The "What Are You Thinking About Right Now?" PIP

This.

34 minutes ago, Matt! said:

Is this how it starts? Now she’s being called a "victim"? This scumbag got 20 years in federal prison for sex trafficking and crimes involving minors. Is this the first step towards softening her image so Donald can pardon her later?

@Stromboli1 You probably know Newsmax so please be kind and educate me on the matter.

Newsmax is the ying to MSNBC & CNN's yang if you know what I mean.

31 minutes ago, Matt! said:

And what would that be?

Education, sports, their jobs, local governments, military, police, firefighters, and many more.

33 minutes ago, Stromboli1 said:

Newsmax is the ying to MSNBC & CNN's yang if you know what I mean.

I know what you mean. Except MSNBC and CNN aren’t out here calling convicted child traffickers "victims". That’s not "yang", that’s propaganda.

35 minutes ago, Stromboli1 said:

Education, sports, their jobs, local governments, military, police, firefighters, and many more.

You say they value education, but red states consistently defund public schools and push anti-teacher agendas. You say they value jobs, yet fight unions, block wage increases and rank highest in poverty. You say they wave flags for military, firefighters and police but scream "deep state" and "feds are corrupt" when things don’t go their way. What part of that is "value" ?

1 hour ago, Matt! said:

You say they value education, but red states consistently defund public schools and push anti-teacher agendas. You say they value jobs, yet fight unions, block wage increases and rank highest in poverty. You say they wave flags for military, firefighters and police but scream "deep state" and "feds are corrupt" when things don’t go their way. What part of that is "value" ?

very few Americans are members of unions (unlike in Germany and other european countries etc) due to massive de-industrialization. The collapse of industry in the 1980s-onward decimated the blue collar unions.

libertarians/republicans attack public education/teachers unions because according to libertarian doctrine/dogma the private sector does everything better and the public sector is just a source of social parasitism. So all government jobs are considered more or less parasitic/lazy mouth-breathers. The sub-par performance of American public education for decades has reinforced this belief.

Their idea is to make K-12 education a for-profit enterprise like the insanely expensive US university system!

However republicans/libertarianism has exceptions (military, firefighters, police). Here in the US we also have enormous numbers of for-profit prisons!

When you see the dismantling of elements of the federal gov't & mass firings by the Trump administration he is merely following the Project 2025 blueprint created by the Republicans. I believe that the goal is to eliminate as many Republican unfriendly Deep State elements as possible and also open up business opportunities for the private sector.

10 hours ago, Matt! said:

You say they value education, but red states consistently defund public schools and push anti-teacher agendas. You say they value jobs, yet fight unions, block wage increases and rank highest in poverty. You say they wave flags for military, firefighters and police but scream "deep state" and "feds are corrupt" when things don’t go their way. What part of that is "value" ?

The school stuff happened during covid where parents started pushing back on public schools, although there were calls for school choice before covid. Then there was always the argument that the US was #1 in the world and Top 10 for education until the Department of Education was created.

Some states are right to work states where employees can't be required to join unions.

As for the military the physical standards were lowered, image problems, woke/dei issues within the military, take the jab or be discharged, and I'm forgetting other stuff.

The police in areas applied a two tier application of the law, closed down businesses that didn't break covid protocol while looking the other way for certain businesses.

Both sides view the government when their side is not in power as corrupt, ruining this country, etc. Then there's the conspiracy theorists who conspiracy no matter whomever is in charge.

11 hours ago, Matt! said:

I know what you mean. Except MSNBC and CNN aren’t out here calling convicted child traffickers "victims". That’s not "yang", that’s propaganda.

They're all propagandists on different sides of the political spectrum.

23 minutes ago, Stromboli1 said:

The school stuff happened during covid where parents started pushing back on public schools, although there were calls for school choice before covid. Then there was always the argument that the US was #1 in the world and Top 10 for education until the Department of Education was created.

Some states are right to work states where employees can't be required to join unions.

As for the military the physical standards were lowered, image problems, woke/dei issues within the military, take the jab or be discharged, and I'm forgetting other stuff.

The police in areas applied a two tier application of the law, closed down businesses that didn't break covid protocol while looking the other way for certain businesses.

Both sides view the government when their side is not in power as corrupt, ruining this country, etc. Then there's the conspiracy theorists who conspiracy no matter whomever is in charge.

The U.S Department of Education was established in 1979. Before that comparisons of international education systems were extremely limited and not standardized, so no legit global ranking put the U.S at #1 or Top 10 in any verified way.

Standards have been adjusted over time, mostly to accommodate modern roles like tech-based warfare (parade drone guy has probably never seen the weight room, but he can do more damage on the battlefield than group of marines.)

Conservative media and Pete uses “woke” as a catch-all for any effort to diversify or modernize. DEI programs are about making sure the best talent doesn’t get excluded because of race, gender or background not about lowering standards.

Forget the previous line for a second, let’s quickly compare the current and former SecDefs. Lloyd Austin served 41 years in the Army, retired as a 4-star General and led CENTCOM. Pete Hegseth left the National Guard as a Major after a few years and spent the last decade ranting on Fox & Friends. So tell me, who looks like the "DEI hire" here?

38 minutes ago, Stromboli1 said:

They're all propagandists on different sides of the political spectrum.

Agreed, propaganda exists everywhere, but calling a convicted child trafficker a "victim" isn’t just spin, it’s morally bankrupt. There’s a difference between bias and outright rewriting reality.

