Accurate except for the “instead” part. Road maintenance comes from local taxes, whereas military aid comes from federal taxes.
I mean, potholes in my area get fixed pretty quickly, because the local government takes its job relatively seriously.
Sorry about all the broken veterans with TBIs. We could have invested in better healthcare infrastructure, TBI treatment research even better armor and helmets for our troopers dealing routinely with IEDs. But instead we got experimental tanks with active camo, a shitty plane which we're phasing out and aid to Israel to perpetuate their ancient religious genocide program.
It's just that US soldiers are poor and expendible and people with money tell us who and what is important.
Well if you really want to get technical about it.... No programs or spending are really funded by taxes anyway, the government just says "OK" and the numbers in the bank accounts of the companies implementing said program go up. Taxes funding things is just a myth. Taxes just delete money. So technically, nothing is funded by taxes and taxes are just a money void.
Edit: People seem to be down voting because they think this is tinfoil hat BS or something. It's not. Look up modern monetary theory. Governments with fiat currency don't need to collect money to pay for things. They just invent and issue more currency. See this video: https://youtu.be/75udjh6hkOs?si=dVpp9V5f96kLDV4-&t=1628
the wikipedia page says:
MMT is controversial, and is actively debated with dialogues about its theoretical integrity, the implications of the policy recommendations of its proponents, and the extent to which it is actually divergent from orthodox macroeconomics. MMT is opposed to the mainstream understanding of macroeconomic theory and has been criticized heavily by many mainstream economists.
i don’t think your comment properly highlights how controversial MMT is. i’m not an economist, but i don’t think it’s fair to use language like “taxes funding things is a myth” and “technically nothing is funded by taxes and taxes are just a money void”, when those claims rely on such a controversial theory.
Yes this is all true, MMT is a theory. It's in the name. Yes, it's controversial.
But those points have nothing to do with the validity of the statements I made, including the ones you quote. It's a very broad economic theory covering how things should be done etc etc.
My point is not founded on MMT, I referred to it as a "look this stuff up by starting here". That's why it's only mentioned in the edit. The mere fact that this is an even remotely acceptable implies the statements I made is valid - otherwise MMT would fall apart at its seams.
Taxes funding things is indeed a myth, and they're essentially a money void. Go read up on those specifics if you want to get into it. The video I linked has a literal explanation of this like 30 seconds later. When congress approves programs, they just allocate new funds to it, and move on. There's no digging up taxes to point towards it.
You could begin making an argument it has implications for the validity and reliability of the sovereign currency, but it has no real relationship to taxes. That's just not how modern economics work anymore.
has been criticized heavily by many mainstream economists.
In other words... it upsets the rich people that got us into this mess.
I mean this is a cute clever thing that sounds smart that isn’t.
The government pays for things. The government funds that through monetary policy that includes printing money, as well as raising money via taxes. Whether the government deletes a dollar you give them and prints another dollar vs transferring the dollar you gave them into their spending budget is super irrelevant.
It’s functionally the same and either way, your tax dollar, whether “deleted” and replaced or transferred is still your proportional allocation of funding.
This is real “I am very smart” vibes.
Same could be said about your post. It's very "haha I have a gotcha" vibes.
Yes the government deletes money. And they also create money. That doesn't mean they do or have to do the same amount of each. They can and do create more than they delete. They're not funding programs and then making sure they delete the same amount in your taxes. That's not how modern economics work.
Of course not. But none of that changes the fact that your taxes, in part, pay for what the government spends money on.
For state taxes, where the states don’t control monetary policy, it’s even less true. But it’s not really true for the federal government either.
Everyone who is paid in USD or pays in USD, in addition to people who pay taxes, pay for whatever we spend money on in one way or another.
It’s not a gotcha. Nothing was got. It’s just an absurd thing on the face of it. That while technically correct (in the sense that dollars are fungible) your dollars given in taxes will make up a percentage of total dollars spent this year by the federal government, and thus, you are paying for whatever they are doing. Along with other people.
Not at all. Look up MMT. Modern monetary theory and economics are well beyond "spend taxes to fund programs". Governments that issue debts in their own made up currency don't need to "spend" money, they just give money to the programs they support.
So money goes in and gets deleted, and then they create money and they give it away?
When I think of it, I do the same thing every time I buy something.
The money in my bank account doesn't get transferred, the bank just deletes it on their servers and then they create money and give it to the store.
As far as I understand that's the definition of fungibility, right? Every dollar is interchangeable and identical?
So there's no functional difference between deleting $1 and creating $1 except semantics, compared to moving $1, as long as the total value doesn't change.
The government just deleting money and printing money to pay for whatever it wants suggests that those things aren't equal, which would be the problem if it were true.
That’s what causes inflation. When you print more than you delete, at a rate faster than total economic growth.
Yes, they both create and delete money. That doesn't mean that the two processes need to be equal or balanced.
Your purchases do, or someone is owed their portion of the transaction. That's not the case when the government is writing bonds or appropriating funding to programs. They can create money freely, regardless of the tax they collect. Taxes serve a different purpose.
