notpc

That wasn't immigration. That was the dislocation of one people by another. 90% of Indians died shortly after first contact because of smallpox, which moved faster than the Europeans themselves did.

And of course, if the Indians had their informed choice, they would never have wanted Europeans to come.

But they didn't have the power to do anything about it. This world doesn't care about right and wrong, only weak and strong.

Edit:

Actually you're dead wrong. There was no immigration essentially from the start of the republic until the late 1800s, and again almost none between 1920 and 1950. And until the 60s, it was only from European societies for the most part.

The ones who were engaged in tribal wars of conquest with each other before Europeans ever showed up?

You need only look at the banlieues of Paris, full of second and third generation Middle Easterners who hate France and hate French values to prove my point.

I'm going to very amused as Google's "don't be evil" facade comes crumbling down, having lost their revolving door with the US government and protection from antitrust enforcement.

Google has a very small business, search & ads, that basically prints money. They then spend almost all of that money on unprofitable operations that crush competition by 1) setting the price-point for many services at free, 2) intercepting customers (e.g. Google Flight and Hotel bookings at the top of search results), and 3) poaching all of the best talent and wasting it away on these terrible side businesses.

Yes, there does have to be a winner and a loser. Given that ISIS aims for a global caliphate and the destruction of the US and Israel, I sure hope you want them to lose...

I can't put together a proof that we're the 'good' and they are 'bad' in some objective moral sense.

We have our vision for what we want for the world and our nation, they have theirs. It's better for us if we win.

"It is better to be feared than to be loved, if you cannot be both."

Muslims are the primary victims of terrorists groups. They would be very happy to be rid of the likes of ISIS and Al Qaeda.

>That's more or less how we got here in the first place.

I don't agree. We got here because Western institutions and ideas were causing dramatic and rapid social change in the Muslim world, and inspired a violent counter-reaction.

It will only become easier and easier to do great harm to many people. And so there is no number of terrorists that is an acceptable risk.

We can't allow these savages to keep developing their capabilities, growing their numbers, and inspiring sympathizers around the world. The only option is to eradicate ISIS and similar groups from the face of the Earth. We must strike fear deep into the hearts of any who would think to do us harm.

I'm highly amused that you start with "actually, no it's not", implying that you are going to disagree with my comment, because you don't actually address anything I said. Did you even read what I said?

It doesn't sound like ad purchasers have much of a choice here.

The fact that Obama wasn't as environmentalist as some would have liked doesn't change the fact that Trump is clearly much much less so.

This is a silly argument. Trump and Clinton competed for the electoral college, not the popular vote. Which means that Trump spent a lot of time campaigning for one electoral vote in Maine and almost none in courting millions of people in California and New York. It's impossible to say what the outcome would have been if the popular vote would have mattered, because both campaigns would be run totally differently.

Like it or not, increasing fossil fuel extraction and cutting environmental regulations is now the policy of the President of the United States. The public communications of the executive branch are under his authority and he's not just going to let the EPA run its public relations and releases contrary to his agenda.

Like others have pointed out, there are other ways the public can get the information. But it won't be the EPA running a press office counter to the President's.

It shouldn't be an ad network's job to adjudicate truth, especially given Google's monopolistic position. They should stick to selling and reselling eyeballs and clicks, and regulating things directly material to that, e.g. deceitful ad placement.

These critics don't understand what it means to get things done. It's becoming a meme at this point.

Media for the last year and a half: "Donald Trump will NOT be able to build the wall."

Just now, Donald Trump: "We will start IMMEDIATE CONSTRUCTION of a border wall."

This is driven by expectations of Trump's deregulatory agenda. He says he's going to cut 75% of regulations.

I can't believe this is happening. America is back people.

Given that certain opinions are very unpopular around here, why should I be forced to use my primary account to post on political topics?

If you look through the comment history of this account, I think you'll find that the posts are all very civil.

You retain sovereignty in a technical legal sense, but the cost of exercising that sovereignty becomes prohibitively expensive if you can't get the other signatories to agree. That's why trade agreements that mandate extensive intellectual property and other regulatory frameworks are so dangerous.

I just removed it because it's not even the right word. I meant to refer to the philosophy that seeks to incrementally build an international legal order. It's commonly called "liberalism" within the context of international relations but isn't directly related to contemporary western leftism, also called "liberalism". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism_(international_rela...

TPP was a threat to the sovereignty of the United States. It would have encoded in a multilateral trade agreement, representing huge amounts of economic activity, massive regulatory requirements, enforcement courts, and processes for further multilateral regulation. It would have made the cost of changing those regulations unbearable for any future administration.

We almost had the regulatory state imposed at an international level. Good riddance.

