Open mike 21/10/2019

Written By: - Date published: 7:00 am, October 21st, 2019 - 42 comments
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42 comments on “Open mike 21/10/2019 ”

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  1. Andre 1
    21 October 2019 at 8:59 am

    Pootee on the Geneva Convention: fuk dat shit.

    How much more stuff like this is needed before those cheering on the rise of nationalism and isolationism, and the collapse of international institutions and ideals start to think 'hmm, maybe not so great after all' ?

    https://thehill.com/opinion/international/466531-russias-snub-of-geneva-convention-protocol-sets-dangerous-precedent

    • Adrian Thornton 1.1
      21 October 2019 at 9:08 am

      And who exactly in your mind amongst the main powers are defending and abiding to those 'international institutions and ideals'?

      • Andre 1.1.1
        21 October 2019 at 9:16 am

        It's one thing for war crimes to be done covertly and the perpetrators to be embarrassed when busted and at least make a token effort to do better for the future.

        It's a much bigger step blowing the door wide open for atrocities against vulnerable populations for a great power to openly repudiate the idea that certain atrocities are actually war crimes.

        • Adrian Thornton 1.1.1.1
          21 October 2019 at 9:19 am

          Maybe instead of obfuscating as usual, just answer the question directly for once pal.

          • Andre 1.1.1.1.1
            21 October 2019 at 9:24 am

            Your question was based on a false premise. Reread my comments and see if you can work out what the false premise you tried to frame your question on actually was.

            • Adrian Thornton 1.1.1.1.1.1
              21 October 2019 at 10:46 am

              Here is a really good debate that starts with Trump's Foreign Policy but ends up being about these "international institutions and ideals" specifically around the UN….



              • McFlock …
                21 October 2019 at 12:22 pm

                40 minute video instead of making a point, huh.

                Feel free to share the relevance to a discussion about the difference between failing to live up to humane ideals and repudiating them outright.

        • Brigid 1.1.1.2
          21 October 2019 at 1:17 pm

          "It's one thing for war crimes to be done covertly and the perpetrators to be embarrassed when busted and at least make a token effort to do better for the future."

          Eh?

          Which said perpetrator makes a token effort to do better for the future?

          • Andre 1.1.1.2.1
            21 October 2019 at 2:35 pm

            The US sometimes does. The conditions for those very rare occasions seem to be that there is a current Democrat president, and said crimes occurred under a previous Repug president, and the crimes have been comprehensively exposed by the press, and there's no political downside for the incumbent Dem in being seen to be operating differently.

            Not aware of the rooskies ever making an effort to do better. Their MO seems to be just trying to figure out how they got busted, and what brutal repression techniques are best suited to make it less likely they'll be busted in the future.

    • ianmac 1.2
      21 October 2019 at 9:50 am

      USA snubbed the Geneva Convention for the Iraq war.

      • Andre 1.2.1
        21 October 2019 at 10:00 am

        Yup. The poms did too. As likely did a bunch of other participants. And the US refusal to accept ICC jurisdiction is a major obstacle in the way of improving simple decency of relations around the world.

        But every new open repudiation of something like the Geneva Convention by a significant power is a noteworthy contribution to the crumbling of the international framework trying to protect simple basic human rights.

    • aom 1.3
      21 October 2019 at 10:25 am

      Some additional context: – https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-warcrimes-convention/russias-putin-revokes-geneva-convention-protocol-on-war-crimes-victims-idUSKBN1WW2IN. Apologies – not from RT so can't ' blame the Russians' for the reporting.

    • francesca 1.4
      21 October 2019 at 11:02 am

      Well, as your link helpfully points out, the US has never even deigned to ratify the particular protocol in question

      And their actions in Raqqa don't give any confidence they informally adhere to the principle of the protocol.

      Now the proxies they armed and trained to fight Assad( the moderate rebels ) have become the "Turkish backed Syrian fighters" killing and committing atrocities on the Kurds.

      I'm not a huge fan of American political jargon so moonbat convergence, second option bias etc etc means nothing.Presumably these are arcane insults, not meant to clarify but shut down

      • Andre 1.4.1
        21 October 2019 at 11:43 am

        That's a nice bit of whataboutery to try to justify a shit action from a nasty authoritarian dictator. But my concern is around the cumulative effects of all of these small actions tearing down the few small guardrails against barbarism that managed to get erected last century. See my other comments for a few more clues about my views.

        ps: google is your friend if you don't know the meaning of something.