13 hours ago, Matt! said:

Is this how it starts? Now she’s being called a "victim"? This scumbag got 20 years in federal prison for sex trafficking and crimes involving minors. Is this the first step towards softening her image so Donald can pardon her later?

@Stromboli1 You probably know Newsmax so please be kind and educate me on the matter.

Yeah, didn’t take a genius to figure it out. I’ll translate it for you: "If she says the right things, she will go free".

The US military has been corrupt since WW2. Even President Eisenhower warned of the corruption in the MIC. This is long before DEI and other excuses. The Republicans/MAGA have a very delusional and ahistorical belief in the military.

As far as serious conflicts go, the US has not won a major war against peer opponents since World War 2 and is poorly led from top down. It is grossly inefficient in the production of weapons and material.

8 minutes ago, Matt! said:

Yeah, didn’t take a genius to figure it out. I’ll translate it for you: "If she says the right things, she will go free".

Pretty much this.

2 minutes ago, Cult Icon said:

As far as serious conflicts go, the US has not won a major war against peer opponents since World War 2 and is poorly led from top down. It is grossly inefficient in the production of weapons and material.

Yes, there are inefficiencies and problems (efficiency varies a lot depending on the program, branch, and contracting method) in the system. However, the U.S still produces some, if not the most advanced and effective weapons systems in the world with a defense industrial base that remains a global leader in production capacity. So, I’d say calling the entire production "grossly inefficient" is an overgeneralization.

1 minute ago, Matt! said:

Yes, there are inefficiencies and problems (efficiency varies a lot depending on the program, branch, and contracting method) in the system. However, the U.S still produces some, if not the most advanced and effective weapons systems in the world with a defense industrial base that remains a global leader in production capacity. So, I’d say calling the entire production "grossly inefficient" is an overgeneralization.

The US isn't a global leader in production capability, it's China. If you look at the price tag of American weapons you would be shocked. There is no reason why an artillery shell should cost $5,000 for instance or Patriot batteries should cost billions.

Wars aren't won by having the most advanced weapons or claiming to have the most advanced systems. (this is a common delusion- this is what arms manufacturers want people to believe.)

The US MIC/Military exists to cause conflict around the world, most of them unnecessary and incompetent.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wunderwaffe

Wunderwaffe (German pronunciation: [ˈvʊndɐˌvafə]) is a German word that roughly translates to "wonder-weapon" and was a term assigned during World War II by Nazi Germany's propaganda ministry to some revolutionary "superweapons". Most of these weapons however remained prototypes, which either never reached the combat theater, or if they did, were too late or in numbers insufficient to have a significant military effect.

1 hour ago, Stromboli1 said:

The school stuff happened during covid where parents started pushing back on public schools, although there were calls for school choice before covid. Then there was always the argument that the US was #1 in the world and Top 10 for education until the Department of Education was created.

Public schools have been under fire for about 2 decades plus for poor performance (as far as I remember).

That being said American children/parents are also to blame and also anti-intellectual cultures in the US.

The Republican party has anti-intellectual/anti-college strains and so do American white rednecks, blacks, latinos etc.

46 minutes ago, Cult Icon said:

The US isn't a global leader in production capability, it's China. If you look at the price tag of American weapons you would be shocked. There is no reason why an artillery shell should cost $5,000 for instance or Patriot batteries should cost billions.

Wars aren't won by having the most advanced weapons or claiming to have the most advanced systems. (this is a common delusion- this is what arms manufacturers want people to believe.)

Depends on the kind of production capability you mean. China may lead in overall manufacturing volume, but pumping out rifles and ammo doesn’t win modern wars. The U.S still leads in advanced military technology, global defense exports and high-end R&D.

Sure, wars aren't won by most advanced weapons alone, strategy, logistics and politics matter as well. But advanced systems "don’t matter"? If you can strike from 1000 miles away while the other guy is still loading his RPG, that’s not a minor advantage, it’s decisive. Arms manufacturers exaggerate to some extent to boost sales, but dismissing technological superiority entirely is its own kind of delusion.

21 minutes ago, Matt! said:

Depends on the kind of production capability you mean. China may lead in overall manufacturing volume, but pumping out rifles and ammo doesn’t win modern wars. The U.S still leads in advanced military technology, global defense exports and high-end R&D.

Sure, wars aren't won by most advanced weapons alone, strategy, logistics and politics matter as well. But advanced systems "don’t matter"? If you can strike from 1000 miles away while the other guy is still loading his RPG, that’s not a minor advantage, it’s decisive. Arms manufacturers exaggerate to some extent to boost sales, but dismissing technological superiority entirely is its own kind of delusion.

Western supremacy/white supremacy is very outdated as the China easily swamps the US in shipbuilding & drones and arms production volume, and claiming that China is 'lower quality' is very 1990s era. They have advanced to peer opponents of the US for a long time now including producing advanced fighter aircraft. The US is also behind Russia/China in hypersonic missiles.

Advanced systems can only provide small tactical victories, which is what America's advanced systems have done or pretended to have done in social media & in politics. It does not have a strategic impact in actually winning peer wars. It didn't work for Germany in WW2 and it hasn't done so for America ever since. I can only think of the atom bombs in WW2 as being decisive.

Look at the Vietnam war for example...

The idea of an incredibly powerful and technologically advanced US military that can conquer any country is mainly the product of brainwashing, from movies & videogames, NATO, and politicians. Not careful study of military history and military operations.

The US has been de-industrializing since the 1980s, and with that goes military power.

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