US Presidential Contenders

[binTravkin]

Browder did business in Russia 1996. - 2008.
And he was forced to quit it not during the wild years, but during "stability" of Putin.

Here's an interview with him by Fareed Zakharia: http://edition.cnn.com/videos/tv/2015/02/23/exp-gps-browder-sot.cnn

[Buster's Uncle]

Well Putin's "stability" is a profoundly corrupt and frequently violent kleptocracy - and that's according to the Russians.  Even Ugly American I know that.

[Buster's Uncle]

Mr. Kasich is talking today about the likelihood of a brokered convention - I still think he's dreaming, but given the fellows ahead of him, he could come off looking like the only grownup in the room to the Party, if it came to that.

It appears Mr. Rubio is thinking along similar lines, but between his Senate attendance record and the savaging he took recently from Mr. Christie, the mass media group mind seems to be congealing around the idea that his window of opportunity has passed.  -And nobody likes Cruz.

[Buster's Uncle]

Sorry to have taken so late in the day to get to this - but I woke up to a wall of text, and that's almost never going to get responded to right away.  I'm just not a morning person.

Buncle on the "empire" thing, you came out of WW2 with huge "soft" power influence due to loans and a system of international treaties, most of which were designed to create buffer between you and your enemies.
NATO, WTO, Marshall plan, India Green Revolution, etc., are/were all designed so that with some help, locals would become useful both to U.S. as well as improve themselves.
Apart from some misguided policies (mistakes happen) in Central America and probably a few others, the countries U.S. historically helped, were better off with U.S. than without.
As you can also see, even if U.S. holds influence, it is neither absolute, nor irreversible, nor unsurmountable as would be the case with real empires (at least until they are close to disintegrating).
Just see "Castro & Cuba", "Merkel & Germany", etc.

For a person who has lived in a real empire, U.S. people saying they have an empire sounds like you're in a different world.

We used to look up to U.S. the entirety of soviet years, especially the years before disintegration.
Even with the problems U.S. had (nobody's perfect) it was a "dreamland" of the type found in fairy tales compared to the murky place we were in.
People literally would not believe it can be so good as they tell about the level of prosperity and individual freedoms in U.S..
We had this Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty thing which was mostly just telling as it is and people were saying it's all "capitalist propaganda" because it could not be true and would not work that way.

When we joined NATO, there was a celebration in the streets. We joined it by a referendum. A dozen countries did.
Are empires built by referendums w/o foreign troop presence?
There was no real opposition to joining NATO & WTO in most countries that did.
Compare it to joining EU, where doubts remain even after living in it for decades and reaping a lot of benefits from that (see Brexit).

U.S. until recently was THE center of good in the world not because it's perfect or has no problems, but because it is still an order of magnitude better than almost every other country of global significance and because people trust U.S. not to outright annex them, which is not the case with pretty much any other influence they could come into, and thus view U.S. as a kind of protector which has little if any interest in themselves other than keeping them intact/free.

I'll only say that A.) think of it as more reason to trust the US, that so many of us worry about such stuff, and B.) you're the first time in my years on the web that a European has told me the US rocks.  That's pretty refreshing, sir.

I see I should have gotten to this sooner.

---
I guess vonbach is the residental forum troll?
I assumed he was serious, but the medieval tax comment cleared all doubts.
---

If I thought he talked like he does to grief us, exactly, I'd have gleefully perma'd him six months ago.  No, not in my opinion, a troll.  He just believes the infuriating stuff he says, and hasn't adjusted to our forum culture to adopt a more sophisticated way of expressing it.  -That IS a very serious problem, however, getting troll-y as the failure to take the rough edges off and be appropriate to the crowd here gets older and older.  See a good deal of the last two pages of the stickied rules thread in Command Nexus for my policy musings on members who are bad for the community without necessarily actually breaking the rules.  (Protip: don't be that guy - you won't forever, here.)

I believe in maximum feasible transparency in forum management, and this is me trying to shoot straight.

