MTG Salvation

Quote from Ljoss »

People have differences of opinion on words and phrases. Why is it so hard for the left to get that? You can redefine racism and sexism as you have and start using your own wacky definitions, you're allowed. But you don't get to tell other people how to use language. If you want to convince them to do so, you can do that. But this is still America, so you don't get to impose that on everyone.

Fake, not genuine, made up, concocted - it's what this report is and I'm fine using the phrase fake news to describe it.

So your explanation for why you would say, "left does the same things that it vilifies the right for doing" is that the left vilifies the right for producing and promoting fake news, and you have chosen to redefine the term "fake news" to mean something substantively different from what the right does. You therefore conclude that because you use the same words "fake news", it constitutes the same thing. Tell me, have you also redefined the term "same" to mean something new that would make any of this make even the tiniest bit of sense?

Quote from Ljoss »

It's terrible journalistic ethics to publish (or in CNN's case, ideologically promote) explosive allegations with no corroboration. I'm fine with the description 'fake news.'

Is that what's got you all riled up? I get that you're giddy about seeing the lamestream media taken down a peg or whatever, but how about getting your facts straight first?

Quote from Ljoss »

The other way around - what's interesting is the left does the same things that it vilifies the right for doing. Since our fact-checking organizations of the future will apparently be Snopes and Pravda, expect fake left news to take off this year.

Oh, the left does the same thing? Like how Obama never answered any questions from Fox? Oh wait...

Quote from Ljoss »

Trump went off today on fake news outlets Buzzfeed and CNN. There are plenty of things that are going to be bad about a Trump presidency, but this campaign that he's running against the garbage in the media is fantastic. Here's the video evidence.

Refusing to take a question from CNN while taking a question from Breitbart is not cracking down on fake news, it's cracking down on oppositional news, and hoping people like you won't be able to tell the difference.

Quote from Ljoss »

Did he actually say anything racist during the campaign trail, though? I could see chauvinist being a pretty appropriate word for him what with the way he treats women and all.

Let me try to put this in my own words and you tell me if this is what you mean. Do you mean that: he has been suspicious of illegal immigrants from Mexico and Muslims and, while Mexicans and Muslims aren't a race (so that you can't be racist against Mexicans or Muslims), they still have associations with "brownness" and that kind of talk triggered all the people that have a latent (or not latent, actually) hatred of brown people?

My mistake, I should have included "quibble over what is and is not a race" in the list of behaviors used to excuse racism.

Quote from MTGTCG »

Helpful links updated:
-New Youtube video under 'What About the Poor?'.
-Wikipedia page replaced MisesWiki link under 'What is Libertarianism?'.
-New book, 'The Problem of Political Authority', added under recommended books section.
-'What is Wrong With Our Government?' section added.
-'AnarchoCapitalism' section added.

Clicked on one link, saw this gem:

And without a central government “representing” an entire geographical area, there would be no reason for a foreign country to invade a large region if they did have such a dispute.

Does that sound correct to you?

Quote from MTGTCG »

Edit:I forgot to address your argument against my proposed gambling system of funding the minarchic government: if someone wants to ruin their life by gambling, more power to them, it is not my job to tell people what they can or can not do, and I shouldn't be guilty for allowing them to excersise their free will. Also all the government has to do to outcompete the private onlinegambling/lottery companies is to match their price/odds/winnings proportion, not that hard to do.

Isn't the Nash equilibrium of that game for the lottery to collect a vanishingly small rake? If the government is running a lottery with enough profit to fund a military, there's plenty of room for private lotteries to undercut them. If the government is running a lottery which cannot be profitably undercut, it can't possibly fund a military with its measly earnings.

Quote from MTGTCG »

Would you rather buy a lottery ticket that supports your national defense or a lottery ticket from a private business who uses the profit in a way that he/she wants?

I'd rather buy the one that gives me better odds.

Quote from Blinking Spirit »

What osieorb said. The feeling of humiliation is one of the most effective generators for extremism and rage. The Trump movement is so angry at "political correctness" precisely because of this attitude. As distasteful as it may seem, the way to defuse radicalism is to give the radicals a seat at the table. Look at South Africa. Truth and Reconciliation. You think Mandela never sat down and played nice with people who considered him subhuman?

The Truth and Reconciliation process was not giving a seat at the table to the ideas of Apartheid. Botha didn't even show up. The people who showed up were those willing to apologize for past abuses and renounce Apartheid, not those who remained apartheid supporters. Even today South Africa is a deeply racially divided country - as much the Truth and Reconciliation Comission accomplished, it certainly didn't succeed in all its goals.

What about Denazification efforts in post-WW2 Germany? That process was certainly at least as successful in defusing radicalism, and it certainly didn't offer Nazism a seat at the table.

The Bruna and Gisela cards in exile will meld into Brisela, Voice of Nightmares (C.R. 712.1a), since that's the result of carrying out the meld keyword action, which is merely to "put them onto the battlefield face up and combined" (C.R 701.35a); nothing in the meld keyword action refers to the name of the resulting melded permanent.

Quote from Highroller »

Quote from bLatch »

It contains a legitimate response. It also contains an ad hominem attack.

