a magic dial to control oil prices. But the logic also has sane decision making baked into it - president’s consider the effects that their actions will have on the price of oil and don’t do shit like this that will definitely increase it. Since that sanity no longer holds , the logic no longer holds .

The moment anyone else moves to assist he will simply bail out and walk away. He was actually dumb enough to say that out loud too. It would be strategically stupid and politically suicidal for anyone else to get involved.

China is getting Iranian oil right now and the US isn’t going to control Iran. Why would either of them commit to this? Pretending like you solved the problem when none of the incentives line up is ridiculous. Either of them could militarily defend Iran if they want to without commiting to a security guarantees for Iran. So why would they bind themselves unnecessarily?

Yes they could do that. But why would they commit to that?

Lol so now Russia China and Europe have to jump into militarily attack the US ? This is your plan? Well sounds solved to me.

This is basically just the Obama Iran deal. It was working pretty much exactly like this until Trump tore it up and began in multiple rounds attacking Iran.

After this war, Iran has no reason to sign such a deal especially since Trump and Israel will just tear it up whenever they want. Iran needs security guarantees which your deal doesn’t provide.

That doesn’t matter if he’s been failing upwards ever since.

I visited friends near Bath last year and they decided to take me canal boating. They signed one form to rent the boat and then a guy came on board and taught us how to drive it. I didn’t sign anything. They didn’t check my license or sort out any insurance or anything. I drove it for over 3 hrs lol. I was thinking how much paperwork such a thing would take of this was in the US or Canada.

You like many Americans are trying to solve cultural rot by putting in more rules. “If only we had a rule that ___” this wouldn’t have happened. That’s not going to solve this. Being a congress-person is a skill. It requires actual skill, and it takes time to get to know how to be most effective. You can put in this rule if you want, and it might solve the problem you’re targeting, but it will create many more. You can’t solve problems caused by cultural rot (literally tens of millions of voters being okay with this) by putting in more administrative rules. Ultimately , democracies grant the people the power to destroy democracy. That is what the US is choosing.

He says other nations will have to guard and police the Strait of Hormuz as necessary, after his attacks on the country prompted Iran to target vessels in the crucial world shipping lane.

Yeah that’s why nobody wanted to touch this mess with a 10 ft pole.

Presumably the US would allow any other tankers to pass. They don’t want to block other countries. The remarkable thing is that they’re allowing Iranian tankers to pass, and the reason is that blocking them is basically an act of was against China.

They won’t all die, that’s not on the table here lol

I am not sure how abstinence only being the only acceptable option is any better than it being the best option.

The distinction is important because perpetuating their only acceptable option despite it being demonstrably ineffective indicates that child welfare is not the primacy concern in play.

Again being Pro-life does not necessarily mean that they will vote for dismantling social services.

And yet, despite it not being necessarily true it is absolutely true in every practical sense in reality.

I simply don’t understand why you insist on assuming that they are lying.

I simply don’t understand why you insist on taking political talking points as 100 percent sincere instead of looking at the tangible actions being taken in this space.

Is that not what you are doing? You are blaming them for voting how they do.

You don’t even know what to do with this definition after quoting it. If course I “blame” them for voting how they do. Is assigning someone responsibility for their actions “demonizing” them? Lol. You’re lost in the sauce bruh.

Ultimately I think we have reached that 3rd situation. I have decided that nothing I say is going to change your mind on this and am choosing to walk away.

Other countries are able to have this discussion in far more healthy and productive ways. Instead of being content with your one insight that prolife and pro-choice are talking past each other, I suggest you ask yourself why that is, and why this positioning of the discussion is basically unique to the US. There’s a whole wide world out there.

But, before I do that, I think you have lost what my original argument was about. I am asserting that the abortion debate will never end due to each side arguing about disparate things.

Since you’re apparently lost, I’ll make I’ll summarize - the two sides talking past each other is how this issue was engineered. This is a manufactured debate designed for political purposes, and not for the welfare of kids. There’s a reason this nonsense took hold in the US and nowhere else in the western world.

But this ignores one of their central beliefs; that abstinence only is the best education to reduce abortions.

They absolutely don’t believe that lol. They believe it is the only acceptable option (even it demonstrably doesn’t work).

Next you talk about dismantling social safety nets. From looking at a few Pro-life groups many of them do not really talk about changing social services for kids at all. The ones that do talk about increasing education, providing counseling, and promoting adoption as an option. I think what the misunderstanding might be is that many people who are Pro-life are also republican who also believe in a reduction of government social services in favor of private services. This assignment of belief is not transferable. What I mean by this is that being Pro-life does not necessarily equate to wanting to dismantle social safety nets.

I simply don’t understand why you insist on taking what everyone says at face value while ignoring their actual actions - how they vote.

Last thing that you mentioned that I want to comment on is about single-issue voters. Of course I would encourage people to be aware about all the issues that affect them. But I do not agree with the demonization of single-issue voters.

I’m not demonizing them lol. I’m calling them stupid. If you’re a single issue voter, you are completely captive. The guy who embodies your one key issue can do anything else they want because they know they have you. Single issue voters always end up being suckers in there end.

I think I agree, but I really don’t think it matters. What, are Trump’s ideas coherent or something? What I trust is Bernie’s overall intent. He’s kind of unique in this way because of his decades of consistent political sctivism. Had Bernie been elected in 2016 somehow and we got 8 years of Bernie, the US would still be a capitalist society. It just might be slightly better one.

I think a great example of naive ideas that have dominated political discussion on the left is student loan forgiveness. Like I’m not opposed - if PPP loan forgiveness is acceptable then student loan forgiveness is infinitely more acceptable. No brainer. But the complete lack of discussion about structural reform to the college tuition situation that causes people to need such huge student loans in the first place makes me think that the whole issue was to some extent controlled opposition.

You could have gotten 100 percent student loan forgiveness - the whole thing passed and done and student loans would immediately start to pile up again the next day. Probably even higher tuition too.