---

Points off for using Maggie Thatcher on me.  For someone who claims to 'get' the west better than the westerners -that is something you've been trying to tell me, that I don't know the challenges and problems of my own country and you're setting me straight- that's colossally tone-deaf.  Snipped, and you're unlikely to ever get any traction trying to sell me on the evils of socialism with the clear implication that Sanders leads to Stalin.  Leninism and its various derivatives around the world were indeed bad to be on the same planet with - stipulated.  The lot were murderers and tyrants, stipulated.  -The rest of your line does not necessarily follow, and this will continue to be a no-sale.

I'm not a U.S. citizen, and even if I were, I know politics from inside a little - the basic learning is, politicians are like cars on used car lot.
You may like this one better visually or this one could be more fit for your needs, but don't fall in love with any or you're likely in for a disappointment.

I am also not promoting anyone, just pointing out that some of the "features" of candidates which you either ignore or even consider beneficial are not, as well as some of the background you are using to evaluate candidates and the way your country is going, is based in false assumptions, such as the "american guilt"/"we have enemies because what we did" myth or that your taxes are high.

This was just rude.  Your assumptions are insulting, undiplomatic, and your argument bad persuasive strategy - much as I enjoyed Romney calling those people "suckers", that never works.  You've come on strong with your passionate anti-communist message, and I've chosen not to engage it directly much, but you need not assume that silence=anything.  I wasn't particularly inspired to discuss something that smelled of a fight, okay?

Not your fault that we had some serious trouble in the 50s in the US with fanatical anti-communists who weren't fanatically in favor of the Bill of Rights, but coming on too strong with that sort of talk has unfortunate associations to Americans not of the fanatical right persuasion.   Joe McCarthy was a lot more dangerous to my parents than Stalin ended up being.  Now you know.

I'm not on here to quarrel.  You say interesting things articulately, and that's great; keep that part up, and educate me about Latvia, 'cause I'm curious.

[Rusty Edge]

Mr. Kasich is talking today about the likelihood of a brokered convention - I still think he's dreaming, but given the fellows ahead of him, he could come off looking like the only grownup in the room to the Party, if it came to that.

It appears Mr. Rubio is thinking along similar lines, but between his Senate attendance record and the savaging he took recently from Mr. Christie, the mass media group mind seems to be congealing around the idea that his window of opportunity has passed.  -And nobody likes Cruz.

Well, I think it's either [Sleezebag] wins the nomination outright- or it goes to the convention.

For a while, everybody thought that [Sleezebag] would eventually screw up, and they wanted to inherit his supporters, so they were polite, or circumspect. Either that, or the media would take him down. They love to do that, it creates stories and new frontrunners. He actually did screw up, as expected.

The trouble is [Sleezebag]'s base doesn't waiver, and [Sleezebag] won't run out of money, so he won't go away.

I think Shrewd Cruz was the first to figure that out, and turned on [Sleezebag]. He wanted to position himself as the anti-establishment alternative. But as you say, he's not so likable. More than any Republican, he's been an obstructionist. So if you're informed, and you don't like the way the federal gov is failing to budget, stay operating, etc... he bears a lot of blame. 

Rubio seized the spotlight, trying to portray himself as Reagan reincarnate, the consensus to bring the party back to glory. As you say, I think his moment has passed.

I think Romney was right that the way to deny [Sleezebag] is to keep everybody in the race. As the single digit candidates dropped out, [Sleezebag] went from the low to mid 30's to the low to mid 40's.

So in a convention- well, I don't see the Cruz or Rubio or [Sleezebag] supporters closing ranks behind the other guy after a nasty campaign like this one. Summer is a little too soon to forgive and forget. But if they really want to win, they should run with Kasich. 1) The Republicans never win without Ohio. It's that important. 2) He runs on his record, not from it. 3) America prefers him, according to the numbers.

But that's assuming that the Republicans can agree on an effective candidate.

Personally, I'm expecting [Sleezebag] to win outright. I've already determined his perfect running mate-
Charlie Sheen! "Winning!"

[binTravkin]

You're the first time in my years on the web that a European has told me the US rocks.  That's pretty refreshing, sir.

