Donald Trump learned much of what he knows from Vince McMahon. Vince has never cared a single ounce about the health of his performers (the list of wrestlers dying young would fill a book). Now he has leveraged his wife's position in the Administration to get the Governor of Florida to declare a scripted athletic spectacle an "essential business". Without any question whatsoever, the two most horrendous responses from the sports world have come from McMahon and Dana White of the UFC. Both repulsive human beings long before this. And both hardcore Trump supporters. Go figure:
I'll freely acknowledge that Wikipedia is not an ideal source for data, but without anything better, I'd just like to point out that there appear to be between 10,000 and 100,000 African migrants in the city/area of Guangzhau (Based on the available evidence I could find, the 100,000 number early in the 2010s, and that China has started implementing strict immigration control, knocking the number waaaaaaaay down - towards that 10k number right now).
Depending on how you want to count the population, there's between 11,000,000 and 56,000,000 people living there (I give that range based on Urban population or the Metroplex population. It's not clear to me which applies for this situation).
Typically, I wouldnt consider that an "invasion".
Also - we've have a handful of Swedish posters who have come in here in the past and discuss the impact of migrants in Sweden, and it sounds like the "rape capital of the Europe" stuff that was floating around right-wing media outlets over the past few years were misinterpreting and misrepresenting the statistics involved.
The Swedish rape statistics argument against immigration has been used forever now, even though it doesn’t work. Ever since Nigel Farage first came with his ”rape capital” quote, people (including me in the old thread) have pointed out over and over and over again why it’s wrong and why it’s notoriously difficult to compare rape statistics at all. Different legal definition, different ways to sort files and higher inclination to report - I’m sure a lot of you have heard those three several times by now.
And that's not saying that Sweden doesn't have a problem with rape. It's saying that the entire world has a huge problem with rape. And that statistics is a tricky business.
Then I clarified my point in a rather long post when I felt people misunderstood me:
(Quote)
Other countries' numbers will look different because of the different definitions. I wasn't saying "oh, it's just sexual assault, so it doesn't count." I was saying that in other countries, they might not count it as rape or sexual assault at all, making their rape statistics look "better". The classic example is people raping their spouses, or rape victims who don't resist. Which might not be illegal depending on where you are. Or systematic abuse over the course of several years that looks like a single case of rape in the statistics. Or the whole "she was asking for it" nonsense that leads to obvious rapists going free. So it's relevant because it's really hard to compare. And that's why it's brought up, not because it's some cynical obfuscation tactic.
And yes, men born outside the EU are overrepresented when it comes to people convicted of rape in Sweden. But there is a lot of criticism of what conclusions you can draw from that. I think the biggest problem in Sweden (and the world) here is that so few are convicted of rape. And that could also lead to skewed statistics, since it's based on convictions. So the conclusion when we're talking about an extremely oversized portion of criminals is still based on very few individuals compared to the number of crimes.
One thing I remember from the statistics for... 2012-2017 I think, is that you could draw the conclusion that people from Tanzania are more likely to rape someone in Sweden (it was among the top 4 "high-risk" countries). But that was based on one single person from Tanzania that was convicted of rape. Since there are so few Tanzanians in Sweden, it still had an impact on the numbers.
I'm not saying all this because I want to defend rapists from other countries or something. Or even because I want to defend immigration policies for that matter. I just think that tougher immigration policies simply won't have any effect when it comes to rape and sexual crime in general. Because rape happens everywhere, on all social levels, all over the world. And if 0.02% of the people in one group are rapists and 0.01% are rapists in another, I don't think you can draw any conclusions at all about the groups as a whole. Especially when the groups are of vastly different sizes.
I'll freely acknowledge that Wikipedia is not an ideal source for data, but without anything better, I'd just like to point out that there appear to be between 10,000 and 100,000 African migrants in the city/area of Guangzhau (Based on the available evidence I could find, the 100,000 number early in the 2010s, and that China has started implementing strict immigration control, knocking the number waaaaaaaay down - towards that 10k number right now).
Depending on how you want to count the population, there's between 11,000,000 and 56,000,000 people living there (I give that range based on Urban population or the Metroplex population. It's not clear to me which applies for this situation).
Typically, I wouldnt consider that an "invasion".
Also - we've have a handful of Swedish posters who have come in here in the past and discuss the impact of migrants in Sweden, and it sounds like the "rape capital of the Europe" stuff that was floating around right-wing media outlets over the past few years were misinterpreting and misrepresenting the statistics involved.
I agree those numbers don't seem that significant. Looking at other sources suggests a range of 5k-15k for resident Africans, though there are much larger short-term numbers (business travellers, tourists, students and shoppers). If anything the 1m+ Chinese in Africa would appear to be more significant - particularly given that there is also very considerable investment capital moving from China into Africa.
I've seen no data on the impact of immigration into China. That's so small (World Bank figures for 2015 make it 0.07% of the population for immigration from all other countries, not just Africa) that it's hard to believe it has a major impact on the country as a whole. However, I would be surprised if it did not mirror on a smaller scale the experience elsewhere. The UK for instance had large numbers of immigrants from Eastern Europe as a result of EU enlargement. The data on that is pretty clear that the immigration improved the UK economy overall, but that there were real concerns at a local level due to clustering of immigration - causing things like pressure on wages and access to public services. That may well be the case in Guangzhou where a very large proportion of African migrants appear to be centred. I would though put those local problems mainly down to failure of government to address local pressures - which should certainly have been possible in the UK given the overall improvement in the country's finances and I guess the same would apply to China.
@ktchong, like BallpointMan I did a quick Google in the way you suggested, but only saw evidence of anti-immigration attitudes - see this piece for example, which reviews why the number of migrants to China has reduced in recent years. Although I looked at quite a number of different sources, I didn't see any evidence of the significant problems you say have been caused by immigration. Can you point me to that evidence?
I'm now hearing 400 people at one meatpacking plant have tested positive. All of those workers have been going to and from work for weeks. While South Dakota is sparsely populated, Sioux Falls most certainly is NOT.
Welcome to the forum, @ktchong! We have very few folks from Asia on this forum, so I appreciate the new perspective.
I'll have to argue with you on your first point, though. I am not surprised that anti-African attitudes rose in China following an influx of African immigrants, but I am highly skeptical that African immigrants are raping Chinese women en masse. We've seen those fears pop up before over here in the States during the civil rights era, and I suspect the Chinese public is accepting the same stereotypes (the stereotype that black males are hyper-sexual and hyper-violent) that our own white supremacists liked to spread back in the 20th century. I think stereotypes are just filling the void left by lack of contact with black folks.
Also, while the CCP does try to paint a vision of a harmonious, multi-ethnic China, I doubt the Xi administration is so minority-friendly that it would actually avoid cracking down on violent crime just because the alleged criminals were minorities. After all, we're talking about the same government that is locking up countless people in actual concentration camps in Xinjiang for the crime of being ethnic Uighurs, based on largely groundless fears of terrorism and separatism. The Chinese government touts ethnic harmony as a propaganda tool, but in terms of actual policy, they have no compunctions about targeting minorities.
Got an email from our bank about the corona stimulus. They say that benefits would be based on tax returns, which would mean my family gets nothing. I thought that was negotiated to be based on scoial security?
