M3M3M3 comments

After watching Iranian missiles rain down on Tel-Aviv, I hope it's now clear to everyone (especially Japanese politicians) that the effectiveness of the Patriot missile defence system has been grossly oversold. In the event of war, every base, every port, every piece of critical infrastructure can be targeted and destroyed with relative ease. Expensive wonder weapons aren't going to protect us.

Wouldn't we worry about the near universal Muslim non-recognition of Israel?

It's literally the number one worry and priority of the US State Department. The Abraham accords, massive aid and support to Egypt, Jordan, Saudi, the invasion of Iraq, the bombing of Syria, Iran, Yemen etc. The reason they don't insist on formal recognition from Muslim states is because they want to avoid a repeat of 1979.

No, this is actually about North Korea's nuclear program.

Why has North Korea been under crippling sanctions long before they started developing nuclear weapons? If it's the legacy of a brutal war, why were ties with Vietnam established 30 years ago? One of the US conditions for re-establishing ties with Vietnam was recognition of Israel, which Vietnam did in 1993. If North Korea were to abandon it's nuclear program tomorrow but maintain its stance that the Palestinian state extends over the entire territory claimed by Israel, do you serious think the US would ease any sanctions? Be honest with yourself.

The true reason the US government maintains sanctions against North Korea has nothing to do with the Korean war, with communism, or the nuclear program. The US fought and lost a brutal war with Vietnam but they now enjoy diplomatic and economic ties despite Vietnam still being communist. Pakistan has developed nuclear weapons but enjoys close military ties with the US.

The reason the US maintains the sanctions regime against North Korea (and Cuba) is because they are the only two non-Muslim countries in the world that have never recognized Israel as a state. It's not a coincidence. These concerns guide US policy on every issue regardless of party or administration.

Children are starving yet someone could buy a piece of crap like this with a clear conscience. Insane.

Or how many mosquito nets can be bought 

Or how many safe-to-drink wells could be drilled

Whoever bought this bag isn't just splurging 8.6 million on a whim. It's likely a careful investment, and a hedge against inflation. Ironically, they might be trying to protect their wealth from people such as yourselves who have a thousand ideas for how to spend other people's money.

I don't think it's a great poster because there are too many subtle clues suggesting that he may have just forgotten his things instead of deliberately littering. First, he's clearly in a rush looking at his watch, shirt untucked. The bottle still has a fair amount of liquid indicating that he hadn't finished drinking it yet. If he's a litterer, why has he been careful to collect various pieces of trash in the white bag up to this point? Why didn't he just leave them somewhere before getting on the train? The other passengers seem shocked and disturbed, as if something unexpected and inexplicable has happened.

A better poster would have the man leaving behind one empty piece of trash. He should be walking away slowly with a smug look on his face to highlight the deliberate nature of his littering. The other passengers should be angry and annoyed (rather than shocked) to indicate that there's been a clear and unambiguous transgression of social norms.

(Also, where's the boy going to sit when there's only one empty seat?)

The culture of Tibet and the Ughurs should be decided by those people

Sounds perfectly reasonable, but the problem you're going to face is that most progressive liberals will twist themselves into a pretzel before they agree on what a Tibetan actually is.

There are only around 3.5 million people living in the Tibet Autonomous Region of the PRC, and 90% of these are what I would call 'ethnic Tibetans'. However, if you look at the area of Greater Tibet (which the Tibetan government in exile claims as Tibet) ethnic Tibetans number around 6 million while ethnic Chinese now number around 7 million.

Would these ethnic Chinese who were born in Greater Tibet or lived there for 50-70 years have any say on the culture of Tibet, or would you limit the decision making authority on Tibet's culture and future only to ethnic Tibetans? Liberal progressives are ideologically prevented from ever agreeing to the latter.

If followed this without an agenda you would know that he has given up his political authority.

Not sure what you mean. I'm not a Buddhist and I don't follow any of this closely. The Dalai Lama is a spiritual leader, is he not? At the very least I assume he's on the board of this non-profit that's going to find him?

a non-profit that he has founded will have the sole authority to recognize his future reincarnation

So when this person dies he will be reincarnated and his non-profit organization will somehow find him and put him back into his rightful position as leader, presumably in perpetuity. How charming.

and now people killing each other in law firms.