Many Europeans suck.
They've grown up in capitalism, had most of the stuff they wanted and never knew any other system nor cared to check the available evidence and are clamoring for those others with religious conviction.
Additionally, in youth there is massive sense of entitlement.
Regardless of the fact that their parents started their careers in very humble jobs before arriving at their current prosperity, many youths refuse to work in those same low-level jobs that business often considers stepping stones to higher levels.
Instead, they claim that, because they have this high level of education, they should immediately be placed in a corresponding level of responsibility.
In some countries with worker deficit, like Latvia, this happens with very bad results to overall business efficiency, in others, like Spain, this results in huge (almot 50%) youth unemployment, them being replaced by immigrant workers, who are happy to fill those low paid jobs and later advance their career to fill the same spots youth was aiming at in the first place.

Also, learning history or just checking basic facts which are now publicly available in seconds due to internet age, seems to not be "in", which contributes to rise of the European Trumps - Le Pen, Corbyn, Farage, Orban, Kaczynski, Podemos and others.
Paradox or information availability - the easier to check the facts, the more popular are liars.

Points off for using Maggie Thatcher on me.  For someone who claims to 'get' the west better than the westerners -that is something you've been trying to tell me, that I don't know the challenges and problems of my own country and you're setting me straight- that's colossally tone-deaf.  Snipped, and you're unlikely to ever get any traction trying to sell me on the evils of socialism with the clear implication that Sanders leads to Stalin.  Leninism and its various derivatives around the world were indeed bad to be on the same planet with - stipulated.  The lot were murderers and tyrants, stipulated.  -The rest of your line does not necessarily follow, and this will continue to be a no-sale.

That you don't personally like Thatcher does not mean she did not understand the topic or was not right on it.
Similarly, I never claimed Sanders leads to Stalin.
None of the quotes from Kasparov or Thatcher seem to imply that either.
Rather, they are talking about impact of socialism on society and economy.
I've witnessed this impact firsthand and many people who have travelled from west to post-soviet countries and vice versa, express the same opinions.
The perils of socialism described in those quotes have nothing to do with Lenin or Stalin or any other murderers or tyrants.
They don't even mention any human rights abuses, so I wonder where are you getting this "line" I'm not even trying to sell.

This was just rude.  Your assumptions are insulting, undiplomatic, and your argument bad persuasive strategy - much as I enjoyed Romney calling those people "suckers", that never works.  You've come on strong with your passionate anti-communist message, and I've chosen not to engage it directly much, but you need not assume that silence=anything.  I wasn't particularly inspired to discuss something that smelled of a fight, okay?

I'm not a native English speaker, so some things may sound sharper than they are meant.
But I also like to say things as they are.
If somebody comes to discussion and goes at length about exorbitant U.S. taxes, when information of the contrary is available in seconds, I don't consider it rude to point out that they should do the most basic of homework. It's simply the truth.

My point was, "the american guilt myth" and others named are simply myths.

Nobody knowing anything about Middle East history thinks U.S. is "guilty" of the Middle East turmoil now happening. This is something that would have happened sooner or later for reasons I explained before.
Similarly, nobody in their right mind thinks U.S. is "guilty" of any of these:
 - Korean war
 - Vietnam war
 - Gulf War
 - Afghanistan war

Some can dispute Iraq war, but Iraq would be Syria's clone now, should Saddam stayed.
For very similar reasons and with very similar results.

As I already pointed out, vonbach actually put the root of this myth - the idea that your enemies are such because you did something to them.
Truth is, your enemies are mostly such because they hate what you are as it is in direct conflict with their worldview.

Some convinced "enemies of U.S." live next door to me.
I can talk with them any day and I know there is nothing rational in their hate. At best you can write it off to envy.

If you bring up atrocities/civilian deaths as reason to feel guilt, consider the following:
1. Rationalist argument.
Both sides caused civilian deaths and had atrocities.
In some cases, the regime which filled the vacuum after you left caused more death and misery than you ever (could have) inflicted.
And you did not start most of these wars.