If you’re receiving social security benefits, you should be able to receive the impact payment without filing a return according to this press release from the Treasury Dept:
We've been trying to get social security for 6 years now. according to every single proffesional we talk to, we not only qualify, but we are MORE qualified for it than most people that receive it. Nothing like getting screwed over.
@jjstraka34 Considering that we have 0 income. I don't even know HOW we'd file taxes...
Hey @ThacoBell did you see that non-filers can update their info with the IRS to get the stimulus payout?
So we are just going to dismiss people we don't agree with. Not very Democratic.
I don't recall that democracy requires me to think every pandering grifter has something to offer. Bill Maher's the way he is to get ratings - or views, if one prefers. If that man has a real conviction, I haven't seen a sign of it. His discourse is on the level of "schoolyard taunting" despite sounding more intellectual. All he cares about is the sound bite and the money that comes with it.
Also, I don't dismiss Maher because I "disagree" with him. I dismiss Maher because he platforms blatant fascists, such as Milo Y several years ago, and despite his pretense of being a "liberal" or a "progressive" he's not really much different from conservative frauds like Hannity or Limbaugh.
As far as concerns about supermarkets, whatever you think they should be called, I find this more worrying in the US. It's old news at this point, but it's still an issue.
The total cases at the plant in South Dakota is now 545. Seems like a total disaster is about to hit Sioux Falls. This is going to be the incident that breaks the fake invulnerability shield rural states seem to think they have. Mayor now defying the Governor and moving ahead with shelter-in-place ordinance. We should have had national shelter in place 3 weeks ago. This is why. VA facilities are getting hit with a tsunami of cases and lack of protective gear. Ongoing fucking disaster.
All he cares about is the sound bite and the money that comes with it.
This I agree with, well said.
Now on Milo the "Catholic Queer Greek/Jew that likes black men" self proclaimed, If he is what passes for fascist these days we have nothing to worry about.
They don't. And yes the "perspectives" section is an editorial section, merely by another name. The Post publishes op-eds by Republicans, conservatives and libertarians all the time. All you're revealing is a failure to understand how to properly read a newspaper.
Opinion-editorial are separate from the news division. Even Fox News does this with its programming. Having "hard news shows" and having opinion news shows. Again, you are revealing a failure to understand some elementary facts about how newspapers are written.
This is how the Washington Post introduced the very section you were quoting from: "The Washington Post has debuted PostEverything, a digital daily magazine for voices from around the world. In PostEverything, outsiders will entertain and inform readers with fresh takes, personal essays, news analyses, and other innovative ways to tell the stories everyone is talking about—and the ones they haven’t yet heard."
I.e. It is literally a section where the authors are *not* Washington Post journalists. These are undeniable facts dude. And continuing to insist otherwise just shows that you're willing to spread misinformation.
Whether or not they are "Washington Post" journalists or "PostEverything" journalists is irrelevant. They are journalists, and journalists also give opinions. As the statement goes, WaPo debuted PostEverything. It was created specifically to serve as their subsidiary. By Politico's own estimation, they both have similar business models.
Now, what do you call a person who is a longtime writer (one of the first ones, actually) for an online magazine that deals in news, analysis, current events, supposedly expert and non-expert opinions? Most people would call that person a journalist. I find that description perfectly valid, and see little reason to belabor the point more.
I'm sorry, did the Democratic Party suddenly become vehemently Pro-China while I wasn't looking? Yes, i'm saying this is a general reflection of their views on allowable discourse. There is nothing resembling a right-wing partisan bent to this article. Not even a little bit. This isn't some full-throated defense of Kavanaugh we are looking at here, or an argument for reducing immigration, nor anything that would offend the sensibility of your average WaPo journo. It's simply accusing the Chinese companies of doing the things that they are doing.
If this is the best cherry picking can do to establish the existence of a consistent right-wing presence on WaPo, then we might as well call that idea as good as dead.
Did you know that Fox News also features Democrats? It's true. Doesn't make them left wing or unbiased.
This is actually going to delay the checks by a number of days. Besides the fact that Trump sees tax money as his personal bank account. Kinda puts the Democrats holding out 24 hours for unemployment benefits in perspective, doesn't it??:
I'm sorry, did the Democratic Party suddenly become vehemently Pro-China while I wasn't looking? Yes, i'm saying this is a general reflection of their views on allowable discourse. There is nothing resembling a right-wing partisan bent to this article. Not even a little bit. This isn't some full-throated defense of Kavanaugh we are looking at here, or an argument for reducing immigration, nor anything that would offend the sensibility of your average WaPo journo. It's simply accusing the Chinese companies of doing the things that they are doing.
If this is the best cherry picking can do to establish the existence of a consistent right-wing presence on WaPo, then we might as well call that idea as good as dead.
Did you know that Fox News also features Democrats? It's true. Doesn't make them left wing or unbiased.
Todays conservative take from WaPo- "conservative media sucks"
Now this is totally accurate and I wouldn't want to diminish that, but their use of token conservative figures demonstrably does more to boost their own ideology than do anything to threaten it.
Whether or not they are "Washington Post" journalists or "PostEverything" journalists is irrelevant. The are journalists, and journalists also give opinions. As the statement goes, WaPo debuted PostEverything. It was created specifically to serve as their subsidiary. By Politico's own estimation, they both have similar business models.
I dunno how many times this has to be explained but it's clear that you're unwilling to concede a point and frankly are continuing to exhibit an illiteracy when it comes to newspapers. Newspapers have for a long time allowed guests to write columns or opinion pieces. They have also had columnists who have an expertise in a given field. But they are not "journalists" and using their opinions to talk about what "journalists" think is a major league category error.
Furthermore, it's *not* the case that journalists "give opinions" in their media outlet. In fact, the overwhelming majority of the reporters at an outlet like the Washington Post will never write an opinion article in that outlet. It seems you're determined to craft a narrative where objective news outlets are untrustworthy. But it's clear from reading your posts that you both don't read newspapers in any kind of thorough manner and don't even know *how* to read them properly.
As for diversity of opinion at the Post, my point was hardly to cherry pick with the example of Republican Senators. Merely to show that *NON JOURNALISTS* regularly get published in newspapers. Does Sen. Jon Cornyn suddenly become a "journalist" by your definition because he has a WaPo article? He's gotten several op-eds in national newspapers over the years, by the way. Would an article by him be a good anecdote to use in building a case about what "journalists" think? No sensible person would think this way.
Nor does a newspaper publishing a column mean they agree with its argument at all, merely that they think their readers will find it interesting, useful or important. Hell, US newspapers have published op-ed articles by the presidents of foreign countries!
But if you want to say that the Post rarely publishes conservative opinion and that I'm forced to cherry pick, you're dead wrong. This is literally a screenshot from right now:
Hugh Hewitt, Megan McCardle, Kathleen Parker. All regular columnists. None of them liberals. Worth noting as well, a column by former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Lawrence Summers up there, who are *NOT JOURNALISTS*.
I don't see any neutrality here, really. There isn't a single right wing opinion in that screenshot, and some of these non-liberals are still quite strongly anti Trump given the headlines. This all fits with the general political persuasion of the organization itself. There is obviously an overwhelming bias in favor of their general belief system. This is pretty much the case everywhere, and it's really hard to argue against.
