Skiluros

Ironically, on Feb. 26, 20[1]1, two days after the fall of Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak to protesters and just before the wave of Arab Spring protests swept into Syria — in an email released by Wikileaks as part of a cache in 2012 — Assad e-mailed a joke he’d run across mocking the Egyptian leader’s stubborn refusal to step down.

“NEW WORD ADDED TO DICTIONARY: Mubarak (verb): To stick something, or to glue something. ... Mubarak (adjective): slow to learn or understand,” it read.

This is going to be a strange little footnote in history.

John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt

These two are just as bad AIPAC. They just shill for a different group. And unlike AIPAC leaders, who at least have some sort of connection to Israel, these two live in the US and don't seem to want to reject their US citizenship and move to russia (while supporting russian genocidal imperialism). I would almost say them criticizing TWI, adds legitimacy to the organization.

If you actually read the article, it is mostly descriptive and informative, with very little opinion or even analytical conclusions. I would have no issues with sharing it with someone interested in learning more about HTS public policy. If anything, I would have preferred the article to be longer and more in-depth (a mini report of sorts). Did not even notice the org until I went to the comments section.

Is there something specific that bothers you about the article?

Definitely. This was more of a general comment.

I will copy/paste a thought I had about a more structured approach for dealing with corruption/oligarchs:

You need to put them on trial in a legitimate court (i.e. exclude compromised judiciary systems).

If the oligarch/senior lackey is found guilty, you could use real rehabilitation methods that would creates incentives for good behaviour for other criminals:

1. Full asset seizure (every last cent, home, house, everything).
2. Extended family and business partners being required to sign affidavits detailing their knowledge re: assets in [1], with an understanding that if the affidavit was found to have not been signed in good faith, they will be subject to full asset seizure and their own family and business partners will also have to sign similar affidavits for their own case. No statue of limitations for affidavits.
3. 20 years mandatory live-in community service as junior support person at a hospice centre (minimum wage). Exact focus of community service would depend on crimes committed.

One could leverage fully independent courts/tribunals. I believe the ICJ has done something similar for countries with non-functioning judicial systems.

You could start with the corrupt members of the highest court. This would be a good "shit just got real" moment for the oligarchs and their senior goons.

I heard US supreme courts judges feel they are capable of working on complex cases past their 80s. They should be able to do a few more decades providing full-time community service para-legal support for honest pro bono lawyers as part of their rehabilitation program. 😀

I am being glib of course. I recognize the challenges with my proposal in context of the US. But then again, every movement towards progress typically starts with something very simple, sometimes as simple as formulating and brain-storming ideas.

What exactly is "armchair general" about critiquing Europe's slow approach to Ukrainian aid? Just look at Scholz and the contortions he was going through with the delivery of tanks in 2023... Tanks! Do you really need to be a general to critique this?

Do you need to be a general to understand that you need to strike back at the invading country's military facilities?

I hope one day you and your family get to experience the russians invading your country and your hometown specifically (with mass killings of civilians and concentration camps for anyone caught speaking english). And you'd be fine with me stating that I am "anti-war" and that we shouldn't be helping you, right?

liveuamap.com is relatively well known in Ukriane, I often check them.

Never really thought of clicking on "Сирія" in the top toolbar. Did not know they were covering Syria as well.

Do you have a source for this?

As well as a general lack of leadership, courage and a real desire to beat the russians.

Something like putting a goal to enable 100+ ballistic missile strikes deep into russia per month. Just one example.

Billionaires, and those like this guy who enable them, must face consequences

I would propose the following approach:

You need to put them on trial in a legitimate court (i.e. exclude compromised judiciary systems).

If the oligarch/senior lackey is found guilty, you could use real rehabilitation methods that would creates incentives for good behaviour for other criminals:

1. Full asset seizure (every last cent, home, house, everything).
2. Extended family and business partners being required to sign affidavits detailing their knowledge re: assets in [1], with an understanding that if the affidavit was found to have not been signed in good faith, they will be subject to full asset seizure and their own family and business partners will also have to sign similar affidavits for their own case. No statue of limitations for affidavits.
3. 20 years mandatory live-in community service as junior support person at a hospice centre (minimum wage). Exact focus of community service would depend on crimes committed.

I am not saying this is currently possible. Just pointing out that there are "win win" approaches that do not require extra-judicial killings (albeit the nature of human history is such that sometimes people are left with no other options).

Edit: Also, nothing stops someone with a gigantic grudge, patience and high motivation from joining a private security company, getting training, a gun, and placed directly in the vicinity of a potential target. Really, there’s no good defense except not giving a ton of people reasons to want to get rid of you.

Not to mention the use of DIY suicide drones.

I will preface this comment by saying that due to my ethnic background and atheism, I would probably be one of the first in line for a theocratic equivalent of the gulag. I will also add I am not American, but I have lived and traveled in North America, Europe and Asia for many years.

The functional outcomes derived from the actions of US oligarchs and Osama Bin Laden are largely identical. Mass suffering, mass death, condemning many millions of people to a life of misery. If anything US oligarchs have an edge on Bin Laden due to the scale inherent to operating in the US and protection provided by the local judicial system and social attitudes.

Consider Zuckerberg's involvement in the Rohingya genocide.

Now I don't think Zuckerberg had any direct malicious intent here (unlike say Osama Bin Laden, in a different context of course), but what does it matter? His actions, callousness and supremacist attitude led to a large number of people getting killed and many more getting their lives ruined. But because of the compromised nature of the local judicial system, not only did he not have to take responsibility for this actions, but he even had the gal to claim that this was an example of how effective FB was. Do you think we would see a similar reaction if FB was used in hypothetical ethno-religious mass killings (e.g. US Catholics vs Protestants) in the continental US? I think not.

Zuckerberg knowingly enabling the Rohingya genocide could be seen as a controversial argument. I do not. I think any real judicial authority should have seized all his assets (every last cent) and sent him for mandatory community service work for two decades as a junior latrine janitor on the island of Bhasan Char. What about a less "controversial" case?

My favourite oligarch gang in the US are the Sacklers. These thugs set up what is essentially a massive drug cartel peddling one of the most deadly drug substance (we are not talking about LSD or MDMA). And yet all they got was a somewhat larger fine than usual that still allowed them to keep billions. Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán is got be pissed. 😆

Now where does Bin Laden play into this? Both Bin Laden and US oligarchs do horrible things. But unlike US oligarchs, Bin Laden was quiet open about his intentions and did not try to hide behind PR or state that some court in Texas leveraged the 69th amendment of the US constitution to prove that his actions were legal and were about "fighting for freedom". On the contrary, he could have just been doing blow, driving fast cars, chilling on yachts, like all the other elite princes in Saudi Arabia, but instead he gave up that life to fight for something he believed in.

It was wrong, he was a bad person. I am not arguing against that. But how many US oligarchs have the guts to do something like that?

And if the outcomes of the actions of US oligarchs are actually worse than Bin Laden, is it a stretch to say they are worse than Bin Laden?

I often wonder how genuine such polemics are.

From my professional experience working with US companies, such attitudes are more of a cover. "It's technically not illegal, so my actions are just and fair irrespective of the real world impact." There is a fair share of "true believer" types (not at the senior level though), but they are a lot rarer than the amount of public facing polemical copytext would suggest.

This is not a critique per se, more of an observation. I enjoy working with Americans, they are pretty laid back and can be relatively generous with comp if you know what you are doing (and you know how to sell yourself).