You've got to be kidding me. This is quite straight forward.

1. America has figured out how to listen to Merkel's phone calls.

2. Merkel finds out we listen to her phone calls.

3. Merkel stop using her phone for communications.

4. US is no longer able to listen to Merkel's phone calls.

Or:

1. US listens in on embassy.

2. Embassy finds out US is listening.

3. Embassy searches for and finds the bug.

4. US is no longer listening to the embassy.

Now apply this, at large, at the same time, to everyone that Snowden revealed we were spying on.

I doubt that Angela Merkel, or 35 other world leaders, knew we were listening to their phone calls. I doubt the EU knew that several of their offices were bugged by US intelligence. The same goes for the embassies of 38 countries that we had bugged. I doubt that Al Jazeera knew that we were monitoring their internal communications. Even though some people said it was possible that Dual_EC_DRBG was 'backdoored', RSA Security was still using it as its default for some products. Look at this list here: http://www.businessinsider.com/snowden-leaks-timeline-2016-9

All of these people who were successfully spied on before, and others in similar positions, are now surely much more careful and focused on securing their communications. Even if they had reason to suspect that America would try to spy on them, they probably didn't know that their countermeasures (if any) had failed. If they haven't since switched to much more secure communications methods, then they are stupid and should be prosecuted for criminal negligence with their own country's secrets.

How can you possibly expect concrete examples of information that we don't get? I'm sure there's some specific things that we know we don't know, but why would the United States advertise to the world which of their new countermeasures are and aren't working?

>You say he damaged our ability to collect data but don't have any proof.

The damage is very obvious. He revealed a bunch of mediums that the NSA had the capability to monitor. Any sophisticated actor that wants to avoid US intelligence is now avoiding those mediums.

My point is that he didn't have to flee. Instead he fled into the arms of those who stand to gain the most from his knowledge of our intelligence capabilities. Putin is not giving him asylum for free. I'm sure he's getting something out of it, if just the ability to use Snowden as as a propaganda piece and negotiating chip. It'd probably be hard to make a treason charge legally stick, but I believe it is what he is morally guilty of. There are plenty of things that he is plainly guilty of that carry equivalently harsh sentences.

You're right, he had nowhere else to flee but the enemies of the United States. But that doesn't change the fact that he fled, nor where he fled to. He did not have to flee. And yes, I think he's a coward for it.

The whole thing seems very cowardly. If Snowden truly thought he was acting in the best interests of his country, he could have:

1. Leaked only information about the NSA spying on Americans within the US.

2. Stayed within the US and faced the music.

Instead, he damaged America's ability to collect intelligence on foreign countries by revealing our capabilities, and then fled into the arms of our adversaries who have used him as a propaganda piece.

Our country exists with the freedom, prosperity, and influence we enjoy today because millions of men were willing to march to their deaths for it. Meanwhile, Snowden can't even face a jury of his peers for an act of civil disobedience? He must not think much of his cause.

>I also don't see how Ecuador is part of an "anti-American bloc" given that they are a democratic state and literally use the US dollar as their official currency.

You should familiarize yourself more then, with Rafael Correa, Hugo Chavez, and their foreign policy and overseas allies.

I question whether you even read my post because your reply is so comically ignorant of all the points I made.

Leaking to "trusted news sources" is still leaking!

Further, my central claim, that Snowden leaked the details of legitimate foreign intelligence activities, is hard fact. Look at my response to 'abandonliberty'.

As for him just being stuck in Russia, he claims to have been en route to Ecuador by way of Cuba by way of Russia. All of these, mind you, part of the same anti-American bloc (which Venezuela is also a member of).

Just to name one example, Snowden disclosed the America's wiretapping of 35 foreign leaders: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/24/nsa-surveillan...

As for "articulating an impact" that's both obvious, a big diplomatic incident between the US and the nations whose leaders it was targeting, and IRRELEVANT. Snowden was trusted with Top Secret information and it was his duty to protect it, whatever he thought the impact of leaking it would be notwithstanding.

The purpose of prison is to strike fear deep into the hearts of those who would follow in Private Manning's footsteps. And actually, the sentence was 35 years with eligibility for parole in 8 years. There is always a certain arbitrariness to choosing sentences.

Indiscriminately leaking thousands of diplomatic cables is the kind of thing that can change the world forever. It can cause major treaties to fall through, wars to start, etc.

Just as an example, Manning's leaks have been cited as a major contributor to the Arab Spring that has left thousands of people dead, thrown Europe into turmoil, and is in the process of potentially ending the EU due to backlash against migration.

In honesty, the punishment should be death, but given that Manning was a deeply troubled young man, 35 years with the possibility of parole in 10 years is fine with me.