  2. Adrian Thornton 2
    21 October 2019 at 9:02 am

    The dangerous Russiagate conspiracy takes it's natural course to the absurd..

    Max Blumenthal on why Hillary Clinton smeared Tulsi Gabbard and Jill Stein

    • Andre 2.1
      21 October 2019 at 9:06 am

      Just outta curiosity, how many hours a day do you spend winding yourself up watching Russiagate propaganda videos put out by convergence moonbat and second-option bias fantasist polemicists?

      • Kevin 2.1.1
        21 October 2019 at 10:09 am

        Are you actually trying to be funny? Just a bit unsure.

      • aom 2.1.2
        21 October 2019 at 10:23 am

        Being informed takes a bit of time. Reading headlines then making half-cocked and flanneled comments with pomposity and accompanying insults – not so much.

        • Andre 2.1.2.1
          21 October 2019 at 10:39 am

          Indeed. Video is such a slow medium that I really wonder why someone would post a link to a 21 minute video with just the producer's name (obvious appeal to authority) and just a few words that don't really tell you anything about the content, except that one of the words is a pejorative popular in a particular very small political group.

          A written article with the same information content could be read and absorbed in just a few minutes, even if the vid was fully information-dense, which very few are.

          • Kevin 2.1.2.1.1
            21 October 2019 at 10:58 am

            Simple question then:

            Do you think Hilary Clinton was talking about Tulsi Gabbard, with regard to her comments? Yes or no?

            If no, which other female candidate could her comments have been directed at?

            • Andre 2.1.2.1.1.1
              21 October 2019 at 11:12 am

              I haven't actually read Hillary's comments' See 2.1.4.1.

              Guessing from the headlines I haven't been able to avoid, yes Hillary probably was smearing Gabbard. While my opinion of Gabbard is very poor*, it seems to me a smear she doesn't deserve. At most there's some convergence of interest, not any kind of cooperation between Gabbard and Putin. This is just one of many exhibits for why I really wish Hillary would just STFU and fade off the scene.

              *It utterly mystifies me why self-styled anti-war types idolise Gabbard. Do they not actually look into her history and record? She's strongly war-enthusiastic, she just wants it done by remote control by expanding the worst aspects of Obama's methods, and likes the idea of letting war-criminal authoritarian dictators do whatever they want to vulnerable populations.

              https://intpolicydigest.org/2019/07/31/how-anti-war-really-is-tulsi-gabbard/

      • mac1 2.1.3
        21 October 2019 at 10:46 am

        " Russiagate propaganda videos put out by convergence moonbat and second-option bias fantasist polemicists?" Nice invective descriptors. Don't know anything about this topic but wow! 🙂

        • Andre 2.1.3.1
          21 October 2019 at 11:14 am

          Gotta start a conversation somehow.

          • Dukeofurl 2.1.3.1.1
            21 October 2019 at 11:51 am

            The US media has been talking about one particular democratic candidate and russian influence for most of this month.

            Not a whisper here.

            But once Hilary says 'nested doll', all the people who claim to not care about Clinton anymore gird their loins go full passive aggressive mode in defence of someone most others havent even heard of.

            • Andre 2.1.3.1.1.1
              21 October 2019 at 5:09 pm

              I s'pose that they're still so fixated on Hillary slows them down a bit when it comes to fabricating and amplifying smears about the current Dem frontrunners. That will come, tho.

        • Andre 2.1.4.1
          21 October 2019 at 10:59 am

          Y'know, I'm actually not interested in what Hillary has to say anymore to the point that I haven't read what she actually said and don't intend to. I really wish she would just STFU and enjoy a well-earned retirement disbursing millions from the Clinton Foundation around the world. She's had two gos at the top and come up short, and she's put in a hell of a lot of service on the next tier down. It's time for her to leave shaping the future to those that are going to live it.

