@carolannie even though i have lots of disagreements with him in general, i found this surprising and disappointing.

@Gustodon 🙂

@Gustodon i've done a fair amount of grabbing and shaking, so far to little avail.

i have lefty friends who voted for Trump entirely on the theory that he'd challenge the "blob" and US security state, be a force for international peace. maybe so! maybe he's just speaking loudly and carrying a tiny stick. but the case is looking weaker than it did (and it never looked so strong).

remarkable deference. https://x.com/mattyglesias/status/1870897966552322506

@louis @carolannie i guess the post WWII period was a bit unique in that there was some credible threat of enforcement of the norm, by the UN and especially the US. Korea, Iraq I. Even wars the US lost, Vietnam, imposed a heavy cost on those who violated the norm. in prior periods there were mutual security alliances, but little threat some unaligned power would be saved just because its invasion was on some level "wrong".

maybe it's just his way of retaliating against Jimmy Carter for voting Kamala.

@carolannie in the sweep of history, no! but the roughly 80 year period that norm has been somewhat enforced seems better than what preceded it!

call me old-fashioned, but i still think the norm against territorial expansion by military force is worth adhering to and enforcing.

@sqrtminusone probably not! but i think genuinely it is more the European example than the American example those crowds are inspired by, where 20 years ago it would have been the opposite. Even though then as now, only the EU would have been open to their accession.

a lot of crowing about the US’ “amazing” economy leaving Europe in the dust, but one doesn’t see a lot of mass protest by states looking to draw closer to America, while what’s going on in Georgia and Serbia is remarkable.

@homegrown @jalefkowit @oliphant@oliphant.social ( i’ve also written a mastodon archive to static site generator, fossilphant https://github.com/swaldman/fossilphant )

@light it’s the wealth per se, because we can’t meaningfully be political equals with such dramatic divergences of wealth.

@BenRossTransit but leadership punishes the fuck out of anyone who primaries incumbents. there’s a very serious omerta there, which tilts toward squad candidates who have little to lose from leadership anyway. team players don’t primary, even though nothing would be better for the team.

@BenRossTransit right. tight margins make the worst of them kingmakers. that’s a huge problem.

@BenRossTransit i don’t think it’s about leadership. i think it’s about something like the median Democratic congressperson.

@darwinwoodka i’m not sure “we” are institutionally constituted in a way that could ever render it self-interested for our representatives to do the right thing. it can’t in that sense come from us. sometimes people in positions of authority have to make use of their own minds and consciences. otherwise, Musk will happily pay to keep them comfortable doing his version of the right thing, while keeping the public braying for the blood of scapegoats.

@BenRossTransit i don’t have individuals in mind. what i want to know is if Democrats gain control of government, is there sufficient consensus they would act seriously to address the near death (if not actual death) experience any semblance of meaningful democracy is now enduring, or will they equivocate and tolerate the conditions that have brought us here and undoubtedly will again?

@louis it’s a moment where lying well and easily proves very adaptive…