World is Falling Apart Thread (Locked forever)

[J T]

Philippines Duterte calls Obama "*****"


The U.S. in some countries has been considered the bully and dictating policy, interesting on some of the latest events. In Laos, a stairway was not even brought out for Air Force One, President Obama had to come down in the airplane service ladder; geez some welcome!

In watching the video you can see Duterte getting more and more angry. I side with the Philippines President, who states he answers only to the Filipino people. Good for him, but could have been maybe a little more tactful to his U.S. ally!
Love the guy just like Trump, entertaining and pulls no punches!

PULLS NO PUNCHES!?!?!? He has people fucking killed! He has admitted to killing 3 people himself. When that woman in Australia was raped, his only concern was that the mayor didn't get to have her first. He wants journalists murdered who go against him. This is your fucking hero?!?!?! JESUS! Just because he hates Obama like you do?!? Please tell me your opinion is based on limited information. He is a real life monster.

Actually, I think Obama has done a fair job, though I could care less on the mandated Health Care taking priority over jobs. The Philippine President is not my hero, just good that he is standing his ground stating the U.S. cannot dictate policy to his country. This is why we get in so much issues with different countries even when we try to help. No country wants to be counseled on how the country is run even when we brought Democracy there.

I agree that the US can be a bully and other countries should advocate for themselves. I just find Duterte to be an otherwise reprehensible political figure and human being, so I couldn't believe someone here, especially someone as bright as you, was saying "love the guy". I'll just have to assume that you said that without a fuller understanding of who this guy is.

[Exhuminator]

Duterte is a dictator in the making. Even if he didn't agree with Obama's behavior towards him, he did not handle his rebuttal in a respectful fashion whatsoever. I believe he will regret this action in time. I mean Obama doesn't even let little shit go:

"Mr. President, don't touch my girlfriend," Jones quipped as he walked by the two.

"I really wasn't planning on it," Obama replied, joking that Jones was "an example of a brother just embarrassing you for no reason."

Obama got back at Jones after voting, with a hug and a kiss for Jones' fiancé.

"Now, he's really jealous," Obama told Cooper.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/21/politics/ ... ing-jokes/

[Sarge]

The answer to the Trump question is, "I don't know." He may or may not be any better in that regard, but he also hasn't been in the position Hillary was to show that sort of carelessness with confidential information. So no matter what I think, he gets a (sort of) pass because he's not the one being accused of it.

Also note that some of the emails were Special Access Program only, which is beyond even Top Secret classification. Regardless of their markings or lack thereof, she as Secretary of State should be able to recognize them as SAP and act accordingly. This is true of other clearance levels as well; the lack of markings does not absolve an individual of the responsibility to recognize sensitive information.

[marurun]

Michel Barnier and Guy Verhofstadt have been chosen as Brexit negotiators. As reddit comments put it "Dis gon be gud!"

This is gonna be a hell of a fight.

It's going to get tougher for Britain as well. Softbank finalized the purchase of ARM and is committed to expanding jobs in the UK, but is dependent upon favorable access to EU markets through the UK with ARM. So Japan's Softbank is leaning on the UK pretty hard to make sure that they do whatever it takes to preserve their trade access.

Doesn't make other candidates better/etc, but she definitely violated policy in a big way and would be facing serious consequences were she almost anyone else.
That said, I half suspect that the FBI's investigation found a pattern of negligence at that level that wasn't limited to just her, contributing to their leniency.

Let's talk details here, shall we? Violating policy is a problem, but you can't punish someone for violating policy (which isn't law, mind you) once they are no longer with you. So they can't punish Clinton for violating department policy when she's not with the department.

Further, her staff are the ones who sent and forwarded to her emails that contained confidential information, and they stripped the Classified information headers when they did it, so the emails she received didn't have that key information indicating clearly whether the emails had classified information contained within. And the FBI did indeed find that among State Department staff, that kind of behavior was common-place long before Clinton came along. So when you have a large organization in which the employees consistently fail to follow security and IT policies and are too afraid to confront the new boss-appointee with those policies, you can see how a situation like this might come about. The State Department as a whole did not take its own policies seriously.