I'm actually surprised that this sort of thing doesn't happen more often given how legal disputes can completely destroy people's lives and finances. (Of course, we don't know the motive here)

What a nightmare. One good thing about Japan is that certain professions are highly gendered and daycare workers are almost exclusively female. I would never leave my kids in the care of a male daycare worker. Perhaps it's unfair and prejudiced but I just assume any man entering a female coded profession is strange at best and some sort of predator at worst.

your assumption that a majority of the US population is hypocritical to say they support aid while not being interested in actually giving

It's not hypocrisy to support the idea of foreign aid while also believing that it should be limited to a more reasonable amount. I support eradicating homelessness but I don't support donating half my salary to achieve it. That doesn't make me a hypocrite by any reasonable definition. I suspect most Americans couldn't tell you how much is actually being spent, and they might change their views if they did.

They are going to be paying much more for healthcare with your MAGA cutbacks.

Firstly, I'm neither American or MAGA so these are not 'my' cutbacks. However, if what you're saying is true, it sounds like all the more reason to let American taxpayers keep their $64.

I'm not against foreign aid but I would limit mandatory contributions to a more reasonable sum, say $5 per citizen. If people want to contribute more privately, I commend their generosity and superior virtue.

"U.S. citizens contribute about 17 cents per day to USAID, around $64 per year," said study co-author James Macinko

if they knew just how effective such a small contribution can be to saving millions of lives."

That's actually far more than I would have ever guessed. It's actually a shocking amount of money if it means a couple is paying $128 (¥18,000) per year.

If you put it to a democratic referendum I wonder if the majority would rather keep their money.

The CCP still stole it, paradise or not.

Perhaps keeping an independent Tibet would have been nice, just like an independent Ainu Hokkaido, or the Kingdom of Hawaii, or an Australia governed by aboriginals. But for one reason or another these polities failed to remain independent and were consumed by larger powers. History marches on.

The idea that modern young Tibetans would choose to give up the economic/educational opportunities that come with being a Chinese citizen in exchange for independence in a small landlocked nation seems very unlikely to me.

The Tibetans are religious people, and no amount of "re-education" by the CCP has changed that, despite decades of horrific repression.

Have you ever wondered why the CCP was able to annex Tibet with so little opposition by the locals? Tibet wasn't exactly a peaceful paradise for ordinary people. Tibetans were serfs who served the land owning monks and would be horribly mistreated and have their ears or nose cut off for disobedience. This was all justified by Buddhism and the idea that serfs deserved their fate because they must have lived unpiously in a previous life to be reborn as serfs. The modern repackaging of Buddhism as some sort of enlightened new-age philosophy makes it difficult to imagine, but Tibet was basically a brutal religious dictatorship.

@plasticmonkey

What do you actually want Trump to do in this situation? Be specific. Should he keep bombing Iranian nuclear sites until the job is actually done? Should he go into Iran and spend the next 15 years chasing Iran's nuclear program with American boots on the ground? Or should he be honest and admit that Iran's nuclear program has not been destroyed, thereby providing Israel with an excuse to continue bombing Iran and destabilizing the region indefinitely?

Like it or not, an outrageous lie was probably the most responsible course of action in this situation. I'm sorry if that bothers some people.

The Trump administration is clearly trying to pretend that any US obligations to the Jews have been fulfilled by bombing Iran's nuclear program and thus there is no need to continue war with Iran. Destruction of Iran's nuclear program is an obvious lie, but it's a noble lie to avoid escalation and war. I'm happy to play along with Trump on this occasion.

Russia can barely take over eastern Ukraine but Europe needs to spend billions more on defense to protect us from what exactly?

None of America's expensive wonder weapons have proved decisive in the Ukraine war. Their most sophisticated multi-billion dollar air defense systems couldn't prevent Tel Aviv from being bombed by cheap Iranian missiles.

In the end it's manpower that makes the difference in war, and that doesn't require spending 5% of GDP. This is a shakedown of Europe by Trump and the US military industrial complex.

@OssanAmerica

Incorrect. Whether Taiwan is part of the PRC has never been tested in any International court or Forum, so there exists no basis in International Law.