As I said, i'm not too interested in discussing the semantics of who is and isn't a journalist. The definition of it is inherently sorta vague in the 21st century. If we go by any dictionary definition, it certainly fits, but there is more to it than that. I am sympathetic to the idea that "journalist" should be a more strict term for a more professional class, but that also seems kind of outdated in the era of mass communication, and certainly no such class of people exist at the current time.
I don't see any neutrality here, really. There isn't a single right wing opinion in that screenshot, and some of these non-liberals are still quite strongly anti Trump given the headlines. This all fits with the general political persuasion of the organization itself. There is obviously an overwhelming bias in favor of their general belief system. This is pretty much the case everywhere, and it's really hard to argue against.
As I said, i'm not too interested in discussing the semantics of who is and isn't a journalist. The definition of it is inherently sorta vague in the 21st century. If we go by any dictionary definition, it certainly fits, but there is more to it than that. I am sympathetic to the idea that "journalist" should be a more strict term for a more professional class, but that also seems kind of outdated in the era of mass communication, and certainly no such class of people exist at the current time.
Neutrality is silly. There's liars and propagandists and crazy people, they don't need to be given anything. If we treated everything neutrally we'd still be fighting about vaccines being bad and the earth being flat.
This is actually going to delay the checks by a number of days. Besides the fact that Trump sees tax money as his personal bank account. Kinda puts the Democrats holding out 24 hours for unemployment benefits in perspective, doesn't it??:
Trump insisting on the stimulus checks having his signature is what caused your corona relief check to be so delayed.
Where are all the people that were up in arms when Dems were negotiating to get you a bigger check? Where are all the hand wringers who were crying that Dems were delaying a desperately needed payment because they can't pay their bill?
Trump delayed your check so that he could break protocol and put his signature on a check that does not come from him at all. You see in America there's this thing called the Constitution, and I cherish it, and the power of the purse lies solely with Congress. So Trump's little stunt delayed your and every American's coronavirus relief payment.
An Indiana GOP congressman says he wants more Americans to die of coronavirus, because that's the lesser of two evils compared to the Gross Domestic Product dropping.
All he cares about is the sound bite and the money that comes with it.
This I agree with, well said.
Now on Milo the "Catholic Queer Greek/Jew that likes black men" self proclaimed, If he is what passes for fascist these days we have nothing to worry about.
Milo's completely irrelevant these days but there's actual documented evidence of his work to promote the alt-right.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLNLPIRS62g - That appears to be Richard Spencer doing that Nazi salute in a gathering of white supremacists while Milo sings "America the Beautiful."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Röhm - Ernst Röhm is well documented as a gay member of the Nazi party, before he was killed during the Night of Long Knives.
Anyway, fascism in and of itself is not specific to any particular race, it's about nationalism. A common manifestation of it is white nationalism, which we see currently in the US and UK, as well as other European nations. But we can see the Proud Boys actively recruit men of color, and Andy Ngo, who is Vietnamese-American, but who is a threat to Portland's communities and provides kill lists to Atomwaffen, as they say in some part of the internets.
Trump said before he was considering whether to withhold US money from the WHO and has now said he is indeed going to do that, pending the outcome of a full review. Obviously I've never been a fan of Trump, but this seems incredible even by his standards. I'll probably regret posting this, but my immediate response is this man should not even be in charge of a corner grocery store.
The 'rationale' for this decision seems to have the following aspects:
- the WHO opposition to travel restrictions was flawed.
This needs a bit of context. The reason the WHO opposed such restrictions was their view that they would be difficult to make effective. That could lead to the sort of situation seen in Italy where Chinese residents were prevented from flying back to Italy, so made their way there by other means without any monitoring. This appears to have been a major reason for the unreported spread in Northern Italy which kick-started their epidemic. It seems to me highly likely the same sort of thing happened in the US to at least some extent - Trump did not ban Chinese entry at the end of January, but just cancelled flights direct from mainland China.
The WHO also said that entry screening linked to tracking & tracing would be more effective than travel bans. Those countries, such as South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan, that put effort into this have been more effective than the US in containing the disease.
- delay by the WHO in making clear the extent of the problem
There was a 3 week delay between the first report of a new disease by China on 31st December and a field visit by WHO staff on 20/21 Jan. Following that visit a WHO meeting on 23 Jan considered whether to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern, but by a majority decided not to. Instead they published travel advice before making the declaration on 30 Jan.
In retrospect, it's of course possible to argue that the WHO were too slow to respond, but that's at least partly because we now know the seriousness of the disease - that was not so obvious in early Jan. Even at the meeting on 23 Jan there were only 9 known cases in the entire world outside China (571 inside it). There was plenty of criticism of the WHO for 'raising unnecessary concerns' even following the decision on 30 Jan, so it would have required a very brave decision to formally declare an international emergency earlier.
- flaws in the advice offered by the WHO
I've posted before that there is a reasonable argument for saying the WHO should have argued more strongly for the use of personal protective equipment such as face masks. Another area where they have been arguably too conservative is their recommendation for social distancing of only 1 meter apart.
In both cases though, the WHO advice is geared towards providing a single source of advice for the whole world. A distance of 1m may seem too conservative to me in my comfortable suburban situation, but might still seem incredibly difficult to achieve in an overcrowded shanty town or migrant camp. I understand why the WHO has wanted to stick to a single set of authoritative advice. However, with the improvements of communications technology, I think this is something that should be reviewed in future - could the WHO work in conjunction with national governments to issue more bespoke advice? There would be clear downsides to that and it would create obvious tensions where people in some countries pointed to others and claimed they were being treated as second class, but I think it would be worth at least considering.
Even if I agreed that the WHO had performed more poorly than most national governments (which I don't), it would still be an incredibly poor decision to block their funding during this sort of crisis. A review of everyone's performance will certainly be needed, but for the immediate future it's more important to work together to find the best way to deal with Covid-19. The WHO currently needs more funding to help address this disease (while still continuing with their other work), not less.
I think the real reasons for withholding money from the WHO are:
1) part of Trump's standard tactics to blame everyone except him ...
2) Trump's belief that whenever he (by which he means the US government) pays money to anyone they should do whatever he tells them to. In fact, while the US is the largest donor to the WHO, it doesn't contribute a disproportionate amount and it seems pretty ridiculous to me to suggest the US should have some sort of operational control - even if they were well placed to do that (which they are not). The following graph shows the contributions from various places to the WHO Programme budget (that's their main operational budget, which accounts for 79% of the total WHO budget). The US contribution is just over $400m out of a total $2160m, which is proportionately low compared to the about 25% US share of global GDP (the Gates Foundation by the way contributes about $240m).
In the same briefing Trump made the statement about the WHO, he also said that he will be authorizing governors shortly to open up their States. Leaving aside whether he has any such power of authorization, he's saying that there are around 20 States which are in a good position to open up in the near future (even before 1 May), with all the others to follow as soon as they are ready.
On another day I might have said more about this. For now though I'll just note that in principle I agree there is a need to think about the longer term and there is a balance to be struck between protecting people against Covid-19 and protecting their lives and livelihoods in all other ways. Views about what that balance is will obviously depend on the relative importance you place on different aspects and that will certainly differ according to your political convictions. However, what should not differ is a commitment to consider the evidence in an impartial fashion. I'm highly skeptical about whether it is possible for the Trump administration to consider this balance in such a way.