If everyone were following the rules, presented them clearly to the new boss-lady, and she was the one failing to follow-through despite being coached and surrounded by otherwise compliant staff, that would suggest Clinton was the problem. But Clinton is an accomplished politician because she is very go-with-the-flow. She acclimated quickly to the culture of the Senate when she was a senator, for example. She was placed atop a department that was totally fine with letting her do whatever she wanted and not willing to tell her otherwise, because their existing employees were already doing pretty much whatever they wanted. I'm certainly not arguing that Clinton demonstrated stellar judgment in her handling of electronic communication at the State Dept, but I also don't think she should be pilloried for not being a devout rules-follower in an organization that isn't known for devout rules-followers.

[isiolia]

I'm certainly not arguing that Clinton demonstrated stellar judgment in her handling of electronic communication at the State Dept, but I also don't think she should be pilloried for not being a devout rules-follower in an organization that isn't known for devout rules-followers.

Point still is, classified information is governed by law. Mishandling it like she (and others in the State Department) did is illegal. So if the question is whether or not she actually did anything wrong, well, she did. The circumstances of it don't change that. What they do serve to do is explain the lack of consequences. It's probably counterproductive to go through and try to bring charges against any and everyone involved, and more logical to focus on fixing the problem.

[o.pwuaioc]

I'm certainly not arguing that Clinton demonstrated stellar judgment in her handling of electronic communication at the State Dept, but I also don't think she should be pilloried for not being a devout rules-follower in an organization that isn't known for devout rules-followers.

Point still is, classified information is governed by law. Mishandling it like she (and others in the State Department) did is illegal. So if the question is whether or not she actually did anything wrong, well, she did. The circumstances of it don't change that. What they do serve to do is explain the lack of consequences. It's probably counterproductive to go through and try to bring charges against any and everyone involved, and more logical to focus on fixing the problem.

Did you skip over the earlier conversation? The facts of the law just aren't in your corner: http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2016/07/05/the ... egligence/

I'm far, far from a Clinton fan, but this obsession reeks of ignorance combined with political ax-wielding.

[dsheinem]

I feel like a lot of the hand wringing around Clinton has nothing to do with actual law, actual history, actual "bad things" that she was responsible for causing, etc. How many hearings and inquiries (run by her political enemies or non-partisan agencies) that ultimately exhonerate her need to be held before otherwise rational people will stop poking at her looking for scandal and/or blame worthiness?

[ElkinFencer10]

What happened to having Jefferson run against Adams and McCain run against Obama? Why is it so rare to have legitimate choices? I honestly don't know who I'll vote for. It certainly won't be Trump, and not voting isn't an option to true patriots (inflammatory perhaps, but I adamantly stand by that). I guess I've got two months to choose between the crook and the moron.

Well, the problem is that we give the vote to everyone who can work up the energy to fill out a form but don't have the energy to get informed about the issues.

I certainly can't work up the energy to make a truly informed voting choice, so I do my patriotic duty and don't vote.

I would argue that informing yourself is part of your duty.

[Erik_Twice]

This is gonna be a hell of a fight.

According to what I learnt in my International Negotiation classes, it will probably be a long, incredibly boring process. Strategy dictates that the EU, being in the stronger negotiating position, will stall to its advantage.

Of course, the main problem is that the UK does not have any semblance of negotiating position. They do not know what they want except for two or three things that are so patently ridiculous they won't ever get them.

[isiolia]

Did you skip over the earlier conversation? The facts of the law just aren't in your corner: http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2016/07/05/the ... egligence/

I'm far, far from a Clinton fan, but this obsession reeks of ignorance combined with political ax-wielding.

Taking classified information and putting it on an unclassified system is illegal in and of itself. It carries a lower maximum penalty, but it's still against the law. Some people do get prosecuted for it. That said, it's more common in general that, as with Clinton, actual criminal charges aren't brought. More typically, people would have their clearance revoked, and probably become ineligible for their job (and a lot of other government jobs) as a result.

I haven't been saying she should be jailed or anything. Just that, technically, the law was broken. Personally, I think admitting serious mistakes were made and moving to correct them is fine. It's downplaying or glossing over them that isn't.