That would increase inflation drastically, which is something governments absolutely don't want.
They want inflation to be around 1-2%. Less is no good, because rich idiots would just hoard money instead of investing it. More is also no good because saved money would just disappear quickly.
Tell that to Japan. One of the highest spenders. Still stuck in perpetual de flation for over 20 years at this point.
It's not that simple.
You are aware of the fact that central banks are usually independant institutions and whenever the government meddles with them, that countries currency gets fucked by the market?
Also in todays interconnected financial and real economy there is only so much control any government canexert iver its currency, because the currencies values is significantly determined by the exchange from imported and exported goods.
While both points are true, that still doesn't change whether taxes fund these programs.
Sure there are other complexities like "how much is too much? Can we just keep doing it forever?" but those questions have more to do with the labor force of said country and their exports, and almost nothing to do with their tax rates.
The central banks control the amount of money based on the tasks they were given for their operation. That does not relate directly to the way the government is spending or taking money.
It is simply not the governments taxes and spending that is making or deleting money. It is the system of how the private banks can borrow or deposit money at the central bank with a certain interest rate,that is making or deleting money.
And youll have noticed that it is not the central bank granting loans to the government but bonds being sold on the market for the government to take debt.
MMT is techbros just trying to say, "don't look behind the microvaluation curtain, it doesn't matter." But in the amounts that they're trading on, it absolutely does matter.
This isn’t a problem if your thought process is slightly more sophisticated than an 8 year old’s.
Can’t imagine what about the subject matter would fill anyone with anything less than the giggles.
Please, not fixing potholes have been around longer than the current Palestinian/Israeli and also a completely stupid reduction of the complexity of this whole fucked up situation.
There's nothing complex about it. Israel imprisons an entire people and every time the UN tries to do something about it the US vetoes it.
The "it's complex" excuse is used to have people look the other way by turning it into a hopeless situation.
If there were some psychopaths that were insanely dedicated to killing you wouldn't you want there to be a fence between you and them? It's indeed not all that complex. Israel built a fence as a barrier between them and the psychopaths Palestinians elected to be their government. Seemed a better option than sending in the IDF to attempt a regime change. But apparently the fence wasn't effective, so not many options left other than regime change now.
Hamas has always been the problem. How would you protect people from these psychopaths?
There would be no Hamas if israël hadn't invoked it. It was a response against the occupation and slaughtering israël had been doing since more than 70 years ago until now.
Now THAT'S overly simplifying things to the point of a flat out lie.
You act like every nation there (and beyond) hasn't wanted to kill Jews since before modern Israel.
Giving a different name to Hamas wouldn't change anything.
The Palestinian people voted for Hamas after Israel removed their settlements and ended the occupation of Gaza. Israel withdrawing from Palestinian territory was not considered to be an act of peace, they saw it as an act of weakness and a sign they should vote for fascist strongmen to fight even harder. Maybe you're too young to have been around when that went down and your internet research didn't explain the circumstances in which Hamas took power. Gaza turned to fascism, leaving no real option for peace.
The emotional fervor that fascist propaganda provides is attractive to the young. But it's the same story we've seen before. Fascists take power, then because they can't stop having destructive conflicts their country ends up destroyed.
Hate destroys everything. Doesn't really matter what the justification for that hatred is, it destroys people and countries. Try not to let it destroy you, ok?
after Israel removed their settlements and ended the occupation of Gaza.
You seem to be living in an alternate universe where those things actually happened.
Here's the reality: https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2017/06/israel-occupation-50-years-of-dispossession/
Also what does fascism mean? That's a rhetorical question by the way, we all know you're going to Google it and then delusionally shoehorn your interpretation in it.
Maybe you shouldn't use those psychopaths are a political props to validate your political position.
Thus, amid this bid to impair Abbas, Hamas was upgraded from a mere terror group to an organization with which Israel held indirect negotiations via Egypt, and one that was allowed to receive infusions of cash from abroad.
The symbiotic relationship between Netanyahu and Hamas, The Hill, October 22, 2023
Netanyahu’s policy, however, was in direct opposition to most of the Israeli defense and security establishment, which viewed cooperation with the PA to be in Israel’s security interest. Fans of the Netflix series “Fauda” will recognize that cooperation. Most security experts felt the PA needed to be strengthened, not weakened.
Since returning to power in 2009, Netanyahu made no secret of his desire to keep Hamas and the PA apart for his own political purposes. For example, in 2017, the PA and Hamas were negotiating a possible takeover by the PA of civilian control of the Gaza Strip. Even though the United States and Egypt supported this reconciliation, Netanyahu was adamantly opposed — lest it empower the PA.
Why Netanyahu helped fund Hamas and how that backfired for Israel, India Today, November 1, 2023
“Whoever is against a Palestinian state should be for transferring the funds to Gaza, because maintaining a separation between the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza helps prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state,” The Jerusalem Post quoted Prime Minister Netanyahu as saying in 2019.