The principle of Uti Possidetis has been recognized and applied by the ICJ in many cases over the decades. It's one of the most well established principles of international law. If you can explain why it doesn't apply to Taiwan, I'm interested to hear it.

China claims Taiwan as part of it. Taiwan claims otherwise. Obviously there is a dispute.

The majority of the international community recognizes PRC sovereignty over Taiwan. Of course, Taiwan pays a few tiny states to maintain recognition of the ROC but these are outliers. The situation could change if Taiwan were to declare independence, but that has not happened and the PRC would be within it's rights to invade Taiwan if it did.

However, all three nations you mentioned, despite recognizing Beijing as the sole govt of China, maintain trade, economic, education, cultural exchanges with Taiwan. There is even a Taiwan representative office in Geneva.

The significance of this being what exactly? All of this occurs largely with the consent of the PRC government. Nobody wants to blockade Taiwan and make life impossible for the people.

The "One China Policy" in China is interpreted to include Taiwan. However, the U.S, while agreeing that Beijing represents "China", does not recognize Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan.

The US is one of the most persistent violators of international law in the world and their policy of strategic incoherence on Taiwan is not widely followed. They are ruthlessly pursuing their own political and economic interests. I'm far more interested in hearing what Luxembourg thinks about the situation.

@OssanAmerica

It's not disputable as a matter of international law. That's why responsible and diligent members of the international community like Norway, Switzerland, Finland and others recognized the PRC as the legitimate government over all China as early as 1950 when the outcome of the civil war became clear.

Just because the losers of the civil war continue to be hold up on part of the territory does not split the country into two new entities. There are states in Africa that have never exercised full control over their territories since independence, but we recognize their authority over the entire territory as a matter of international law.

Rutte's sycophantic message to Trump praising the Iran strikes was just embarrassing. Never trust a man who is willing to sell his own dignity to the highest bidder.

At the very least Japan should demand that any soldiers deployed to Japan must meet higher standards that go beyond the basic US military recruitment requirements. For example, a minimum ASVAB score that equates to an IQ of 100 or you won't serve in Japan (or be allowed off base).

As the US military struggles with recruitment and scrapes the bottom of the barrel, these problems will only get worse.

It's cute how people still pretend that any NATO member can invoke Article 5 and everyone will ride to the rescue. The truth is that nothing happens in NATO without Washington's prior approval. The United States makes up such an overwhelming majority of NATO forces (all other members combined are a small fraction) that it's almost laughable to speak of NATO as a separate entity. NATO will go to war when the US goes to war, and it won't when Washington deems it not in US interests. Of course, some will fantasize otherwise.

Iran's arch rival Saudi Arabia has come out and expressed 'deep concern' over the targeting of nuclear sites in Iran and condemned the violation of Iran's sovereignty. We are no longer in a world where countries fall into line and blindly support the US.

We're living in a completely different world after the Gaza genocide. The US and EU have basically discredited themselves and exposed their own hypocrisy/double-standards vis-a-vis Israel. Iran would be a fool to enter into further negotiations and expect agreements to be upheld. If Israel has a veto over your country's foreign policy, you don't have real sovereignty.

Why was Iran enriching uranium to a 60% level?

Probably to deter Israel from bombing them (and their allies) with impunity? It's not unreasonable to conclude that the one thing that might restrain Israel at this point is the threat of nuclear weapons. If Iran withdraws from the NPT they have just as much of a right to have the bomb as Israel does.

The skies over Israel remain completely closed to commercial air-traffic. How long until the people get restless and the economy begins to feel the pinch? My money is on Iran winning a war of attrition.

The nuclear issue is a huge red herring to get stupid people excited. We're watching Iran close Israeli airspace and cripple Israel's economy with conventional ballistic missiles. Israel's US funded missile defence systems have been put through their first serious test and failed spectacularly. The idea of Iran as a sovereign nation with a capable conventional military force is what Israel actually finds entirely unacceptable.

Seeing Iran successfully strike Israel multiple times with hypersonic missiles was a bit unexpected. If there's no consistently reliable defence against these missile, it's a bit of a game changer.

Just be reasonable. That's all our Japanese hosts are asking from us. If the hotel staff really wants to see your gaijin card for some reason, pull it out and show it to them. It's not an affront to your human dignity or a violation of your human rights. Don't make life more difficult than it needs to be.