[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by verme (prevaricator)

No, I'll leave the "pwning" game to you and skuj and whoever. You can have it all.

im not in the same side as skuj. but i'm not against him, much less personally, you were the one trying to trigger him and mock him about the fetal position etc

i understand skuj even if i might not agree with him. he's canadian air force, has his doctrines. me i couldn't fit in any army though. they'd kick me out for insubordination after a long jail sentence

Originally Posted by verme (prevaricator)

And what an amazing job the experienced professionals have been doing. Not just in Ukraine, Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Haiti... the list goes on.

yeah, for example jeff sachs economic policies really backfired in haiti and destroyed their economy. but listen: i don't blame him, see. there is a lot of shit that is wrong where humans are not the cause but the instrument of the cause. this is why tragedy is such a longstanding literary genre. people have undestood for a long time that often life just fucks with you and your luck sucks in spite of all the best intentions

(and you forgot to mention gaza)

i don't know that anyone can fix the world. do you think anyone can? i'm not being a nihilist here, i just think our capabilities to do good are very limited and our capabilities to fuck up are extraordinary. and we fuck up even with the best intentions, and often *because* of them

maybe i'm becoming more "conservative" with old age (hence i greeted you as "new old man" when you apparently realized that the new left could be as repressive as the old right). i am wary of grand schemes and revolutionsry promises as i further lose confidence in humans, and therefore in their good intentions and ideals. but i'm not bitter though, at this loss of faith. i can't explain my mental state in this post

Originally Posted by verme (prevaricator)

You know for a doubting thomas you really seem to go out of your way to exempt Biden from any responsibility, when he happens to be the fucking president.
Conveniently disregarding not only the commanding power he has over your own institutions but also the power he has over NATO and the EU.

hahahhaaaa no no, im not "exempting" him nor calling him a great strategist, im just denying you the chance to score cheap partisan points by riding the maersheimer horse against him

that is what i object to here, the appropriation of great ideas for petty ends. mostly because they distort the great ideas by subordinating them to a worthless cause

and further, i am trying to stick to the big ideas presented, which is the interesting stuff

if you listen to mearsheimer and sachs together, you will see that they don't hold "commanding power" in much regard. the commanders are shaped by the institutions, they say this multiple times. even maersheimer said so clearly when discussing the chances of the young! it's right there! by the time they get through the ranks of the institutions they will have changed themselves

if you enjoy the video form, i cannot recommend enough 2 tv landmarks that show how the world really works

1. yes minister, a farce
2. the wire, a tragedy

these are great shows because, although they feature some great characters, they really go to show you that the characters maybe don't make much difference in the end, and that there are other forces shaping events

persons, personalities, personas... a cosmic joke

so like i said previously, i'm willing to concede that maybe the buffoon scores a victory, but i do not profess any sort of "belief" in him or his acolytes. so maybe he scores a victory for america but does it at the expense of europe. just be warned so you don't get your hopes dashed if it happens

Originally Posted by verme (prevaricator)

But I guess it's my fault for expecting better from you.

don't get emotional. i'm sorry if you don't like my views, but i won't adjust my honest views in order to either please or trigger people

and please understand that i'm giving you the respect of refusing to play a scoring game. i am following the ideas you introduced and refusing to reduce them into blame games for partisan ends. in the end i did care to listen to what you offered. maybe i listened too well. it's the way i'm wired

i mean i can play games too, but this isn't the youtube comments and i take you for an intelligent person ultimately more interested in understanding things than in "winning" some contest