Trump said before he was considering whether to withhold US money from the WHO and has now said he is indeed going to do that, pending the outcome of a full review. Obviously I've never been a fan of Trump, but this seems incredible even by his standards. I'll probably regret posting this, but my immediate response is this man should not even be in charge of a corner grocery store.
The 'rationale' for this decision seems to have the following aspects:
... I think the real reasons for withholding money from the WHO are:
1) part of Trump's standard tactics to blame everyone except him ...
This is the whole reason. The rest is excuses made by him and his yes-men.
In the same briefing Trump made the statement about the WHO, he also said that he will be authorizing governors shortly to open up their States. Leaving aside whether he has any such power of authorization, he's saying that there are around 20 States which are in a good position to open up in the near future (even before 1 May), with all the others to follow as soon as they are ready.
Trump said that he will be authorizing governors shortly to open up their States. Trump is so ridiculous. He doesn't tell states to shut down. Now he's going to tell them to open up.
Why?
Trump's tactics to blame everyone except him and Trump's tactic to take credit for everything that is good. It's the same reason the guy insisted his ugly ass signature needed to be on the coronavirus checks that are from congress. And a lot of people will see those checks and believe it. It's honestly pathetic.
So he pretends he's not in charge and all the states have to fend for themselves.
He has "absolute authority" but he'll take "no responsibility".
It's just insulting and sad that actual people with families and jobs and brains actually think this shameless grifter is anything other than a con artist. How much do you MAGA types hate other people that these type of lies convince you of anything?
All he cares about is the sound bite and the money that comes with it.
This I agree with, well said.
Now on Milo the "Catholic Queer Greek/Jew that likes black men" self proclaimed, If he is what passes for fascist these days we have nothing to worry about.
Milo's completely irrelevant these days but there's actual documented evidence of his work to promote the alt-right.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLNLPIRS62g - That appears to be Richard Spencer doing that Nazi salute in a gathering of white supremacists while Milo sings "America the Beautiful."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Röhm - Ernst Röhm is well documented as a gay member of the Nazi party, before he was killed during the Night of Long Knives.
Anyway, fascism in and of itself is not specific to any particular race, it's about nationalism. A common manifestation of it is white nationalism, which we see currently in the US and UK, as well as other European nations. But we can see the Proud Boys actively recruit men of color, and Andy Ngo, who is Vietnamese-American, but who is a threat to Portland's communities and provides kill lists to Atomwaffen, as they say in some part of the internets.
Of course there were Jews in the Nazi party, Ashke(nazi).
The Proud Boys or ALt-right/lite have every right to exist if Antifa and other Marxist Anarchist groups do. Both sides these days are provocateurs and shit disturbers for hire. People who affiliate themselves or associate with these groups should be drawn and quartered.
Also I don't understand why people say only Fascism is Nationalistic, Communism is also. China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos and Vietnam.
I don't see any neutrality here, really. There isn't a single right wing opinion in that screenshot, and some of these non-liberals are still quite strongly anti Trump given the headlines. This all fits with the general political persuasion of the organization itself. There is obviously an overwhelming bias in favor of their general belief system. This is pretty much the case everywhere, and it's really hard to argue against.
As I said, i'm not too interested in discussing the semantics of who is and isn't a journalist. The definition of it is inherently sorta vague in the 21st century. If we go by any dictionary definition, it certainly fits, but there is more to it than that. I am sympathetic to the idea that "journalist" should be a more strict term for a more professional class, but that also seems kind of outdated in the era of mass communication, and certainly no such class of people exist at the current time.
You're clearly not interested in being convinced of my original point. I'm just going to state the argument again in brief form, because I think it's important for people to recognize a certain dangerous problem that's widespread among American conservatives right now.
You attempted to cast aspersions on a whole profession -- journalists -- by citing an essay written by a history professor.
I think the real reasons for withholding money from the WHO are:
1) part of Trump's standard tactics to blame everyone except him ...
2) Trump's belief that whenever he (by which he means the US government) pays money to anyone they should do whatever he tells them to.
What we're seeing are the fruits of a larger and decades-long project by American conservatives, imo. The smearing and attempted dismantling of all sources of authority or information outside of their control. Blaming and discrediting the WHO is part and parcel of blaming and discrediting universities, scientists, journalists, and pretty much every independent source of authority or information building in the world.
It's obviously not every conservative voter or politician in the US who feels this way. However, this ideology that all information or authority must flow through the political party and its movement's adherent is pretty widespread. Obviously this isn't unique to US conservatives (to a great extent this was the playbook of Chavez's party in Venezuela) but it's peculiar because few parties this radically divorced from reality have this much power.
I think the real reasons for withholding money from the WHO are:
1) part of Trump's standard tactics to blame everyone except him ...
2) Trump's belief that whenever he (by which he means the US government) pays money to anyone they should do whatever he tells them to.
What we're seeing are the fruits of a larger and decades-long project by American conservatives, imo. The smearing and attempted dismantling of all sources of authority or information outside of their control. Blaming and discrediting the WHO is part and parcel of blaming and discrediting universities, scientists, journalists, and pretty much every independent source of authority or information building in the world.
It's obviously not every conservative voter or politician in the US who feels this way. However, this ideology that all information or authority must flow through the political party and its movement's adherent is pretty widespread. Obviously this isn't unique to US conservatives (to a great extent this was the playbook of Chavez's party in Venezuela) but it's peculiar because few parties this radically divorced from reality have this much power.
I agree there's a desire for control, which sits poorly with the shared sovereignty implicit in international organizations. The powerful people concerned certainly want to take advantage of the greater inter-connectedness of the world (through business, travel, media etc), but don't recognize the logic that there needs to be constraints on their own behavior if they wish to place constraints on others.
It's certainly possible to argue that the action against the WHO is simply seizing on an excuse to continue the assault by this administration on international relationships more generally. While the US has always had a strong streak of wishing to go it alone, that's come out far more into the open in the last 3 years. Examples of that include:
- announcing withdrawal from the UN Human Rights Council in 2018
- announcing withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement in 2019
- withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018, despite that withdrawal being contrary to a UN Security Council resolution (for a smaller country, that action would have been likely to result in sanctions on them)
- ending co-operation arrangements with the International Criminal Court in 2018 (the US was never actually a member)
- announcing full withdrawal from UNESCO in 2017 (it had stopped paying fees in 2011 under Obama, in protest at Palestinian admission.
- refusing to nominate to the WTOs arbitration panel since 2017 (meaning there is currently no mechanism to resolve disputes under the WTO).
There are also numerous examples of threatening language to institutions such as the UN, NATO and the G7.
The "WHO" is the exact kind of thing his base will latch onto. They can't assign him the blame. They'd rather die than admit they were wrong. "WHO" sounds shady, sounds globalist. To them, it might as well be COBRA from GI Joe.
My aunt sent me a Facebook post last week of 3 family members discussing this. I am not exaggerating any of this. The working theory that day was that Bill Gates and Dr. Brix had manufactured the virus in order to get everyone vaccinated in some kind of globalist plot to take down Trump. Nevermind holding this idea in your head and at the same time thinking Trump, who has everything totally under control, is just letting this Bond villain (Dr. Brix) remain in his Administration. I told my aunt not to even bother responding. There is no rescuing anyone from a rabbit-hole that deep.