2. Moralist/human rights argument.
The mere fact you CAN discuss the problems caused by your intervention and publicly feel guilty is a sign of moral superiority.
In most cases, the other side would suppress any and all discussion about their own failings and/or evil deeds, to the point of deliberately deleting/covering up large numbers of deaths and misery beyond recovery. E.g. nobody knows exactly how many people have died of communist regime brutality during and since Korean War in North Korea, but chances are, the number is huge. Similarly, it is entirely possible that Vietnamese villages that cooperated with americans in any way were burned to the ground after U.S. left, but in the statistics these would be counted as "burned by americans". At least that's what USSR used to do with "disloyal" villages in own territory ("burned by Nazis").

Not your fault that we had some serious trouble in the 50s in the US with fanatical anti-communists who weren't fanatically in favor of the Bill of Rights, but coming on too strong with that sort of talk has unfortunate associations to Americans not of the fanatical right persuasion.   Joe McCarthy was a lot more dangerous to my parents than Stalin ended up being.  Now you know.

You like Stalin too much. That's like in the joke about every internet discussion ultimately going down to Hitler.
Reality is, Stalin is just a person, so is Joe McCarthy.
And Stalin's policies were perhaps the most right-wing of all the USSR leaders.
Abortion was prohibited, standard of living significantly reduced, mass militarization at the expense of social needs, distinct focus on large industry enterprises, mass forced labour in industry etc.
Doesn't sound socialist, does it?

Loving or hating a person can obscure the actual problem.
Because some anti-communists were dumb or dangerous, does not imply that communism/socialism is a better idea than it would be without those anti-communists.
In every group large enough there are radicals and judging anti-communists by a few radicals you know, is the same as judging all muslims by San Bernardino.

Basically, I'm talking about socialism as a system and a cultural phenomenon.
There are a few countries in the world where it seems to work, but in most others it has failed spectacularly.

The problems with socialism in U.S.:
1.People are not fond of bigger taxes. Socialism and low taxes like yours just won't work. There are 0 countries in the world history that have managed socialism long-term with your tax levels. Are you prepared to lose a significant part of your purchasing power & export competitiveness due to increased tax?

2. U.S. culture of individual achievement, leadership, striving to be the best, individual freedoms, including socio-economic are contrary to socialism. Are you sure you want to give up your identity?

3. Federation. In countries where significant local autonomies exist, differences in social support level can cause significant internal and external migration, which does not benefit neither economy of country as a whole, nor the social system, as usually more burden is created where it can not be supported. Would you like several more Detroit's just because some blue state goes full-on socialist, while it's red neighbours put on all the brakes they can find?

4. Bureaucracy and more state. Socialism inevitably leads to more state & more bureaucracy. Isn't it contradictory to hate establishment, scoff at bureaucracy and at the same time ask for more? If you think your state manages funds poorly (large mil expenses, red tape, etc) and its agencies are incompetent, why do you think having more funds go through state or more and bigger agencies will help in any way?

5. Very hard to revert. The places that went back from socialism to less socialism mostly did this due to/via internal turmoil. Most voters will never give up social benefits which they consider "free" (although they really are not and are actually quite costly price/performance wise).

[vonbach]

For a while, everybody thought that [Sleezebag] would eventually screw up, and they wanted to inherit his supporters, so they were polite, or circumspect. Either that, or the media would take him down. They love to do that, it creates stories and new frontrunners. He actually did screw up, as expected.

People are so pissed off that there is almost no way for [Sleezebag] to screw it up.
People in general are simply fed up with both parties. Both of them blame each other
so the voters take them at their word and blame both.

If I thought he talked like he does to grief us, exactly, I'd have gleefully perma'd him six months ago.  No, not in my opinion, a troll.  He just believes the infuriating stuff he says,

No. I'm not a troll. I don't care about the opinion of anyone but Yahweh (god) and I haven't learned to sugar coat things.
I'm probably the closest thing to a D and D dwarf you get in real life as far as personality.
Oh by the way I spent two years or so listening to a double PHD in religion and medieval
history. The comment about us paying more taxes than a medieval peasant is more or less
accurate. In biblical times a 10% tax was a punishment.

