this post was submitted on 08 May 2024
389 points (98.3% liked)

politics

19102 readers
3290 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] gregorum@lemm.ee 145 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (75 children)

Proof that protest works.

Go ahead, downvote because you’re mad that I’m right.

[–] 3volver@lemmy.world 41 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Upvoted because I'm happy you're right. Biden will lose to the orange criminal if he doesn't stand up and stop money and weapons to Israel. America is fucked if it keeps supporting Israel.

[–] recapitated@lemmy.world 18 points 6 months ago (2 children)

I think you're overestimating how many voters are deeply against Israel's assault on Palestine, while also underestimating the ability of those virtuous people to understand the landslide of harmful outcomes that would come with another trump presidency.

[–] 3volver@lemmy.world 12 points 6 months ago (3 children)

Trump won without the popular vote. He won Michigan by ~10,000 votes in 2016. I'm not the one who decided this system, but this system doesn't give a shit about the majority. It doesn't take much to sway the balance.

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] zigmus64@lemmy.world 28 points 6 months ago (7 children)
load more comments (7 replies)
[–] Delusional@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Well some protests. Did anything really happen at all after the BLM protests? Cops are still able to get away with murder and have very little oversight.

[–] dumpsterlid@lemmy.world 13 points 6 months ago (2 children)

The BLM protests did work, they exposed that the US is a violent police state where voting doesn’t actually do anything to change whether we live in a violent police state because both the Republicans and centrist Democrats will collaborate as much as needed to betray their voters in order to sustain the system of policing and prisons.

The fact that in the wake of George Floyd a lot of cities and municipalities actually went more draconian with their policing laws in backlash is only an indicator of a failure of the BLM protests if you don’t look closer, step closer and you see the truth is far scarier, the BLM protests did massively change the psyche of America, it’s just that actually has no effect upon policy making because democracy is so broken in the US to the extreme point where many city governments chose to actively do their opposite of the will of the people as a show of force and a chilling warning to leftists.

[–] june@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 6 months ago (2 children)

In particular, I witnessed ACAB go from something that when I would say it would be nearly impossible to defend to many people, to something almost everyone (with some lefty tendencies ofc) immediately understands and agrees with. The first shift was BLM, the second Uvalde.

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] Psychodelic@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I'm mostly with you, but if I tried to exercise and my legs broke, it'd be kinda wild to say the exercising "worked" because it exposed my shitty, unhealthy knees

That said, I'm all for changing up the narrative and using practical propaganda to expand support for protesters!

[–] dumpsterlid@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I’m mostly with you, but if I tried to exercise and my legs broke, it’d be kinda wild to say the exercising “worked” because it exposed my shitty, unhealthy knees

I mean I think where I disagree with this mapping of the metaphor is that it isn't a personal failing or problem, BLM was one of the biggest protest movements around police violence ever.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] retrospectology@lemmy.world 10 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

It depends on what kind of effect you're expecting. Did the US state and federal governments suddenly defund the police and start sending reparations to black Americans? No, not exactly. But Derek Chauvin was convicted and sent to prison for 20+ years. Different municipalities did reform their police departments and even implemented things like unarmed crisis response units. BLM has helped introduce policy discussions that would not otherwise be on the table.

The effects of a protest aren't always direct or immediate, their benefit is as much about changing the national narrative on any given issue than it is just achieving a primary goal by the time the protesrs end, and also it's a way to learn what's effective and what's not.

For example, part of why these recent protests were effective and why they illicited such a desperate response from authorities and the media is because the young people looked at the failed tactics from protests like the Occupy movement and adapted.

One if the weaknesses of Occupy was that there was no unified voice, instead the media would walk up and find some random individual, get them to make some unflattering soundbyte and then put that on blast on their networks. By contrast, the students anti-genocide protests designated a spokes person, and when the media approached random protestors they would just direct the media to that spokes person.

It's really smart and that kind of tactical refinement is arguably a result of the failures of Occupy. It made it difficult for the media to fool the public as to what these protests are really about, and you see that born out in people's growing awareness of how fucked up the situation in Gaza not only is right now, but has been for decades.

Protesting and social justice is iterative and experimental, it's about making it more difficult to just continue with business as usual going forward.

[–] Uranium3006@kbin.social 3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

we have to keep fighting back against this genocide

load more comments (71 replies)
[–] Rapidcreek@lemmy.world 51 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Same interview.. “US is committed to Israel’s defense and would supply Iron Dome rocket interceptors and other defensive arms, but that if Israel goes into Rafah, we’re not going to supply the weapons and artillery shells used”. Defense secretary Austin Lloyd reiterated that same point

[–] NaibofTabr@infosec.pub 57 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Ok, good? All you can do with Iron Dome is shoot down mortar rounds and slower-moving rockets (and maybe drones?) - it really only works for defense. I don't see the problem.

[–] kromem@lemmy.world 17 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (2 children)

In general I love the idea of the US moving more and more towards only supplying defensive munitions to countries (such as the long list of really fucked up countries we deal arms to that would surprise most people).

We could always take special action to supply offensive arms in response to justified conflicts such as in Ukraine, but let's not let authoritarians build up a stockpile of offensive capabilities from US sweat during times of peace. That's a recipe for less peace.

But by all means we should let allies buy as much defensive capabilities as they desire.