Prince Turki al-Faisal's accusation against Israel comes days after a report by Reuters, citing a source privy to the matter, stated that Qatar's financial aid to the Palestinian families in Gaza passes through Israel. The funds are transferred electronically from Qatar to Israel, following which Israeli and United Nations (UN) officials hand-carry the same over the border to the Gaza Strip.
How Netanyahu's Hamas policy came back to haunt him — and Israel, CBC News, October 28, 2023
Yuval Diskin, former head of Israel's Shin Bet security service, told the daily newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth in 2013 that "if we look at it over the years, one of the main people contributing to Hamas's strengthening has been Bibi Netanyahu, since his first term as prime minister."
In August 2019, former prime minister Ehud Barak told Israeli Army Radio that Netanyahu's "strategy is to keep Hamas alive and kicking … even at the price of abandoning the citizens [of the south] … in order to weaken the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah."
Netanyahu's current finance minister, West Bank settler Belazel Smotrich, explained the approach to Israel's Knesset channel in 2015: "Hamas is an asset, and (Palestinian Authority leader) Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas) is a burden."
"But each time Netanyahu was asked, 'Why don't you negotiate with Abbas,' he would say, 'I can't negotiate with a Palestinian Authority that doesn't represent all Palestinians.' And so he would use Hamas and this division to justify his absolute objection to any negotiated peace agreement."
“Both Egypt and Qatar are angry with Hamas and planned to cut ties with them. Suddenly Netanyahu appears as the defender of Hamas, as though it was an environmental organization. This is a policy of submission to terror,” he said, adding that Israel was paying Hamas “protection money” to maintain the calm.
The prime minister also said that, “whoever is against a Palestinian state should be for” transferring the funds to Gaza, because maintaining a separation between the PA in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza helps prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state.
not fixing potholes have been around longer
They haven't been fixing potholes since 1949? Those potholes must be huge.
Yup, longer than the US has been sending aid to Israel, which actually started in the 1970s. Sorry for introducing facts into your ragefest.
LOL! Let me rephrase, then...
They haven’t been fixing potholes since the 1970s? Those potholes must be huge.
To think... you wasted all that energy to achieve so little. Ho hum.
To think… you wasted all that energy to achieve so little. Ho hum.
While you may boast about valuing ignorance over knowledge, there are others on this site that might appreciate learning a little history. So my time may have been wasted on you, but not wasted for the others people on this site.
Being proud over being a waste of other people's time LOL.
Let me rephrase that for the terminally bewildered, then...
To think… you wasted all that energy to achieve so little.
Ho hum.
Yeah, but the money that should be fixing potholes, and paying teachers, and providing healthcare has been going to war for as long as the USA has been around.
TBH, The US pays more for healthcare than defense. Hell social security is the number 1 expense.
Love the false equivalence. Your city taxes can't fix the potholes because your federal taxes pay for a military.
Those federal taxes cannot be allocated to state funds which cannot then be allocated to city funds to maintain roads?
No because they must be spent to kill Palestinian children. Get your Merican priorities straight.
You're not wrong, but original point could still be right, depending in the road. There are many federal highways and interstates, where this equivalence makes sense. However most other roads are state, county or city owned.
Mobile billboards go where people are. I saw a Pro-Life billboard on a similar truck, where it was parked was not linked to the content on the sign.
We send $5,000,000,000 in outright charity to Israel, not including what our legislators are about to fork over as soon as they get their stock portfolios situated in the best ways to profit from it.
That's $100,000,000 per state that could be used to fix potholes or help Americans in other ways, but we're silly geese who 100% support neglecting our own people in favor of war, so we're getting what we voted for.
It’s been a closer to 3B for a while. Against a budget of $1.7T. It’s not even a rounding error.
It's always cute how warmongers pretend that those billions wouldn't make a huge difference for struggling Americans.
I don’t know what in that sentence gives you the confidence to call me a warmonger.
And also, no, it wont really. Unless you redefine “huge difference”. We spend $522B on social/economic assistance programs at the federal level. So a 0.005% 0.5% increase? Hardly a huge difference.
that's how percentages work lol. if you have 100 usd, 100.5 usd would be a 0.5% increase not a 0.005 percent increase (which you would get by dividing 0.5/100, right?)
Yeah, just that 3 billion comes out to $60,000,000 if divided equally between all 50 states. Instead it's being pissed away on other countries' wars.
By any stretch that is huge.
You're absolutely using the warmonger's logic to support your position here, so no need to clutch your pearls.
Except that it’s half a percent. It’s another half a penny on every dollar.
It’s not huge by any stretch.
Exactly. Israel already received tremendous amount of money way before the conflict. And yet, US Congress voted to allow more military aid package to Israel. The money could have gone to those who need them more, both to domestic and to Ukraine who are still fighting the Russians.
Israel already received tremendous amount of money way before the conflict.
The conflict has been ongoing since 1949.
Isn't this a photoshop? Boring Dystopia is a lot more poignant when the content it shows has some reality to it.
While the point the image is trying to make does have quite a bit of reality behind it, the shopping is to its detriment.
