Posts made by djvoxx

@blablarg18
To look at Ukraine, Russia, and Putin through the lens of Dems vs Republicans or Libs vs Conservatives is ridiculous.

Russia took BACK Crimea, which (along with the Donbas and and Eastern Ukraine) was part of RUSSIA until the Soviet Era (Lenin was concerned about Russian chauvinism, so Ukraine's administrative borders were expanded). Russia's only warm-water naval base is in Crimea, and the idea of Russia letting a US-allied Ukraine control Crimea is similar to the USA letting China take Hawaii or Guam.

The war in Ukraine didn't start a year and a half ago. It started in 2014, after Democratic and Republican senators, bipartisan neocon Victoria Nulan, and staff from the (CIA/State Dept cutout ) Natl Endowment for Democracy showed up to what had been a peaceful protest against a democratically elected president with less than a year left in his term. The US meets up with actual Hitler loving and Jew hating nazis and ultranationalist militants and gets them to do what fascists do, and create chaos and violence that concludes with a coup where the Nazis and ultranationalists have taken most of the positions of power. After they passed laws banning Russian-speaking children from being taught in their native language, outlaw many pro-Russian and socialist/communist political parties, and takes away Crimea's special autonomous status, people in Eastern Ukraine declare independence. So Kiev lets Azov
Bat (Nazi paramilitary group) shoot missles at Eastern Ukraine. Putin then sends arms to the separatists. Eastern Ukraine has been a war zone for ten years.

Now, if Trump had won re-election Putin might not have invaded Ukraine. But this isn't because Trump is a Putin puppet or because Republican foreign policy is superior to Democratic policy. I would be because Trump didn't include many of the key neocon and regime-change goons in his administration.

I do agree that there is a large hardcore Dem base, that has totally embraced Bill Kristol, George Bush, the CIA, FBI, and pretty much anyone or anything that is anti-Trump. And the Dem Party is more hawkish now than the Republican Party. Even Senator Barbara Lee voted to send weapons to Ukraine. In California's all party primary, Adam Schiff (financed by US weapons makers) received more votes than (rhetorically) populist Katie Porter and (previously) anti-war Barbara Lee combined.
If you are against arming Ukraine or meddling in their affairs, your views are represented by a handful of Republicans in Washington.
But if you are against arming and giving aid to Israel, you certainly won't find any Republicans who agree with you. And that is because a large minority of the base believe the Bible should determine our Middle Eastern foreign policy.

And on both Ukraine and Israel/Palestine, the US and Europe are isolated from the rest of the world. Brazil, most of South and Central America, Africa, China, India, most of Asia, Russia, Mexico--most of the world--have formal diplomatic relations with Palestine, believe Israel is illegally occupying the
West Bank and Gaza (if not all of Israel-Palestine), and abstained or voted "no" to condemn Russia's invasion of Ukraine in a UN General Assembly vote.

I think both "libs" and conservatives should stop worrying about the other party, and take a step back and look at their own party bullshit. Both parties serve overlapping corporate interests, and party loyalty is much more about self-dealing and personal power than any ideological belief. Both parties use race, gender, and sociocultural issues in their rhetoric to fire up their bases, while doing very little policy wise. And if you thought Republicans were successful with their long game with the Supreme Court and abortion, then you missed the bipartisan long game to pack the court with pro-corporate, pro-war, pro-banks, anti-worker judges without anyone noticing because confirmation hearings are now culture-war theater (distraction, spectacle, scandal).

When it comes to policy (legislation, administrative rules, foreign policy) is see very little difference between Dems and Republicans--at least on most the major issues affecting people's material lives. The only differences are how many bombs to drop on poor countries, how big should the tax cuts for the wealthy be, how big should we let monopolies grow, how big should the big banks get,how many democratically elected governments should we undermine.

I have a 2TB network drive that is 90% full.

Believe all women–this is a right wing trap meant to make all liberals, all feminists, the #MeToo movement, the Democratic Party, and all mainstream and liberal media appear to be hypocrites. The #MeToo phrase is "Believe women". That being said, the corporate "liberal" media and Democratic establishment have been hypocritical in how they have doubted and smeared Joe Biden's accuser despite there being more evidence against him than there was against Brett Kavanaugh.

Black lives matter--this is a simple statement not meant to be confrontational or exclusive but rather aspirational that black lives matter just as much as any other lives and as much as white lives. (From wikipedia: "In 2013, the movement began with the use of the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter on social media after the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the shooting death of African-American teen Trayvon Martin in February 2012. The movement became nationally recognized for street demonstrations following the 2014 deaths of two African Americans: Michael Brown—resulting in protests and unrest in Ferguson, a city near St. Louis—and Eric Garner in New York City.[3][4] Since the Ferguson protests, participants in the movement have demonstrated against the deaths of numerous other African Americans by police actions and/or while in police custody."

Emmet Till–a fourteen year old African American boy who was accused of flirting with or whistling at a white women. Four days later he was brutally murdered. A very influential photo of his open casket exposed the violent and brutal nature of American racism. His mother insisted on an open casket, and a very influential photograph to show the world the violent brutality of American racism.  Whether he flirted with the woman or didn't isn't known, and isn't really relevant. 
  Are you suggesting that liberals, who "believe all women" should thus believe the women who accused Till of flirting--and then should be OK with Till's murder? Or, are YOU suggesting that if a black child flirts with a white adult they should be killed?

DEFUND AND ABOLISH LOCAL POLICE.

The number of police in a community has little to no impact on crime levels, but does have an impact on arrests and prosecutions. If you want more people in jail, hire more police. If you want less crime, create decent paying jobs.

Of all the video of protests, uprisings, looting, and police brutality–from all over the country--I haven't seen ANY video of police arresting looters or coming to the aid of a business owner or homeowner.

I saw Love, Simon this weekend. Me and my boyfriend were the oldest people in the theater by 20 years at least. We were at a noon show with 25 others, mostly teenagers and mostly female. But we all clapped and cheered at the same time, and 1/2 of us were crying when the credits were rolling.

The movie was a very clever twist on the John Hughes movies of the 80s. It's could also be called a "romantic comedy", and yet unlike most movies of that genre which have the theme "you will not be complete until you find you one and only true soulmate", Love, Simon was more about having the courage and self-respect to be your authentic self, and when you do that you enable and inspire others to do the same.

It's not going to win Academy Awards, but was intelligent, entertaining, and uplifting, and had soundtrack with a few songs that have been stuck in my head for since seeing the movie.