Being an ally to the US should be more associated with the benefits of protection from bullies than capacity to bully.

(And most important IMO is that we don't allow selling tech officially or privately by US corporations to enable authoritarians to abuse their own citizens. Something we very much do and I really wish we didn't.)

load more comments (2 replies)
[–] assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world 5 points 6 months ago

I'm fine with this model. Defend them from attacks, but don't help them offensively. And leverage our defensive aid to strongarm them into not being genocidal.

load more comments (1 replies)
[–] meleecrits@lemmy.world 22 points 6 months ago (3 children)

This is a good move. He's doing what he can to temper Netanyahu's attempts at genocide, while still protecting Israel.

I just hope it's enough to stop the killings. That monster will sacrifice every man, woman and child to stay in power (and out of prison).

load more comments (3 replies)
[–] plz1@lemmy.world 16 points 6 months ago (2 children)

um, didn't the supply already happen?

[–] Maggoty@lemmy.world 10 points 6 months ago

AFAIK Other stuff has gone forward but they're specifically holding back the large bombs that caused so much death in the rest of Gaza.

Now though we have the problem of Israel holding all but one border crossing closed. (Unless they've reopened some in the last 24 hours) Aid is not getting through at all right now. The single border crossing is in the North of Gaza where they're already in a Famine. The With now has no aid access by ground. It's all ship stuff, but the ground access is actually far better. There's also the problem that Israel will not let aid groups import fuel and with the borders closed they can't drive trucks in to unload the ships.

So the new position has to be either Israel lets aid in or the US steps out of the way in the UN security council.

[–] RizzRustbolt@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago

No, those had a sticky note on them that specifically said, "not for usse in rafah".

[–] Cryophilia@lemmy.world 14 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Agent Provacateurs Left Confused After Biden Does What They Want - "How do we make Biden look bad now?"

[–] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 6 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Biden was making himself look bad by supporting genocide. Hopefully this is indicative of more positive change to come.

[–] assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago (3 children)

I love to see optimistic Ensign Crab posts. It's always a good sign

[–] blazeknave@lemmy.world 3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Hahahahaha I thought it too.. this place is too small

load more comments (1 replies)
load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments (1 replies)
[–] NoLifeGaming@lemmy.world 10 points 6 months ago

Despite the pause, the Israeli military has enough weapons supplied by the U.S. and other partners to conduct the Rafah operation if it chooses to cast aside U.S. objections, the first official said.

He added that none of the pauses apply to the billions of dollars in additional israel aid passed by Congress last month. With regards to that, the Biden administration just approved $827 million worth of weapons and equipment for Israel in the latest tranche of Foreign Military Financing, the official said.

Take it with a grain of salt. A good first step however.

Source.

[–] oakey66@lemmy.world 9 points 6 months ago (1 children)

This should have been the move on day 10 of the invasion. And a white house insisting on peace negotiations and the release of hostages on both sides. He would have instantly been viewed favorably on this issue and likely wouldn't have tanked his polling.

[–] PugJesus@lemmy.world 5 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

He would have instantly been viewed favorably on this issue and likely wouldn’t have tanked his polling.

  1. His polling didn't tank in tandem with the Gaza genocide.

  2. Most Americans are either in support or ambivalent towards Israel in this conflict.

  3. Every poll I've seen asks the most important issue to voters, and it's always the economy, with the Israel-Palestine conflict coming in near the bottom.

Israel is committing a genocide, to be clear. The moral thing is to, at minimum, stop supporting their genocide. But that's not the same as saying that the Palestinian genocide is what brought Biden's poll numbers down, or that it's a silver bullet (or even an unambiguous net gain) electorally speaking.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz 7 points 6 months ago (6 children)

Most Americans are either in support or ambivalent towards Israel in this conflict.

This either isn't true or is only true when you're including Republicans, whose opinions are irrelevant to Biden's reelection. Dem/Lean Dem oppose Israel's conduct 52-22, while Rep/Lean Rep support it 59-17 (they love blowing up Arabs).

load more comments (6 replies)
[–] autotldr@lemmings.world 4 points 6 months ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:


WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden said Wednesday that he would not supply offensive weapons that Israel could use to launch an all-out assault on Rafah — the last major Hamas stronghold in Gaza — over concern for the well-being of the more than 1 million civilians sheltering there.

It also comes as the Biden administration is due to deliver a first-of-its-kind formal verdict this week on whether the airstrikes on Gaza and restrictions on delivery of aid have violated international and U.S. laws designed to spare civilians from the worst horrors of war.

Biden’s administration in April began reviewing future transfers of military assistance as Netanyahu’s government appeared to move closer toward an invasion of Rafah, despite months of opposition from the White House.

The decision also drew a sharp rebuke from House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, who said they only learned about the military aid holdup from press reports, despite assurances from the Biden administration that no such pauses were in the works.

“If we stop weapons necessary to destroy the enemies of the state of Israel at a time of great peril, we will pay a price,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., his voice rising in anger during an exchange with Austin.

The State Department is separately considering whether to approve the continued transfer of Joint Direct Attack Munition kits, which place precision guidance systems onto bombs, to Israel, but the review didn’t pertain to imminent shipments.


The original article contains 1,417 words, the summary contains 245 words. Saved 83%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

load more comments
view more: next ›