[Buster's Uncle]

People are so pissed off that there is almost no way for [Sleezebag] to screw it up.
People in general are simply fed up with both parties. Both of them blame each other
so the voters take them at their word and blame both.

This is true, sadly.

[Buster's Uncle]

You're the first time in my years on the web that a European has told me the US rocks.  That's pretty refreshing, sir.

Many Europeans suck.
They've grown up in capitalism, had most of the stuff they wanted and never knew any other system nor cared to check the available evidence and are clamoring for those others with religious conviction.
Additionally, in youth there is massive sense of entitlement.
Regardless of the fact that their parents started their careers in very humble jobs before arriving at their current prosperity, many youths refuse to work in those same low-level jobs that business often considers stepping stones to higher levels.
Instead, they claim that, because they have this high level of education, they should immediately be placed in a corresponding level of responsibility.
In some countries with worker deficit, like Latvia, this happens with very bad results to overall business efficiency, in others, like Spain, this results in huge (almot 50%) youth unemployment, them being replaced by immigrant workers, who are happy to fill those low paid jobs and later advance their career to fill the same spots youth was aiming at in the first place.

Also, learning history or just checking basic facts which are now publicly available in seconds due to internet age, seems to not be "in", which contributes to rise of the European Trumps - Le Pen, Corbyn, Farage, Orban, Kaczynski, Podemos and others.
Paradox or information availability - the easier to check the facts, the more popular are liars.

TL;DR version - they're spoiled.  There's a lot of that going around in the First World.  We're talking like Boring Old Farts, but the kids still really are spoiled.

That you don't personally like Thatcher does not mean she did not understand the topic or was not right on it.
Similarly, I never claimed Sanders leads to Stalin.
None of the quotes from Kasparov or Thatcher seem to imply that either.
Rather, they are talking about impact of socialism on society and economy.
I've witnessed this impact firsthand and many people who have travelled from west to post-soviet countries and vice versa, express the same opinions.
The perils of socialism described in those quotes have nothing to do with Lenin or Stalin or any other murderers or tyrants.
They don't even mention any human rights abuses, so I wonder where are you getting this "line" I'm not even trying to sell.

I predict that Sanders will get a couple of more liberal planks on the Democratic platform at the convention, make a speech endorsing HRC, and proceed to campaign for her, having nudged her left with his success.

This is a good thing.  Someday, the progressives will be on top and need to be opposed when they go too far; that is the way of the world.  That day is not close, however.

This multi-quoting is too much work.  More next post.

[Elok]

As a (barely) Millennial, I have to say: the reason so many of us believe we ought to have everything right away is that we were persistently taught it for our entire lives.  How much did we learn about the importance of self-esteem in school?  How many movies did we see where some bright-eyed schmo triumphs against all odds by following his dreams and enduring a thirty-second training montage?  When we were told about our career options, how much stress was laid on innate ability or available opportunities?  Go into any third-grade classroom and you'll find at least three kids planning to be president, with another five each interested in sports and entertainment.  Nobody will ever caution these children to have a back-up plan.

I pursued an English major for years.  Nobody--not parents, not friends, not college officials--warned me that it would be useless for getting a job.  I took it for granted that I'd find a job waiting for me when I graduated because nobody had ever told me any differently.  They all said college---->career.  It didn't help that I was arrogant and lazy, but the only reason I'm not drowning in debt as a double-employed foodservice worker right now is that I had a fantastic personal support network and my education was paid for.  I can see how somebody with $40K left in student loans and nothing to show for it might be angry.  There's something wrong with this picture.

[Buster's Uncle]

I'm not a native English speaker, so some things may sound sharper than they are meant.
But I also like to say things as they are.
If somebody comes to discussion and goes at length about exorbitant U.S. taxes, when information of the contrary is available in seconds, I don't consider it rude to point out that they should do the most basic of homework. It's simply the truth.

My point was, "the american guilt myth" and others named are simply myths.