Trump and right-wing media are engaged in the most Orwellian messaging campaign I have ever seen. They spent an entire month pretending (and I say pretend because they damn well knew better) the virus was "just the flu" and a "Democratic and media hoax". There are HOURS of video tape and audio of this. And they are insisting that never happened. It is a stunning display of their intent and guilt:
"The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command".
As for what @Grond0 mentioned about Trump being able to "authorize and order" Governors to open up their states, he has no such authority in any capacity, and it isn't even debatable. It's not worth having a discussion about. And any "conservative" who is arguing that he does has revealed themselves to be a complete fraud who should never be listened to about anything again. Every since African-Americans were (ostensibly) given rights in this country, we've been drowning in a litany about "state's rights" from the American right-wing. Now, all of a sudden, the President has absolute power to order states to end local health directives. Trump is actually wholly impotent in this situation, and he knows it. The Governors (even some Republican ones like DeWine in Ohio and Hogan in Maryland) realize they aren't dealing with a rational person or honest broker. So they have made the decision to phase him out entirely. Trump obviously doesn't like this, because (as I have said dozens of times) he believes when he won the election "ownership" of America transferred to him (see him putting his name on the paper stimulus checks, as if our tax dollars are his personal bank account). So he is "declaring" his authority over them. He has no such authority.
Edit: Just one example of Trump, on camera, praising both China and the WHO two months ago:
Here's an small sampling of the multiple narratives/who is to blame evolution we have seen over the past 60 days:
1.) Just the flu
2.) Democratic hoax
3.) China's fault
4.) Obama's fault
5.) Governor's fault
6.) I was distracted because of impeachment
7.) Media's fault
8.) No one could have predicted
9.) WHO's fault
What you have to understand about right-wing media is that yesterday doesn't exist, much less a week or a month ago. Every 24 hours is a clean slate, a restart. They DON'T CARE that there is tape and audio of them taking completely contradictory positions. They know their audience will eat their shit anyway.
All he cares about is the sound bite and the money that comes with it.
This I agree with, well said.
Now on Milo the "Catholic Queer Greek/Jew that likes black men" self proclaimed, If he is what passes for fascist these days we have nothing to worry about.
Milo's completely irrelevant these days but there's actual documented evidence of his work to promote the alt-right.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLNLPIRS62g - That appears to be Richard Spencer doing that Nazi salute in a gathering of white supremacists while Milo sings "America the Beautiful."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Röhm - Ernst Röhm is well documented as a gay member of the Nazi party, before he was killed during the Night of Long Knives.
Anyway, fascism in and of itself is not specific to any particular race, it's about nationalism. A common manifestation of it is white nationalism, which we see currently in the US and UK, as well as other European nations. But we can see the Proud Boys actively recruit men of color, and Andy Ngo, who is Vietnamese-American, but who is a threat to Portland's communities and provides kill lists to Atomwaffen, as they say in some part of the internets.
Of course there were Jews in the Nazi party, Ashke(nazi).
The Proud Boys or ALt-right/lite have every right to exist if Antifa and other Marxist Anarchist groups do. Both sides these days are provocateurs and shit disturbers for hire. People who affiliate themselves or associate with these groups should be drawn and quartered.
Also I don't understand why people say only Fascism is Nationalistic, Communism is also. China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos and Vietnam.
We're all still waiting on the first homicide from Antifa, and it's been almost 4 years. Know of at least 3 deaths that can be DIRECTLY tied to the Alt-right world-view (Charlottesville and the Portland train stabbings). And that number is only that low if you're gonna flat-out ignore the 22 people killed in El Paso perpetrated by a guy who wrote a manifesto about how he was going there to murder immigrants. But we won't ignore that. So, at BEST as of April 2020, the death scorecard is: Alt-Right-25 Antifa-0. But BOTH SIDES!!!!!!!!!!
All he cares about is the sound bite and the money that comes with it.
This I agree with, well said.
Now on Milo the "Catholic Queer Greek/Jew that likes black men" self proclaimed, If he is what passes for fascist these days we have nothing to worry about.
Milo's completely irrelevant these days but there's actual documented evidence of his work to promote the alt-right.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLNLPIRS62g - That appears to be Richard Spencer doing that Nazi salute in a gathering of white supremacists while Milo sings "America the Beautiful."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Röhm - Ernst Röhm is well documented as a gay member of the Nazi party, before he was killed during the Night of Long Knives.
Anyway, fascism in and of itself is not specific to any particular race, it's about nationalism. A common manifestation of it is white nationalism, which we see currently in the US and UK, as well as other European nations. But we can see the Proud Boys actively recruit men of color, and Andy Ngo, who is Vietnamese-American, but who is a threat to Portland's communities and provides kill lists to Atomwaffen, as they say in some part of the internets.
Of course there were Jews in the Nazi party, Ashke(nazi).
The Proud Boys or ALt-right/lite have every right to exist if Antifa and other Marxist Anarchist groups do. Both sides these days are provocateurs and shit disturbers for hire. People who affiliate themselves or associate with these groups should be drawn and quartered.
Also I don't understand why people say only Fascism is Nationalistic, Communism is also. China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos and Vietnam.
We're all still waiting on the first homicide from Antifa, and it's been almost 4 years. Know of at least 3 deaths that can be DIRECTLY tied to the Alt-right world-view (Charlottesville and the Portland train stabbings). And that number is only that low if you're gonna flat-out ignore the 22 people killed in El Paso perpetrated by a guy who wrote a manifesto about how he was going there to murder immigrants. But we won't ignore that. So, at BEST as of April 2020, the death scorecard is: Alt-Right-25 Antifa-0. But BOTH SIDES!!!!!!!!!!
Took me two seconds to find this article from late last year. I think the Dayton dude is mentioned. He may not have been a card-carrying antifa member, but if I remember right his views overlapped with theirs.
All he cares about is the sound bite and the money that comes with it.
This I agree with, well said.
Now on Milo the "Catholic Queer Greek/Jew that likes black men" self proclaimed, If he is what passes for fascist these days we have nothing to worry about.
Milo's completely irrelevant these days but there's actual documented evidence of his work to promote the alt-right.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLNLPIRS62g - That appears to be Richard Spencer doing that Nazi salute in a gathering of white supremacists while Milo sings "America the Beautiful."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Röhm - Ernst Röhm is well documented as a gay member of the Nazi party, before he was killed during the Night of Long Knives.
Anyway, fascism in and of itself is not specific to any particular race, it's about nationalism. A common manifestation of it is white nationalism, which we see currently in the US and UK, as well as other European nations. But we can see the Proud Boys actively recruit men of color, and Andy Ngo, who is Vietnamese-American, but who is a threat to Portland's communities and provides kill lists to Atomwaffen, as they say in some part of the internets.
Of course there were Jews in the Nazi party, Ashke(nazi).
The Proud Boys or ALt-right/lite have every right to exist if Antifa and other Marxist Anarchist groups do. Both sides these days are provocateurs and shit disturbers for hire. People who affiliate themselves or associate with these groups should be drawn and quartered.
Also I don't understand why people say only Fascism is Nationalistic, Communism is also. China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos and Vietnam.