All children in Gaza are terriosts! Or potential terriosts! Isreal NEEDS to bomb ambulances, hospitals and water wells because that is where all the terriosts are! ya see?Any amount of infrastructure supports terriosism! Bombing is a nessecity!
It's outright ghoulish.
Well, it‘s actually true that Hamas uses civil infrastructure and civilians as shields, you can’t deny that. Of course that doesn‘t mean that Israel can just bomb everything.
in an area where the population density is 5,300 people/km2 "human shields" is a quite weak argument. It is practically impossible to seperate civillian and military infrastructure in such densely populated areas.
For comparision the Netherlands has about 500 people/km2 and it is one of the most densely populated countries in Europe.
There is a difference between the close proximity of military and civilian infrastructure because of a high population density and actively choosing hospitals as military bases.
Another great way of not getting your civilians targeted is to wear identifying uniforms.
It's almost like Hamas doesn't want to prevent civilian casualties.
You are right. Hamas is not acting responsible leave alone lawful in where they put military installations. But that is used by Israel to just bomb anything they feel like bombing, and for that it is a weak arguement. Especially since we have nothing but Israels pinky promise that there were military targets in whatever they bombed.
Given how Israel extensively attacked civillian and ambulance convoys fleeing on the routes designated by Israel to flee to the south, as demanded by Israel, i cannot help the feeling that they are just shooting at random to instill more fear and destruction.
For that again i find it weird, how Israel was entirely unprepared for the terror attacks of Hamas on the 7. October but immediately claimed to know exactly where Hamas is having what installations in Gaza. I remember how the Russian preparations for the Ukraine invasion have been discussed for months and the question remaining was, whether Putin is that insane or not. Now with Hamas that question was moot, so how the fuck did Israel both know exactly where all of Hamas is, but didnt notice any preparations for the attacks?
I cannot shake the feeling that Israel has much less knowledge about Hamas positions than they claim.
Or, that they do know what's going on, but let the attack happen because Israeli civilians are nearly as expendable as Palestinian civilians, at least to the people who profit from the war machine...
Israel does appear to value its civilians a lot more than Hamas. There have been prisoner swaps where Hamas will hold out swapping one Israeli until Israel agrees to literally hundreds of Palestinians.
it‘s actually true that Hamas uses civil infrastructure and civilians as shields
Riiight... there's a Hamas "terrorist" hiding behind every Palestinian child... and if you can't see them, it just proves how sneaky they are, amirite?
its a straw man, but only just, people more or less say this through implications when you hear "What else do you expect Israel to do"
Baby bones don't have a high enough density and material integrity for that to be an appropriate solution.
One of my favorite facts (factoids?) is that if everyone in the world stood shoulder to shoulder we'd all fit inside the single city of Paris.
The u.s destroyed half my country, killed tons of my people, bought up the wreckage and now owns us. But none of you gave a shit, cause the news didn't tell you to care
True and also because people today lack empathy for what the real horrors of war actually put people through. I do give a shit -but it's like tossing a turd into the ocean of hate and thinking it will somehow sparkle. I hate war and the horrible inhumanity of war, but when I say that people accuse of me being on a "high horse of moral superiority." If it's superior to dislike war - I'm all too happy to agree with them.
This is 100% how it works for most of the people here in America.
It's why they're rooting for another hundred billion of our tax dollars to be sent to other country's wars even though they're living with a 30-50% cost of living increase under Biden, who has no intention of sending us our own money in the form of aid.
Sorry to hear you did not get the option to become a vassal state and a US military base like so many others. It did give us a few good years at the cost of corrupting our societies and souls.
Big daddy if you're watching I'm only joking, I love you with all my heart and bow at your magnificence!
Nah, they didn't care because it didn't give them a chance to be Anti Semitic. All of these from the river to the sea chants are explicitly calling for a fucking genocide and people are proudly lining up to scream it.
Wild times we live in. There are significant human loses happening in Yemen, China, and a host of places right now but this group of terrorists in Gaza with their supporters in Iran have figured out the tik tok algorithm a whole lot better the poor people of Yemen or the Uyghurs ever did so those people are simply forgotten.
What does this abstraction contribute to the discourse? Does it rile up support for fixing potholes? Does it rile up support for Palestine?
My feeling is it obfuscates the issues and makes progress seem impossible.
It draws attention to the fact that we are paying money to shoot missiles at innocent Palestinian children.
Ok, but is this the first time? For as long as I've been alive there has been pot holes and there has been discontent in the middle east. So if anyone was wondering, yes, I know america has a failing infrastructure and is waging war across the world. In fact, I believe this is common knowledge.
Perhaps the frustration is exacerbated by the lack of progress relative to the amount of money spent and time since these issues have manifested. It's also particularly visible in our increasingly globalized and interconnected world.
What's so weird? Watch last week tonight every week. The problems are known. It's the solution that we have to tell people about.