Nobody knowing anything about Middle East history thinks U.S. is "guilty" of the Middle East turmoil now happening. This is something that would have happened sooner or later for reasons I explained before.
Similarly, nobody in their right mind thinks U.S. is "guilty" of any of these:
 - Korean war
 - Vietnam war
 - Gulf War
 - Afghanistan war

Some can dispute Iraq war, but Iraq would be Syria's clone now, should Saddam stayed.
For very similar reasons and with very similar results.

As I already pointed out, vonbach actually put the root of this myth - the idea that your enemies are such because you did something to them.
Truth is, your enemies are mostly such because they hate what you are as it is in direct conflict with their worldview.

Some convinced "enemies of U.S." live next door to me.
I can talk with them any day and I know there is nothing rational in their hate. At best you can write it off to envy.

If you bring up atrocities/civilian deaths as reason to feel guilt, consider the following:
1. Rationalist argument.
Both sides caused civilian deaths and had atrocities.
In some cases, the regime which filled the vacuum after you left caused more death and misery than you ever (could have) inflicted.
And you did not start most of these wars.

2. Moralist/human rights argument.
The mere fact you CAN discuss the problems caused by your intervention and publicly feel guilty is a sign of moral superiority.
In most cases, the other side would suppress any and all discussion about their own failings and/or evil deeds, to the point of deliberately deleting/covering up large numbers of deaths and misery beyond recovery. E.g. nobody knows exactly how many people have died of communist regime brutality during and since Korean War in North Korea, but chances are, the number is huge. Similarly, it is entirely possible that Vietnamese villages that cooperated with americans in any way were burned to the ground after U.S. left, but in the statistics these would be counted as "burned by americans". At least that's what USSR used to do with "disloyal" villages in own territory ("burned by Nazis").

This is too many different subjects at the same time, but a few remarks:

Dude, war is bad.  War is mass murder on a horrific scale and no sale on trying to blanket justify a bunch of foreign wars.  My dad, son of a sharecropper during the Great Depression, served in Korea and was able to put himself through college because of the GI bill afterwards - and I asked him once in his last years if he had to live his life over and not going to Korea meant a life spent pumping gas and being very poor -and believe me, poor was one of the last things the man could have stood being- would he go?  "No", he said.  (He was technically a medic, and had some experiences handling dead bodies that scared him forever.  My life was negatively impacted by that part.)

HOWEVER- on Korea and Vietnam, I'll say that the domino effect was widely mocked in this country in my childhood while we were still fighting in Vietnam -we lost that one, BTW, little as we like to admit- but Mao, still alive at the time, believed in it.  Brezhnev believed in it - it's straight Marxist doctrine.  The communist bloc was aggressively expansionistic, and somebody had to oppose them, whether we believed in the domino theory or not.  Period.  (And we totally won the hell out of Korea, achieving our war aims and nothing but, and I don't have to ask a South Korean -still free over 60 years later- to figure that out.)

So - it's infinitely more complicated than you're trying to claim, but yes, it's good more than otherwise that there was somebody to keep Stalin from expanding and murdering even more than he did.  Partially sold.  War may be bad, but that thinking is only a good thing as long as it doesn't stop peoples from being able to defend themselves.


The Middle East, on the other hand, is Chinatown (movie reference meaning chaotic place where non-stop craziness goes down).  The Ottoman Empire may not have been good for much as overlords, but for 400 or so years, they kept a lot of subject peoples from working out ethnic/religious hatreds on each other in the form of lots of murder - but unfortunately didn't do much to separate them.

When the empire went away at the end of WWI (it's actually more complicated than this, given a lot of western administration not in the best interest of the locals between world wars, as any Middle Easterner will tell you in considerably more detail than I can, but still) the artificial situation the Ottomans left behind has been shaking out for 98 years now, violence frequently involved, and oil bring a lot of money and power into it -also strategic importance to all of the first world- and it's everyone's problem now.

Time to post this much, so I can see what else has happened on the boards while I was writing - more to come on the Middle East...  I hope Elok will pitch in on the historical perspective...