We're all still waiting on the first homicide from Antifa, and it's been almost 4 years. Know of at least 3 deaths that can be DIRECTLY tied to the Alt-right world-view (Charlottesville and the Portland train stabbings). And that number is only that low if you're gonna flat-out ignore the 22 people killed in El Paso perpetrated by a guy who wrote a manifesto about how he was going there to murder immigrants. But we won't ignore that. So, at BEST as of April 2020, the death scorecard is: Alt-Right-25 Antifa-0. But BOTH SIDES!!!!!!!!!!
Took me two seconds to find this article from late last year. I think the Dayton dude is mentioned. He may not have been a card-carrying antifa member, but if I remember right his views overlapped with theirs.
Andy Ngo is not a trustworthy journalist, sorry. A shame on Newsweek for running a story from him too. Though it does belie the claim that "mainstream media" won't run stories by conservatives, that's for sure.
Isn't it notable that the opening example is of a father in the midst of a custody dispute who also happens to be sympathetic to antifa? No, that's not telling at all? I'm sorry, but *I* wouldn't be so disingenuous to credit violence committed in the midst of a child custody dispute on the political ideology of the parent.
Ngo however is. And notably, that's his headlining example.
Comments
Depending on how you want to count the population, there's between 11,000,000 and 56,000,000 people living there (I give that range based on Urban population or the Metroplex population. It's not clear to me which applies for this situation).
Typically, I wouldnt consider that an "invasion".
Also - we've have a handful of Swedish posters who have come in here in the past and discuss the impact of migrants in Sweden, and it sounds like the "rape capital of the Europe" stuff that was floating around right-wing media outlets over the past few years were misinterpreting and misrepresenting the statistics involved.
Then I clarified my point in a rather long post when I felt people misunderstood me:
I agree those numbers don't seem that significant. Looking at other sources suggests a range of 5k-15k for resident Africans, though there are much larger short-term numbers (business travellers, tourists, students and shoppers). If anything the 1m+ Chinese in Africa would appear to be more significant - particularly given that there is also very considerable investment capital moving from China into Africa.
I've seen no data on the impact of immigration into China. That's so small (World Bank figures for 2015 make it 0.07% of the population for immigration from all other countries, not just Africa) that it's hard to believe it has a major impact on the country as a whole. However, I would be surprised if it did not mirror on a smaller scale the experience elsewhere. The UK for instance had large numbers of immigrants from Eastern Europe as a result of EU enlargement. The data on that is pretty clear that the immigration improved the UK economy overall, but that there were real concerns at a local level due to clustering of immigration - causing things like pressure on wages and access to public services. That may well be the case in Guangzhou where a very large proportion of African migrants appear to be centred. I would though put those local problems mainly down to failure of government to address local pressures - which should certainly have been possible in the UK given the overall improvement in the country's finances and I guess the same would apply to China.
@ktchong, like BallpointMan I did a quick Google in the way you suggested, but only saw evidence of anti-immigration attitudes - see this piece for example, which reviews why the number of migrants to China has reduced in recent years. Although I looked at quite a number of different sources, I didn't see any evidence of the significant problems you say have been caused by immigration. Can you point me to that evidence?
I'm now hearing 400 people at one meatpacking plant have tested positive. All of those workers have been going to and from work for weeks. While South Dakota is sparsely populated, Sioux Falls most certainly is NOT.
I'll have to argue with you on your first point, though. I am not surprised that anti-African attitudes rose in China following an influx of African immigrants, but I am highly skeptical that African immigrants are raping Chinese women en masse. We've seen those fears pop up before over here in the States during the civil rights era, and I suspect the Chinese public is accepting the same stereotypes (the stereotype that black males are hyper-sexual and hyper-violent) that our own white supremacists liked to spread back in the 20th century. I think stereotypes are just filling the void left by lack of contact with black folks.
Also, while the CCP does try to paint a vision of a harmonious, multi-ethnic China, I doubt the Xi administration is so minority-friendly that it would actually avoid cracking down on violent crime just because the alleged criminals were minorities. After all, we're talking about the same government that is locking up countless people in actual concentration camps in Xinjiang for the crime of being ethnic Uighurs, based on largely groundless fears of terrorism and separatism. The Chinese government touts ethnic harmony as a propaganda tool, but in terms of actual policy, they have no compunctions about targeting minorities.
Hey @ThacoBell did you see that non-filers can update their info with the IRS to get the stimulus payout?
https://www.irs.gov/coronavirus/economic-impact-payments
I don't recall that democracy requires me to think every pandering grifter has something to offer. Bill Maher's the way he is to get ratings - or views, if one prefers. If that man has a real conviction, I haven't seen a sign of it. His discourse is on the level of "schoolyard taunting" despite sounding more intellectual. All he cares about is the sound bite and the money that comes with it.
Also, I don't dismiss Maher because I "disagree" with him. I dismiss Maher because he platforms blatant fascists, such as Milo Y several years ago, and despite his pretense of being a "liberal" or a "progressive" he's not really much different from conservative frauds like Hannity or Limbaugh.
I don't accept "You can't seriously reject a racist version of reality" as a convincing, coherent or valid argument.
Here's a real Chinese "wet market," or as we call them in the US, a grocery store.
https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/coronavirus-covid-19-update-fda-focuses-safety-regulated-products-while-scaling-back-domestic
This I agree with, well said.
Now on Milo the "Catholic Queer Greek/Jew that likes black men" self proclaimed, If he is what passes for fascist these days we have nothing to worry about.
Whether or not they are "Washington Post" journalists or "PostEverything" journalists is irrelevant. They are journalists, and journalists also give opinions. As the statement goes, WaPo debuted PostEverything. It was created specifically to serve as their subsidiary. By Politico's own estimation, they both have similar business models.
Now, what do you call a person who is a longtime writer (one of the first ones, actually) for an online magazine that deals in news, analysis, current events, supposedly expert and non-expert opinions? Most people would call that person a journalist. I find that description perfectly valid, and see little reason to belabor the point more.
https://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2014/01/njs-adam-kushner-to-launch-new-opinion-venture-at-washington-post-181956
https://washpostpr.tumblr.com/post/74723899067/adam-kushner-to-lead-new-digital-opinion-venture
I'm sorry, did the Democratic Party suddenly become vehemently Pro-China while I wasn't looking? Yes, i'm saying this is a general reflection of their views on allowable discourse. There is nothing resembling a right-wing partisan bent to this article. Not even a little bit. This isn't some full-throated defense of Kavanaugh we are looking at here, or an argument for reducing immigration, nor anything that would offend the sensibility of your average WaPo journo. It's simply accusing the Chinese companies of doing the things that they are doing.
If this is the best cherry picking can do to establish the existence of a consistent right-wing presence on WaPo, then we might as well call that idea as good as dead.
Did you know that Fox News also features Democrats? It's true. Doesn't make them left wing or unbiased.
Todays conservative take from WaPo- "conservative media sucks"
Now this is totally accurate and I wouldn't want to diminish that, but their use of token conservative figures demonstrably does more to boost their own ideology than do anything to threaten it.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/04/14/fox-news-partisan-pandemic/
I dunno how many times this has to be explained but it's clear that you're unwilling to concede a point and frankly are continuing to exhibit an illiteracy when it comes to newspapers. Newspapers have for a long time allowed guests to write columns or opinion pieces. They have also had columnists who have an expertise in a given field. But they are not "journalists" and using their opinions to talk about what "journalists" think is a major league category error.