Ain't that the truth. Not to mention the Israeli children gutted and beheaded by Hamas back on Oct 7th. Our tax dollars didn't pay for that, but they sure are going toward ensuring more kids and regular civilians are turned into worm food for some nonsensical war over a strip of land neither side really wants to be stuck with.
Well, you forgot to mention the gas and oil field that UK companies and Shell would love to have access to.
With gas coming from Russia is not a sustainable option, this gas field is what they really want.
"Energy Ministry says a total of 12 licenses have been given to six companies, four of which are new players in the exploration of natural gas off the country's Mediterranean coast"
This happens last week.
Literally last week October 27.
Is it fake news? Well the one reported this is "Times of Israel" https://www.timesofisrael.com/amid-ongoing-war-bp-and-eni-among-firms-awarded-gas-exploration-licenses-in-israel/
How much money in there? UN published a report in 2021 June estimated value for the last 10 years to be around 400 billion.
More details from the UN website: https://unctad.org/publication/economic-costs-israeli-occupation-palestinian-people-unrealized-oil-and-natural-gas
This is not "Isreal vs Hamas" or "Jews vs Muslims" or as some would love to say is a "historical religious war"
This is US and UK companies vs indigenous people masked by layers of "confusion" but their ultimate goal is greed.
The more you look for news it becomes clear what the goals are.
Here are some headlines:
2019 November: Cyprus signs $9 billion gas extraction deal with Israel’s Delek, other firms
2023 February: Israel exports crude oil for first time, with shipment heading for Europe
2023 February: Lebanon and Israel’s historic maritime border deal P.S. this to allow gas exploration.. P.S Lebanon government controlled hizballh and Iran.
2023 March: Israel’s Offshore Gas Attracts Foreign Energy Giants
2023 September: Benjamin Netanyahu holds his map of the “The New Middle East” as he addresses the U.N. General Assembly
P.S. "Netanyahu took out his red marker and drew a diagonal line from Dubai along the Persian Gulf, through Israel and toward the ports of southern Europe. He hailed the supposed advent of a “corridor” of prosperity that threaded together these Arab countries and Israel at the heart of a new axis of global trade connecting Asia to Europe."
2023 October: Netanyahu says Israel's response to Gaza attack will 'change the Middle East'
While the conflict seeems a bit confusing looking into it from US imperialist poont view things make sense.
There are four powers that would stop this exploration. Sadam Iraq, most likely, will attack Isreal and claim it a religious war to have access to this new wealth.
Qaddafi Libya, he was already in dispute with turkey over gas in the area https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/gaddafis-prophecy-comes-true-as-foreign-powers-battle-for-libyas-oil
Syria as Russia allies will never leave a piece of the cake either directly or throu distablization in the region. This cut russia market to eroupe.
And finally, the indigenous people of the land....
Oh for fucks sake. I wish we'd transitioned to renewable, maybe even nuclear, a lot sooner.
How many future doctors, writers, craftsmen and families have been lost in the wind, all for that damnable black gold
Back in the 70s the government funded a study which showed that America was already pretty much ready to transition to nuclear or renewable energy with a minimal investment in infrastructure (minimal by government spending standards). Here we are 50 years later still heavily dependent on oil and gas extraction from increasingly depleted sources. We CAN rely on other sources of energy and make them work - it's the big oil and gas companies that are standing in everyone's way unable to look or care beyond their own greed.
That is definitely a huge factor and should have been mentioned at the very start. Greed is always the motivational factor in what humans do to each other. Munitions dealers get fat and rich off of war so have a vested interest in keeping it going. I totally agree with all the points you're making - I wish this wasn't the world we live in - but that's exactly what we're dealing with. And good luck going up against big oil or gas companies.
nonsensical war over a strip of land
I've struggled to understand why civilians on either side have wanted to continue residing in that specific zone after decades of clashes/violence. I know it's not as simple as just uprooting your family to move elsewhere, but as a parent I know I'd rather any other option than living in constant fear of unbridled violence erupting at any moment in a highly volatile area.
Well, a part of it is that the people of Gaza are not allowed to leave.
There are only a handful of crossings out of Gaza and Israel controls all but one. The Egyptian crossing leads out into a desolate desert with no services.
Want to hop on a boat and flee that way? Israel will torpedo you. Want to walk up to the wall to see the boundary of your prison? Israel will machine gun you down, no questions asked, no warnings given.
A large portion of the population of Gaza started out as refugees, forced out of their homes and off of their land so that Zionist settlers could have it.
I've heard that they aren't allowed to leave, but the strip of land we're talking about isn't all that small either. I know that Israel has confined Palestines to that area for decades which is not just oppression, it's akin to running a death camp. I believe there's enough room in that region for Palestinians to live comfortably beside the Jewish people - so why not concede this land to them? And stop forcing people to remain there if the wish to leave.
Even given the option, most if not all will choose to not leave. Since 48 the Palestinians have been chanting "from the river to the sea" and not taking lots of peace treaties offered by Israel and other nations, based on the premise that they'll stay in their current 67 border.