        • Dukeofurl 2.1.4.2
          21 October 2019 at 12:05 pm

          More information about Tulsi and her right wing republican father and a hare Krishna Cult

          Tulsi was defending her dad on his anti gay crusade

          'But Tulsi Gabbard jumped in. “I smell a skunk,” she emailed back. “It’s clear to me that you’re acting as a conduit for … homosexual extremist supporters of Ed Case.”

          https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tulsi-gabbard-krishna-cult-rumors_n_6879588

          • Siobhan 2.1.4.2.2
            21 October 2019 at 4:05 pm

            Personally I don't care about Tulsi, I've never seen her as being that relevant…my issue is with Hillary and her Russia accusations and how they derail serious political discourse and political evolution and hobble the Democratic Party….and have been for a few years now.

            • Dukeofurl 2.1.4.2.2.1
              21 October 2019 at 4:31 pm

              She only raised what others have done this month previously….. you dont care about that …. you just havent gotten over Clinton beating Sanders in the primaries 3 years ago….SAD

              Is this keeping you awake at night

              "

              Former Democratic presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton, without naming names — and just ahead of the debate — said that a female 2020 candidate is a “favorite of the Russians”–comments that picked up steam on Friday on social media.

              “They’re also going to do third-party again. And I’m not making any predictions, but I think they’ve got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate. She’s the favorite of the Russians, they have a bunch of sites and bots and other ways of supporting her so far…"

  3. ScottGN 3
    21 October 2019 at 10:00 am

    The Canadian Federal election campaign has drawn to a close with polls expected to open Monday (overnight our time starting in Atlantic Canada).
    The Liberal and Conservative parties are in a dead heat in aggregated polling from CBC. Neither party appears to hit much of a chord with the electorate. Both have slumped to about 32% support which you’d have to assume is their baseline. The campaign seems to have favoured the centre left NDP party and the Bloc Québécois. The Greens started the campaign with historic double digit polling but have waned slightly as the campaign progressed.

    Given Canada uses FPTP for elections and due to better vote efficiency because of that, the Liberal Party is likely to end up with the most seats and will probably continue as a fairly weak minority government with the smaller parties providing support on confidence.

    https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/elections/poll-tracker/canada/

    • Dukeofurl 3.1
      21 October 2019 at 12:01 pm

      " probably continue as a fairly weak minority government with the smaller parties providing support on confidence."

      Typical slated comment. A broad support government is a better government. The Liberals have been a majority government and yet had plenty of internal ructions. Why should a coalition be seen as a problem when it isnt, coalitions are the norm in the rest of the world outside Canada ( including NZ ) and a few other places

      • ScottGN 3.1.1
        21 October 2019 at 2:58 pm

        It wasn’t a slated comment Duke. I don’t have any issue with Coalition government. I was happy when the one we currently have was formed.
        In Canada where formal coalitions are rare it’s common to refer to the minority governments they regularly end up with as either ‘weak’ or ‘strong’ depending on how close they are to having a majority of seats in the House of Commons in Ottawa.
        It’s likely that whichever of the two main parties forms government after this election will (if the polls are correct) be at least 30 seats short of the 170 required for majority and so will be considered a weak minority government in the Canadian system.

  4. AB 4
    21 October 2019 at 10:11 am

    This opinion piece from the Guardian on AOC's endorsement of Sanders. While it covers some fairly obvious ground on class vs identity, and seems to imply that they are opposites rather than different lenses arising from the differing material conditions of life of the observer, it is spot on concerning the uselessness of the liberal media commentariat.

  5. swordfish 5
    21 October 2019 at 4:50 pm

    .
    Colmar Brunton Leadership Performance Approval

    Doing a few quick back-of-the-envelope calculations: looks very much to me like around One Third of Intending National Voters currently Approve of Ardern's performance as PM. (Almost certainly in the 28%-38% range … but most likely close to One Third of Nats (give or take a % or 2)).

    That compares with Approval for Ardern of:

    92% of Intending Labour voters

    86% of Intending Green voters

    Meanwhile, 47% of National Voters Approve of Bridges' performance as National Party leader.

    Again, a few quick calcs tell me that therefore 18% of all non-Nat voters Approve of Bridges' Performance as Oppo Leader (non-Nat voters collectively are disproportionately comprised of intending Labour voters, followed in size by those Undecided on the Party Vote (who still have a say on the Leadership question), then in much smaller numbers … Green, NZF & minor extra-parliamentary party voters)