Furthermore, it's *not* the case that journalists "give opinions" in their media outlet. In fact, the overwhelming majority of the reporters at an outlet like the Washington Post will never write an opinion article in that outlet. It seems you're determined to craft a narrative where objective news outlets are untrustworthy. But it's clear from reading your posts that you both don't read newspapers in any kind of thorough manner and don't even know *how* to read them properly.
As for diversity of opinion at the Post, my point was hardly to cherry pick with the example of Republican Senators. Merely to show that *NON JOURNALISTS* regularly get published in newspapers. Does Sen. Jon Cornyn suddenly become a "journalist" by your definition because he has a WaPo article? He's gotten several op-eds in national newspapers over the years, by the way. Would an article by him be a good anecdote to use in building a case about what "journalists" think? No sensible person would think this way.
Nor does a newspaper publishing a column mean they agree with its argument at all, merely that they think their readers will find it interesting, useful or important. Hell, US newspapers have published op-ed articles by the presidents of foreign countries!
But if you want to say that the Post rarely publishes conservative opinion and that I'm forced to cherry pick, you're dead wrong. This is literally a screenshot from right now:
Hugh Hewitt, Megan McCardle, Kathleen Parker. All regular columnists. None of them liberals. Worth noting as well, a column by former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Lawrence Summers up there, who are *NOT JOURNALISTS*.
As I said, i'm not too interested in discussing the semantics of who is and isn't a journalist. The definition of it is inherently sorta vague in the 21st century. If we go by any dictionary definition, it certainly fits, but there is more to it than that. I am sympathetic to the idea that "journalist" should be a more strict term for a more professional class, but that also seems kind of outdated in the era of mass communication, and certainly no such class of people exist at the current time.
Neutrality is silly. There's liars and propagandists and crazy people, they don't need to be given anything. If we treated everything neutrally we'd still be fighting about vaccines being bad and the earth being flat.
Trump insisting on the stimulus checks having his signature is what caused your corona relief check to be so delayed.
Where are all the people that were up in arms when Dems were negotiating to get you a bigger check? Where are all the hand wringers who were crying that Dems were delaying a desperately needed payment because they can't pay their bill?
Trump delayed your check so that he could break protocol and put his signature on a check that does not come from him at all. You see in America there's this thing called the Constitution, and I cherish it, and the power of the purse lies solely with Congress. So Trump's little stunt delayed your and every American's coronavirus relief payment.
Why does the GOP want Americans dead?
https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/14/politics/trey-hollingsworth-coronavirus/index.html
Milo's completely irrelevant these days but there's actual documented evidence of his work to promote the alt-right.
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/heres-how-breitbart-and-milo-smuggled-white-nationalism - Check out this well documented story about how Milo used his position at Breitbart to bring white supremacy front and center.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_Röhm - Ernst Röhm is well documented as a gay member of the Nazi party, before he was killed during the Night of Long Knives.
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-12-24-mn-12209-story.html - There were Jewish men in the Nazi's army.
Anyway, fascism in and of itself is not specific to any particular race, it's about nationalism. A common manifestation of it is white nationalism, which we see currently in the US and UK, as well as other European nations. But we can see the Proud Boys actively recruit men of color, and Andy Ngo, who is Vietnamese-American, but who is a threat to Portland's communities and provides kill lists to Atomwaffen, as they say in some part of the internets.
The 'rationale' for this decision seems to have the following aspects:
- the WHO opposition to travel restrictions was flawed.
This needs a bit of context. The reason the WHO opposed such restrictions was their view that they would be difficult to make effective. That could lead to the sort of situation seen in Italy where Chinese residents were prevented from flying back to Italy, so made their way there by other means without any monitoring. This appears to have been a major reason for the unreported spread in Northern Italy which kick-started their epidemic. It seems to me highly likely the same sort of thing happened in the US to at least some extent - Trump did not ban Chinese entry at the end of January, but just cancelled flights direct from mainland China.
The WHO also said that entry screening linked to tracking & tracing would be more effective than travel bans. Those countries, such as South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan, that put effort into this have been more effective than the US in containing the disease.
- delay by the WHO in making clear the extent of the problem
There was a 3 week delay between the first report of a new disease by China on 31st December and a field visit by WHO staff on 20/21 Jan. Following that visit a WHO meeting on 23 Jan considered whether to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern, but by a majority decided not to. Instead they published travel advice before making the declaration on 30 Jan.
In retrospect, it's of course possible to argue that the WHO were too slow to respond, but that's at least partly because we now know the seriousness of the disease - that was not so obvious in early Jan. Even at the meeting on 23 Jan there were only 9 known cases in the entire world outside China (571 inside it). There was plenty of criticism of the WHO for 'raising unnecessary concerns' even following the decision on 30 Jan, so it would have required a very brave decision to formally declare an international emergency earlier.
- flaws in the advice offered by the WHO
I've posted before that there is a reasonable argument for saying the WHO should have argued more strongly for the use of personal protective equipment such as face masks. Another area where they have been arguably too conservative is their recommendation for social distancing of only 1 meter apart.
In both cases though, the WHO advice is geared towards providing a single source of advice for the whole world. A distance of 1m may seem too conservative to me in my comfortable suburban situation, but might still seem incredibly difficult to achieve in an overcrowded shanty town or migrant camp. I understand why the WHO has wanted to stick to a single set of authoritative advice. However, with the improvements of communications technology, I think this is something that should be reviewed in future - could the WHO work in conjunction with national governments to issue more bespoke advice? There would be clear downsides to that and it would create obvious tensions where people in some countries pointed to others and claimed they were being treated as second class, but I think it would be worth at least considering.
Even if I agreed that the WHO had performed more poorly than most national governments (which I don't), it would still be an incredibly poor decision to block their funding during this sort of crisis. A review of everyone's performance will certainly be needed, but for the immediate future it's more important to work together to find the best way to deal with Covid-19. The WHO currently needs more funding to help address this disease (while still continuing with their other work), not less.
I think the real reasons for withholding money from the WHO are:
1) part of Trump's standard tactics to blame everyone except him ...
2) Trump's belief that whenever he (by which he means the US government) pays money to anyone they should do whatever he tells them to. In fact, while the US is the largest donor to the WHO, it doesn't contribute a disproportionate amount and it seems pretty ridiculous to me to suggest the US should have some sort of operational control - even if they were well placed to do that (which they are not). The following graph shows the contributions from various places to the WHO Programme budget (that's their main operational budget, which accounts for 79% of the total WHO budget). The US contribution is just over $400m out of a total $2160m, which is proportionately low compared to the about 25% US share of global GDP (the Gates Foundation by the way contributes about $240m).
In the same briefing Trump made the statement about the WHO, he also said that he will be authorizing governors shortly to open up their States. Leaving aside whether he has any such power of authorization, he's saying that there are around 20 States which are in a good position to open up in the near future (even before 1 May), with all the others to follow as soon as they are ready.