Not to mention lots of Jews also don't wanna live in a non-jewish state of fear of prosecution, pogroms and antisemitism, which you can see examples of happening right now in Europe.
An Israeli I know was given benefits from the government to settle near that area. Luckily he went to his in laws house the second the war started. But the government paying people to live there might have something to do with it
I was a bit harsh but from the footage I've seen (and mind you it's almost all footage of war torn areas) I'm not understanding why there's a conflict over it at all. I do understand the history of Palestinian repressing by the country of Israel and I do understand the horrors that Hamas has unleashed - but as you say why favor living in a land of unbridled hostility and volatility. And what's to lose by giving Palestinians their land back and maybe a little more besides? Israel is a big place. There IS room for both muslims and jews. We all either learn to live in peace or we destroy each other until nothing is left.
Financially the US is gaining from it all, like she is from the Ukraine war. The point is good, but Israel buying weapons systems from the US means less potholes.
They aren't being bought. It's being freely given. All profits go to weapons manufacturers.
Using "freely given" and "profits" in the same sentence should've set alarms as to how the issue might be more complex than just who buys what from who.
You are wrong and a simple research into the subject reveals how.
The bread and butter of the US Military Industrial Complex is selling weapons/platforms/systems to other governments. Yes, US contractors can't just directly sell weapons/etc to other countries (without express permission/case by case basis).
What the person you replied to said is accurate: The US is giving these weapons to Ukraine "for free" (i.e. nothing is ever truly free, Ukraine will end up paying for it one way or another if they come out victorious in the end). However, the DoD is still paying the defense contractors who manufacturer these weapons (unless it's ammunition and certain types of munitions, which the DoD actually makes themselves).
Regardless, I agree that it is a bit complex, but not that complex. The US Military Industrial Complex is well documented and proven, not sure why you're acting like the US being the world's largest arms dealer isn't what it is.
I literally have colleagues working the Ukraine program within the Army. But whatever, I'm sure the people actively working all of those packages have no idea what the fuck they're talking about.
Anyway, I responded politely and you responded like a complete asshat, so I'll no longer continue this conversation. Maybe grow up and act like an adult rather than pretend to be some sort of expert with zero sources to back up any of your claims (I didn't ask for any, but I see in other comments here when others pressed for them, you instead responded with equal rudeness and incompetence).
I literally have colleagues working the Ukraine program within the Army
Sure buddy.
Anyway, I responded politely
You responded with some misinformation and I corrected those parts for you, like I have corrected those who commented before you and this meme itself.
You can either get emotional about it or thank me for clarifying these things for you, but I see you've already made your choice.
Again, you didn't dispel any misinformation because you've provided zero sources. Here:
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/u-s-to-send-250-million-in-weapons-and-ammunition-to-ukraine
Where in either of those articles, each a year apart, does it say anything about us sending Ukraine weapons/supplies that are "ancient"? Much of it was purchased brand new, as well as from existing stocks straight from active military units' inventories.
jfc i was hoping you weren't gonna choose to be an idiotic pedant but here we are.
the us government signs incredibly expensive contracts with weapons manufacturers. aka "buys weapons." then gives those weapons to its allies. https://www.vox.com/world/2022/12/16/23507640/dc-party-invite-military-contractors-money-ukraine-russia-war-us
wtf do you think these votes in the senate about giving military aid mean? the idea that paying defense contractors to replenish our arsenal is somehow funding local infrastructure is utterly deranged.
edit, to be clear, im not saying that supplying our allies is wrong (well, at this point it might be wrong in israel's case. certainly not in ukraine's though). I'm just saying that your earlier statement about the wars making money for the US is wrong. Some US companies are making money, but only because it's being spent by the US government. Not a positive for the rest of us.
I literally work in the business and know a thing or two on how these aid contracts are written.
I only know about the "ink printer" or "Gillette" aspect of the aid contracts. How does the money get back to fixing potholes? You mean through taxes on the consumables?
He's a liar who has no idea what he's talking about. "Do your own research" style moron. I'm sure his dad works at Nintendo.
Good lord you're infuriatingly stupid. That isn't at all the subject of the article I linked, and you didn't even read my comment!? "The game of define words" is a game YOU played, not me, moron, by conflating 2 sentences about "freely given" and "profits" without thinking for even a fraction of a second about WHO the weapons are being given to, and WHO is making the profits!
Enough with the "do your own research" bullshit. Either explain yourself or fuck off.
I have explained myself. I don't see a reason to hold your hand and explain things that are beyond your comprehension to you, when I can just ask you to research before having an opinion on a subject you know nothing of. Personally I think you have all the rights in the world to be as wrong as you want, but I will of course call you out on it. Being misinformed unfortunately seems to be fashionable and it's either that or plain laziness to research into it that makes you wrong.
The dystopia will get a whole lot less boring if the civilized world allows Islamic jihadism to achieve its goals.
This is an investment in your future.
Oh yeah, I forgot that ethnically cleansing the Palestinians will cause all Islamic terrorist to stop. Neat!