Because apparently saying someone's statements are racist is not a legitimate response.

Look it's simple. If I say, "X is a better third baseman than Y," and you reply, "Well X is racist," that's an ad hominem fallacy. It's a fallacy because you're not attacking X on the merits that he's an inferior baseball player, but instead on a quality of his character that his wholly irrelevant to the discussion.

However, saying, "Your argument is racist" is hardly an ad hominem fallacy. It's addressing the argument, and it's ENTIRELY relevant whether or not your argument is racist.

------

On another note, Trump settled the lawsuits against him for Trump University when he previously said he would not.

Racists don't like being called racist because it hurts their feelings. The politically correct term is "politically incorrect."

Quote from Ljoss »

But insulated within the Presidential office, being removed from the pressures of an election, I do believe he'll be more restrained.

HOW? HOW COULD YOU POSSIBLY BELIEVE THIS?

How much denial do you have to be in?

Quote from Tiax »

This is the sort of stuff that Trump supporters believe in. The table lists Equatorial Guinea as having an average IQ of 59, which is well below the cutoff for mental retardation. Think this through for a second - is there really a country where everyone is mentally disabled?

Any thinking person would be able to tell that's obviously not the case.

Indeed - especially as this is the *average*. Given these things tend to be a bell curve, if the average was 59, you'd have a lot of people in the 30-45 range - which is to say about as smart as chimps - and a non-trivial number in the 'cannot dress or feed self' range.

I mean, frankly it's pretty insulting to Australia to claim our average is lower than the world average, but suggesting that every africa country that doesn't border the med is full of mildly to severely mentally handicaped people is mind-boggling racist and seems self evidently false.

(I mean, yes, the average person in most countries in africa is going to be less well educated than the average in a western country, but education != intelligence)

Not everyone is getting assistance, not everyone needs to go to the doctor, and I know tons of people who just decided "Don't get caught" is better than getting a license. That isn't even accounting for the fact that poor people can't take the time off of work to go the the DMV and there have been instances of states actually cutting back on DMV hours after passing laws to require photo ID.

Quote from Tiax »

Quote from Magicman657 »

I'm not understanding why people are upset about the mere suggestion that our election process is actually free from corruption. We have evidence that clearly shows the Democrats aren't afraid to manipulate the electoral process, and one can only imagine the Republicans do similar things. We've seen countless times that the media has corruption issues and has both political and financial biases towards corporate candidates. Why, then, is it such a ridiculous suggestion that maybe the groups that stand to gain the most from election fraud in favor of certain candidates might actually be committing election fraud? Are we seriously too afraid to even question it, let alone discuss the issue? The way that the media is so casually dismissing the idea as crazy is somewhat disturbing to me.

What evidence do you think we have that "clearly shows the Democrats aren't afraid to manipulate the electoral process"?

Can you name some of these "countless times" that we've seen the media has "corruption issues"?

I'm going to assume that they are referring to the O'Keefe video, though I certainly hope not since it's a steaming pile of hot garbage.

Quote from Tiax »

Maybe if people are allowed to blow smoke at me, I should be allowed to spray water at them. If the water happens to put out the cigarette, so be it.

Ok, but what do I do if instead of a smoker I am dealing with a Vapist? I swear it's 10x more obnoxious than smoking is because they think its cool to blow their smoke everywhere. Absolutely disgusting. At last most smokers have the common decency to not aim it at you.

So far, my read is that Trump's camp is composed of four groups:

1. People who are indeed racist, sexist, xenophobic, and bigoted, who have found in Trump a mainstream candidate willing to reflect their own bigotry and xenophobia.
2. People who are legitimately news ignorant, OR who actively reject any news that does not fit their biases.
3. People who are so locked in a partisan mindset that they will vote Republican automatically.
4. People who specifically hate Hillary Clinton, and who may or may not think she is actually Satan. (No, I'm being serious, Google it.)

The thing that is important to remember is that these camps definitely have overlap.

Quote from osieorb18 »

Oh, I wouldn't be surprised. But given what the country has shown in the past, it's reasonable to expect ignorance over malice.

Why do you think it's an either/or?

If you're going to say ignorance causes hate and fear, then that's fine, but it's like arguing over the chicken and the egg. The point is we have ignorance AND malice, and by no means are they mutually exclusive.

Quote from Tiax »

Good one. What is the non-governmental, forceless alternative? We all hold hands and sing kumbaya while we ask Wells Fargo very nicely to stop doing mean things?

Tiax, what's it going to take for you to realize that it's only when the government stops interfering with business that monopolies will stop forming? Does a little thing called the Industrial Revolution ring a bell? I guess you didn't pay attention in US History, so let me edumacate you. The government didn't interfere, no anti-trust laws, and we basically had unchecked capitalism, and there were ZERO monopolies! Why? Because the invisible hand took care of it! You didn't need anti-monopoly laws against things like oil or railroads, the invisible hand took care of it! You didn't need laws, for example, regulating the meat industry for health safety, the invisible hand took care of it! Because guess what? Free market and lack of government interference would remove these kinds of problems, and government interference does nothing to remedy them!

... Wait. Wait. No. That's the opposite of true, isn't it? Oh man, I'm embarrassed.