On another day I might have said more about this. For now though I'll just note that in principle I agree there is a need to think about the longer term and there is a balance to be struck between protecting people against Covid-19 and protecting their lives and livelihoods in all other ways. Views about what that balance is will obviously depend on the relative importance you place on different aspects and that will certainly differ according to your political convictions. However, what should not differ is a commitment to consider the evidence in an impartial fashion. I'm highly skeptical about whether it is possible for the Trump administration to consider this balance in such a way.
This is the whole reason. The rest is excuses made by him and his yes-men.
Trump said that he will be authorizing governors shortly to open up their States. Trump is so ridiculous. He doesn't tell states to shut down. Now he's going to tell them to open up.
Why?
Trump's tactics to blame everyone except him and Trump's tactic to take credit for everything that is good. It's the same reason the guy insisted his ugly ass signature needed to be on the coronavirus checks that are from congress. And a lot of people will see those checks and believe it. It's honestly pathetic.
So he pretends he's not in charge and all the states have to fend for themselves.
He has "absolute authority" but he'll take "no responsibility".
It's just insulting and sad that actual people with families and jobs and brains actually think this shameless grifter is anything other than a con artist. How much do you MAGA types hate other people that these type of lies convince you of anything?
Of course there were Jews in the Nazi party, Ashke(nazi).
The Proud Boys or ALt-right/lite have every right to exist if Antifa and other Marxist Anarchist groups do. Both sides these days are provocateurs and shit disturbers for hire. People who affiliate themselves or associate with these groups should be drawn and quartered.
Also I don't understand why people say only Fascism is Nationalistic, Communism is also. China, Cuba, North Korea, Laos and Vietnam.
You're clearly not interested in being convinced of my original point. I'm just going to state the argument again in brief form, because I think it's important for people to recognize a certain dangerous problem that's widespread among American conservatives right now.
You attempted to cast aspersions on a whole profession -- journalists -- by citing an essay written by a history professor.
What we're seeing are the fruits of a larger and decades-long project by American conservatives, imo. The smearing and attempted dismantling of all sources of authority or information outside of their control. Blaming and discrediting the WHO is part and parcel of blaming and discrediting universities, scientists, journalists, and pretty much every independent source of authority or information building in the world.
It's obviously not every conservative voter or politician in the US who feels this way. However, this ideology that all information or authority must flow through the political party and its movement's adherent is pretty widespread. Obviously this isn't unique to US conservatives (to a great extent this was the playbook of Chavez's party in Venezuela) but it's peculiar because few parties this radically divorced from reality have this much power.
I agree there's a desire for control, which sits poorly with the shared sovereignty implicit in international organizations. The powerful people concerned certainly want to take advantage of the greater inter-connectedness of the world (through business, travel, media etc), but don't recognize the logic that there needs to be constraints on their own behavior if they wish to place constraints on others.
It's certainly possible to argue that the action against the WHO is simply seizing on an excuse to continue the assault by this administration on international relationships more generally. While the US has always had a strong streak of wishing to go it alone, that's come out far more into the open in the last 3 years. Examples of that include:
- announcing withdrawal from the UN Human Rights Council in 2018
- announcing withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement in 2019
- withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018, despite that withdrawal being contrary to a UN Security Council resolution (for a smaller country, that action would have been likely to result in sanctions on them)
- ending co-operation arrangements with the International Criminal Court in 2018 (the US was never actually a member)
- announcing full withdrawal from UNESCO in 2017 (it had stopped paying fees in 2011 under Obama, in protest at Palestinian admission.
- refusing to nominate to the WTOs arbitration panel since 2017 (meaning there is currently no mechanism to resolve disputes under the WTO).
There are also numerous examples of threatening language to institutions such as the UN, NATO and the G7.
My aunt sent me a Facebook post last week of 3 family members discussing this. I am not exaggerating any of this. The working theory that day was that Bill Gates and Dr. Brix had manufactured the virus in order to get everyone vaccinated in some kind of globalist plot to take down Trump. Nevermind holding this idea in your head and at the same time thinking Trump, who has everything totally under control, is just letting this Bond villain (Dr. Brix) remain in his Administration. I told my aunt not to even bother responding. There is no rescuing anyone from a rabbit-hole that deep.
Trump and right-wing media are engaged in the most Orwellian messaging campaign I have ever seen. They spent an entire month pretending (and I say pretend because they damn well knew better) the virus was "just the flu" and a "Democratic and media hoax". There are HOURS of video tape and audio of this. And they are insisting that never happened. It is a stunning display of their intent and guilt:
"The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command".
As for what @Grond0 mentioned about Trump being able to "authorize and order" Governors to open up their states, he has no such authority in any capacity, and it isn't even debatable. It's not worth having a discussion about. And any "conservative" who is arguing that he does has revealed themselves to be a complete fraud who should never be listened to about anything again. Every since African-Americans were (ostensibly) given rights in this country, we've been drowning in a litany about "state's rights" from the American right-wing. Now, all of a sudden, the President has absolute power to order states to end local health directives. Trump is actually wholly impotent in this situation, and he knows it. The Governors (even some Republican ones like DeWine in Ohio and Hogan in Maryland) realize they aren't dealing with a rational person or honest broker. So they have made the decision to phase him out entirely. Trump obviously doesn't like this, because (as I have said dozens of times) he believes when he won the election "ownership" of America transferred to him (see him putting his name on the paper stimulus checks, as if our tax dollars are his personal bank account). So he is "declaring" his authority over them. He has no such authority.
Edit: Just one example of Trump, on camera, praising both China and the WHO two months ago:
Here's an small sampling of the multiple narratives/who is to blame evolution we have seen over the past 60 days:
1.) Just the flu
2.) Democratic hoax
3.) China's fault
4.) Obama's fault
5.) Governor's fault
6.) I was distracted because of impeachment
7.) Media's fault
8.) No one could have predicted
9.) WHO's fault
What you have to understand about right-wing media is that yesterday doesn't exist, much less a week or a month ago. Every 24 hours is a clean slate, a restart. They DON'T CARE that there is tape and audio of them taking completely contradictory positions. They know their audience will eat their shit anyway.
We're all still waiting on the first homicide from Antifa, and it's been almost 4 years. Know of at least 3 deaths that can be DIRECTLY tied to the Alt-right world-view (Charlottesville and the Portland train stabbings). And that number is only that low if you're gonna flat-out ignore the 22 people killed in El Paso perpetrated by a guy who wrote a manifesto about how he was going there to murder immigrants. But we won't ignore that. So, at BEST as of April 2020, the death scorecard is: Alt-Right-25 Antifa-0. But BOTH SIDES!!!!!!!!!!
Took me two seconds to find this article from late last year. I think the Dayton dude is mentioned. He may not have been a card-carrying antifa member, but if I remember right his views overlapped with theirs.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.newsweek.com/antifa-far-left-violence-extremism-deadly-year-opnion-1477065?amp=1
Andy Ngo is not a trustworthy journalist, sorry. A shame on Newsweek for running a story from him too. Though it does belie the claim that "mainstream media" won't run stories by conservatives, that's for sure.
Isn't it notable that the opening example is of a father in the midst of a custody dispute who also happens to be sympathetic to antifa? No, that's not telling at all? I'm sorry, but *I* wouldn't be so disingenuous to credit violence committed in the midst of a child custody dispute on the political ideology of the parent.
Ngo however is. And notably, that's his headlining example.