Not that I'm pro one side or the other, but what should be done when hamas tells civilians to stay, and then hides behind them? That leaves hamas alive to stage another attack on... civilians.
Like, I get that there should have been a better solution than what was done after ww2, but we can't go back in time and the Israelis aren't leaving.
So... what? Hamas doesn't seem to care that their avilians die, and actively use them as shielding so they can kill more Israelis. It's fucked.
This "human shield" propaganda is so biased. By Israel's extremely broad definition, every Palestinian is a human shield.
If you were to apply this sick "human shield" logic to both sides, most of the innocent civilians killed by Hamas on Oct 7th would be acceptable military targets.
The IDF has military infrastructure near schools, malls, and hospitals. Why are they hiding behind human shields?
If you were to apply this sick "human shield" logic to both sides, most of the innocent civilians killed by Hamas on Oct 7th
There were no military hiding among the party goers, or among the people living in their homes. The military personnel killed, was stationed at separate military installations that Hamas also targeted.
I'm not talking about all Palestinians. I'm talking about the ones who are talked into staying where they are by hamas despite a warning ahead of time from Israel (and b4 you come in with "24 hours isn't enough time," I agree with you, but it's something. It's an attempt. The ravers were given zero warning, on purpose.)
Those Palestinians are, literally, being used as human shields, and trying to brush that off as deceptive propaganda is ignoring the evilness of hamas.
Being near something is different from hiding behind them. Hamas is IN civilian schools, sitting with the students, and IN the malls, standing among the shoppers, and IN the hospitals, betting on the fact that when Palestinians die, more people will back their agenda. They want them to die because it garners sympathy.
I'm just asking you to apply the same logic to both sides.
Members of the IDF also go inside schools, malls, and hospitals. In fact, since there is mandatory military service in Israel, it's easy to say that the IDF are everywhere. In my opinion, this does not justify Hamas rockets targeting Israel, but the same logic is used to justify the massive Israeli bombardment on civilian infrastructure.
Suggesting that Hamas wants it's own civilians to die is just sick IDF propaganda to justify war crimes. I think civilians stayed in north Gaza because they did not want to abandon their homes, not because "hamas talked them into staying" lol
The IDF has launched, by it's own admission, over 8000 rockets into Gaza. Are we to believe all 8000 were launched at legitimate Hamas targets? To justify such an act we need serious evidence, "The IDF said it was all Hamas" is not good enough.
All of this is hauntingly similar to the US "war on terror". At a certain point, we labeled all military-aged males as "enemy combatants", therefore it was acceptable to kill them all. Israel is following the US lead: kill them all, then label them as Hamas to justify the mass slaughter.
Israel has conscription. Pretty much all of its adults have been in the military. We should be allowed to expand on your rationale to claim that most of the Israeli deaths weren't civilians because they have been in the IDF.
It's shit logic, but so is yours.
This is what I don't understand is so hard for people. It's not like Israel has always been there, in that spot in in the Middle East, and that Palestinians teleported into Gaza and the West Bank unannounced one day. Gazans are basically refugees shoved in a tiny plot of territory carved out of what used to be their homeland, walled in, and brutally repressed for almost sixty years now. This doesn't excuse Hamas targeting innocents, but it goes a very long way towards explaining why Gaza might be home to a hardline anti-Israeli guerilla organization that sees the lives of their own people as cheap and those of their enemies as valueless. That's kinda the dynamic that the Israelis forced onto them, and now they're all up in arms that Hamas is acting accordingly.
Don't get me wrong, Hamas are still bad guys in this particular episode. But that sure as shit doesn't make Israel the good guys. There are only villains and victims here.
In a place with the living conditions of Gaza, one has to wonder who is stupid or evil enough to have so many children.
No, we can condemn both sides without calling it all terrorism. That's just plain stupid. Terrorism is a specific tactic and just because you don't like what a conventional military is doing doesn't make it terrorism. It's worthwhile to maintain our definitions.
the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims
Open season on hospitals, refugee camps and journalists seems it’s fits.
That specific ambulance was taken from the people of Gaza by hamas. Not only did hamas use it for transporting their terrorists they also robbed the people of gaza of said ambulance
If a killer hides in your house, is it right for the whole house to be bombed? Or are you now a terrorist by virtue of proximity?
If there's a criminal hiding in a crowd, how many people can a cop shoot through to make sure the criminal doesnt get away?
Ah, the "Moscow theater hostage crisis" school of collateral damage avoidance. Real good model to follow, that one...
Do you not think the innocent Palestinians are terrified?
Justify the killing of innocent people by saying they killed one man makes you no better than the terrorists that started this latest conflict.
Before you inevitably bring up that well Hamas are the ruling power, therefore the people must support them. Remember that the vast majority of people weren’t even alive when Hamas took power, and even then it was a narrow win.
I find you abhorrent for trying to defend any kind of terrorism, even if you believe in the cause. No life is worth more than any other, you sick fucks.
