Comment by mschuster91 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mschuster91 | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

> but they aren't sterilizing Muslims

There were accusations of forced sterilization at the Mexican border: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-54265571

> disappearing political dissidents

cough Julian Assange, Reality Winner, Chelsea Manning

Yes, it's not "disappearing" as in "getting them killed", but nevertheless their treatment has been horrifying.

> creating debt traps for the developing world

The US has putsched against a lot of Southern American countries and keeps supplying their narco gangs with money and weaponry. That is just as bad as the Chinese debt trapping.

> The United States launches inquiries into civilian casualties

Lots of police violence goes unpunished. Trump pardoned Joe Arpaio and soldiers convicted of war crimes.

> enforces regulations generally aimed towards the public good

Hard disagree. The amount of regulations torn down during the Trump term is massive.

> enforces rule of law

For those who can afford it, see my point about police violence above.

> has free democratic elections

The US is still considered a "flawed democracy" (https://thehill.com/homenews/news/537204-us-score-falls-in-e...), partially due to systematic voter discrimination (gerrymandering, voting access requirements).

> If you would rather live in the orbit of any single other superpower or empire in world history, you're deluded.

Come to the European Union. I admit it, we are not perfect either (particularly on handling the refugee situation and member countries drifting towards authoritarianism and dictatorship), but generally we are a better society in a number of metrics.

>> disappearing political dissidents cough Julian Assange, Reality Winner, Chelsea Manning

They haven’t been disappeared.

No, but their lives have been ruined for... what? Think about this: we spent millions of dollars identifying the leak by Assange, then forcing Assange to sit in an embassy, on PR to discredit his character, and on convincing countries to hand him over.

Yet somehow Epstein and Harvey Weinstein run rampant among our own soil, all with open secrets. Literally decades of abuse before authorities finally arrest them, and only because regular people came out and protested after they heard of the stories publicly. Like the gov had no idea ever... for decades on open secrets like that... until now?

The effort put into these scenarios are very skewed.

Assange chose to remain in an embassy for years rather than face questioning (not even a trial) for the offenses alleged against him. Snowden and Manning's leaks endangered the lives of US and foreign military and intelligence personnel, and a number of foreign intelligence personnel were killed after being identified in those leaks.

Yet somehow Epstein and Harvey Weinstein run rampant among our own soil, all with open secrets.

Do you expect the police to just magically know that people are committing crime? The criminal investigation process usually begins with a police report (of someone reporting a crime). In the absence of a police report (as with the Epstein and Weinstein cases) the police have "no cause" to investigate absent some other mechanism that publicly reveals alleged crimes (like a news report). And on that note, in both of the cases you cited, prosecutors did try to investigate the rumors, but couldn't find anyone wiling to testify against those men until the scale of their crimes became public.

Epstein was arrested and awaiting trial once his crimes became publicly known, and before he committed suicide was expected to face charges in multiple states and countries. Epstein became so toxic that multiple men known to have gone to Epstein's parties have faced social and financial repercussions for it. Melinda Gates famously divorced Bill because of his friendship with Epstein. Similarly, Weinstein was also arrested once his crimes became public and is facing charges in multiple states, was kicked out of every industry group, and essentially banished from his former life.

> Snowden and Manning's leaks endangered the lives of US and foreign military and intelligence personnel, and a number of foreign intelligence personnel were killed after being identified in those leaks.

Nitpick, but wasn't that only true of Manning? Assange irresponsibly put Manning's cables out in unredacted form, which I believe revealed the names of sources who were put in danger. IIRC, Snowden only leaked to Greenwald and a few mainstream newspapers who were careful to make redactions on what they released to avoid such outcomes.

> Yet somehow Epstein and Harvey Weinstein run rampant among our own soil, all with open secrets.

That's partially a product of the US justice system, which is among the more rigorous in the world, and tends to favor letting the guilty go free over punishing the innocent. This is a trade-off, not an objectively bad thing.

Now, I would attribute the rest of those scenarios to plain-old corruption - which is a problem for every system of government without checks and balances (that are actually used).

> Yet somehow Epstein and Harvey Weinstein run rampant among our own soil, all with open secrets.

What are you talking about? Epstein died in jail, and Weinstein is currently in prison.

Chelsea Manning was even pardoned.

> There were accusations of forced sterilization at the Mexican border: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-54265571

Read up on that story. It was malpractice by one outside doctor that served one detention center, it was not government policy.

How much is the payment for being a CIA shill? Is the lost of one's decency and common humanity worthy?

https://www.panoramas.pitt.edu/health-and-society/dark-histo...

Shameless.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com