[Buster's Uncle]

SO -

Iraq I:  to oversimplify, screw Hussein.  The invasion of Kuwait was naked aggression and nothing but - you should never get to get away with that at all in the modern world, and you certainly don't when you do it to Very Rich People with Very Rich and Scared Neighbors Who Figure They're Next.  War aims achieved, Kuwait back to status quo, the Saudis paid us, Hussein at least bloodied and humiliated.  The real George Bush is a much, much better man than the left gave him credit for -ditto the far right that hated him for not being far right enough- and handled the international diplomacy angle very, very well.  -A pity, all that didn't get done, not least Hussein still having his own country to run and murder with/in, but that would have been a whole 'nother order of problems, bad diplomacy and not part of our war aims.

Afghanistan - I don't have anything original to say about this one.  It was necessary.  The way we did it, sending in a few hundred spooks and special forces to organize the Afghan opposition, was the right play for getting involved in The Graveyard of Empires.  It's not going to accomplish much good in the long run, probably, to win a war and lose the occupation, but there are limits, and sometimes the ugly business of statecraft means you have to go bust up a place to let the world know you mean business - and we at least achieved that.

Iraq II - they sold this as having something to do with the thing that happened in New York -a plain ol' lie- but I'll admit that I don't buy that Hussein didn't have WMDs just because we didn't find them after he knew we were coming.  It's Hussein, and either we still ain't found them or he destroyed them in time.  The world is rotating just fine without that man still on it.

We made a big mess there, though.  It's another war won, but not so much with the occupation.  We achieved out war aims, with Hussein gone (and I'm convinced the Cheney Bund wanted to disrupt the world oil supply, there being a lot of money to be made if you know that's coming, but I'll be shocked if that's ever proved - it is treason, though).  But only time will tell if the settling out of ethnic and religious hatreds (mass murder) in the artificial UN mandate nation of Iraq offsets the harm Hussein would have done.  We were probably in the wrong to pull out of the occupation as soon as we did - even if you opposed that war utterly, we had a responsibility once we'd overthrown their government to manage our own mess.  I do despair of my own people.

But it's the Middle East, Chinatown, and I sincerely wish we could stay out of it, while acknowledging that we can't.  Oil ruined everything for that, and makes their problems the world's.

[Buster's Uncle]

I already answered the last passage about socialism to my own satisfaction in my prediction about Sanders' future behavior.

We'll see if I'm right or not before the end of the year.

[Buster's Uncle]

As a (barely) Millennial, I have to say: the reason so many of us believe we ought to have everything right away is that we were persistently taught it for our entire lives.  How much did we learn about the importance of self-esteem in school?  How many movies did we see where some bright-eyed schmo triumphs against all odds by following his dreams and enduring a thirty-second training montage?  When we were told about our career options, how much stress was laid on innate ability or available opportunities?  Go into any third-grade classroom and you'll find at least three kids planning to be president, with another five each interested in sports and entertainment.  Nobody will ever caution these children to have a back-up plan.

I pursued an English major for years.  Nobody--not parents, not friends, not college officials--warned me that it would be useless for getting a job.  I took it for granted that I'd find a job waiting for me when I graduated because nobody had ever told me any differently.  They all said college---->career.  It didn't help that I was arrogant and lazy, but the only reason I'm not drowning in debt as a double-employed foodservice worker right now is that I had a fantastic personal support network and my education was paid for.  I can see how somebody with $40K left in student loans and nothing to show for it might be angry.  There's something wrong with this picture.

Has the teaching you mentioned in the past been your main line of work?

[Elok]

I was a sub.  A dead-end job unless I wanted to try teaching full-time, which is a bum deal a lot of people take purely for the stability it offers; quite recently I got out altogether.  I'm now in training as a pharmacy tech, toying mentally with various back-to-school medical options.  I'm still signed up as a sub, but that's just to fill in occasional gaps in my real job, which pays better.  Honestly, this is better than I have a right to expect, given my past choices.  I understand that.

But I can't see what somebody less fortunate is supposed to do with his life once he's screwed it thoroughly.  Should he starve to prove the righteousness of the system?  Well, we don't really starve in this country.  We just settle into a long life of stressful, meaningless work, with welfare to fill in the gaps, until we die from preventable/lifestyle-induced illness.