The issue is that hamas purposely is using their civilians to shield themselves. Isreal can only do so much to try and hit only hamas members, but war isn't that clean, no matter how much we wish it was. Yup, lots of evil all around, and there are some sick fucks in the IDF. But they're not using their own civilians and shields. Like, forcing them to stay in place so they're assured to die.
poor poor "palestinian" cinnamon rolls, never did nothin to nobody
awww cry me a fucking river, guess instead of having all those islamofascist muslim nations vote against israel time and time again, they should have gotten egypt to invade gaza sooner, through it's land crossing in raffah, to root out hamas, pij, and all the other terrorists who attack israel. what is that you say, the united nations islamofascists don't mind when muslim terrorists attack israel and kill jews, only when jews respond with force in their defense?
you don't say
Gaza was given to Arabs for self rule and determination in 2005, all Jews left Gaza, even Jewish graveyards were dug up and moved, it was theirs to do with as they liked.
They've spent the last 18 years making into a terrorist Disneyland with a dozen Islamofascist terrorist organizations with the stated goal of killing Jews and destroying the state of Israel, they've fired hundreds of thousands of missiles into Israel indiscriminately targeting civilians, and launched countless cross borders attacks against Jewish civilians, including one that caused the largest loss of Jewish life in any single day, anywhere, since the Holocaust on October 7th.
They were given Gaza to live in freedom and self determination, they used it to kill Jews. They were warned. They chose to ignore the warnings.
These acts of terrorism were perpetrated by the entire Gazan community, they voted for Hamas, and allowed Hamas to rule their government for the last 17 years, Hamas and all the other Islamic terrorists in Gaza are not outsiders, they were born in Gaza of Gazans, they were raised in Gaza, they were educated in Gaza, they married and had children of their own in Gaza, their Parents, teachers, mosques, hospitals, are all in Gaza, from which they use to hid and store weapons to attack Jews, Hamas, PIJ and all the other Islamic terrorist in Gaza ARE Gaza, there has been no uprising in Gaza, there have only been attacks on Israel. This is what Gazans have supported and sacrificed for in every way they possibly could.
And now it's here. I do hope they enjoy what they've worked generationaly to achieve.
There will be no ceasefire this time.
Look everyone, a pro-Israel propagandist with a bunch of easily refuted 'talking points' (lies). I'm always surprised they bother with places like Lemmy.
Colonizers and apartheidists really are the scum of the earth.
Look up every muslim war against Israel and that is always the primary justification.
lol do you think the Jews showed up 60 years ago and just started killing Muslims for fun or something?
100 years ago. But yes. The Balfour declaration sort of kicked things off.
It's another example of the British giving away land that they didn't actually own. (But they came in and took it after WW1)
Not for fun, for land and their property. The fun thing about referencing history in the modern age is you can literally verify many things with a quick Internet search. The sad thing is many people seem disinclined to do so.
On the contrary islamic radicals are more often well educated. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/05/islamic-state-recruits-world-bank-study-education-boko-haram
Islamic extremism directly funded by Israel, with the goal of keeping the Palestinians divided while also giving an excuse for more ethnic cleansing in areas where that Islamic extremism was not in control.
Oh yea remember the Yom Kippur war where Israeli paid all of its neighboring countries to invade them.
You people need to catch up on your history, saying uneducated things like that just makes you look dumb.
You want to talk history? Let's talk about how the IDF was formed out of three separate Zionist terrorist organizations, and how the worst of the bunch, Lehi, wanted to join WW2 on the side of the Nazis.
You really don't know?
The Lehi actually tried to join WW2 on the side of the Nazis, multiple times from 1940 until the founder of Lehi died in 1941. The Nazis refused to work with them.
This is all well established historical fact.
The founder of Lehi was fucked up. He bought into Nazi race science except he rearranged the races. He claimed that the Jewish people were the chosen ones and that the Arabs needed to be eradicated.
Anyway the main Lehi got up to was assassination.
They murdered British citizens in Mandatory Palestine, Jews who they thought were too friendly with the British or Palestinians, and any Palestinians who looked like they might be influential.
Just saying you might want to look closer into Hamas' election. It was a razor thin over Fatah and fewer than 50% of the vote. Then Hamas decided to not hold elections anymore for the past 17 years. Hamas is not popular at all anymore with 70% of gazans wanting the palastinian authority to take over the strip from hamas in a 2023 poll. Hamas saw the writing in the wall and decided to task Israel with creating a whole new generation of grieving and pissed off people which they are quickly doing.
I found a demographic breakdown of the population of Gaza by age and I think about 70% of people there are too young to have voted in the last election. And given the 50ish percent margin Hamas won by, is reasonable that only about max 15% of the current population actually voted for them. There's a lot of assumptions and hand waving there, but I don't imagine it's too far off.
Joey Ramone would be disgusted with you using his face for this proganda genocidal apologist bullshit.
Israel is so kind to have allowed Palestinians to use a small section of the territory they used to occupy entirely less than 100 years ago to create an enclave with some of the highest population density in the world, truly they're great benefactors!
You know who really fucking sucks? Hamas. You know who else really fucking sucks? The Israeli government.
