Phase 1 of China deal. Done.
USMCA. Done.

Pretty amazing.

If I take you literally, and extrapolate to any serious wrongdoing (you were too specific to the Bidens; makes it sound like a special pleading), it suggests you think a President can investigate anyone because anyone "may" have done something seriously wrong. Can you provide a reasonable, nonpartisan generalized standard that you'd be fine with applying to someone of either party?

It applies to any public official or employee of the government. Conflict of interest investigations are routinely applied to members of Trump’s administration (Scott Pruitt or Ryan Zinke for example, both of whom resigned). If it uncovers corruption then justice should be served, if it doesn’t then so much the better.

I don't know what candidate he is, but really, have listened through a Putin-Trump press conference?

It's REALLY different (like Twilight Zone different) from let's say Trump speaking with an "NATO ally", who Trump can pummel all he wants.

But just listen to him speaking to his followers. Then Trump make sense and is consistent. It's a great Witch hunt against him lead by the Obama-Hilarites of the deep state.

Trump speaks the world goes wild. I’m well aware of the word-politics, mostly because that is all some people have.

Nos4's replies here say it all. On the basis of his many posts, he is a) playing games, b) is mentally ill, c) is in some way a paid troll. It is therefore an error to engage with him. The real clues are in his language. All of his arguments are fallacious. Not least because of their frequent categorical nature.

Tim Wood’s hysteria has polluted his reason, so much so that he see’s enemies in everyone who disagrees with him. His borderline McCarthyism reeks of paranoia and fear, and this while he touts justice from the other side of his mealy mouth.

OK, do you think reasonable people could think it does look bad (on the surface, at least)? Bear in mind that a September poll showed that 63% of Americans (including 32% of Republicans) considered it wrong (source)

Plenty of reasonable people do think it looks bad, so yes.

That's not what I asked. I asked when it is OK for a President, utilizing his office, to push for the investigation of a political opponent.

When that political opponent may have abused his office for personal benefit by letting his son reap vast sums of money from a corrupt company in a destabilized country he just helped destabilize.

You know, on this issue I just base my view just on Trump's obscene adulation of Putin, the utterly crazy propositions Trump has made (and has had to quickly backtrack) and the sheer devotedness on NEVER EVER saying one critical thing about his best friend Vlad. Listening through a Donald and Vladimir press conference was like listening to a leader of a Great Power and a proxy puppet government giving a press conference. Hence I reason that yes, we really can talk of Agent Trumpov in the White House. It's the biggest intelligence coup ever in the history of intelligence work.

That’s hilarious. There are, of course, more simple explanations for reserving criticism of a world leader, but sure, Trump’s the Manchurian candidate.

Please expand on this by answering two questions:
1) are you saying it doesn't look bad to YOU, or do you feel that it shouldn't look bad to any reasonable person?
2) Under what circumstances is it OK for a President, acting as President, to push an investigation of a political opponent? For example, is it always OK? OK if there's an objectively good reason to think the opponent committed a crime? OK if he has hunch that the opponent committed a crime?

1) it doesn’t look bad to me. In fact, to me, it looks like the president is doing his job.

2) It is always ok to ask another leader to look into possible corruption between two countries no matter who is involved, but especially when it involves the conflicts of interest of high-ranking officials, their family, and corrupt energy companies paying vast sums of cash.

There are pictures of John McCain standing with the leader of Svoboda, a far-right neo-nazi, during the revolution in Ukraine. Also, Victoria Nuland, the Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs at the State Department, handed out cookies to protesters. Her leaked phone call, where she discusses possible candidates for the new Ukrainian government, suggests that the US played a little more than a supportive role in regime change. In their hubris we in the West backed neo-nazis in a Ukrainian regime change against a democratically-elected president, giving us the Ukraine we have today.

Familiar names appear throughout this episode: Biden, Brennan, McCain, Nuland (pictured below with the alleged whistleblower).



Nuland and McCain are connected to Steele and his dossier.

I suspect this is all connected to “Russian meddling”, and the current impeachment attempt against Trump is an attempt at a cover up. God forbid someone finds out what went on in Ukraine.

He could have established more, or stricter, benchmarks and held up funding if they weren't met. There were, in fact, benchmarks and these were met in May. Do you surmise that Trump considered these inadequate?

There are no explicit statements regarding benchmarks that I am aware of.

Ok, but you obviously do not believe she is right. So what's your take on it: Mistake? Lying? Something else?

I won’t infer any malicious intent so I will err on the side of mistake or misinformed.

"He was clearly." What does "clearly" mean in this context?

Simply that one can infer from his public statements that those particular situations concerned him.

Do you agree that on the surface it looks bad to pursue the Bidens in this way, since Joe is a political opponent?

No, I do not.

Fiona Hill opined that the efforts to look into the Bidens was a "political errand." Was she lying? Was she simply mistaken? Is there no possibility she was right?

There is always a possibility she could be right.

Can you offer any evidence that Trump was actively battling corruption in Ukraine -other than the Biden matter - that predates the whistleblower complaint?

Trump has no jurisdiction in Ukraine so I do not see how he could actively battle corruption there. He was clearly concerned about Ukraine’s involvement in the Russia hoax, their election meddling with the DNC, Biden’s involvement with the Burisma.

You could be right. Excuse my tinfoil hat, but I would even argue the CIA or at least the State Department had its hand in the Ukraine revolution of 2014. So I worry they would be more protective of what went on there than otherwise.

My point being that it was the role of the CIA to do the investigation, rather than the president, because the president could be vulnerable to accusations of political expediency.

It’s a Ukrainian company in Ukrainian jurisdiction. As for American government officials I think that’s up to the justice dept. The president was only asking the Ukrainian president to look into it

And what did the CIA have to say about Trump getting involved in the investigation of Biden? Or did Trump neglect to tell them. Presumably they were already aware of said corruption from their Ukrainian spies.

I’m not sure what they said.

Roger Scruton once said that it was an "impossible proposition" to think that a Muslim "from the hinterlands of Asia" could produce a child loyal to a secular European state. The guy was a rabid islamophobic, anti-semite (I've cover this in another thread), sexist, and homophobe. Ah, but he wrote so elegantly!!!

You merchants of offence are quite predictable. I get to watch you smear the dead because of your thin skin while you pretend to know what decency is.

You are aware there evidence of wrongdoing., right? Are you just saying the evidence is inadequate to meet some standard of burden of proof?

You started out critical of me for not basing my personal judgments on the legal standard. I think you came to accept that outside a courtroom, such personal judgments are reasonable as long as one remains open to reevaluating as more evidence is available. But given your initial reaction, I'm wondering if you are simply presuming Trump innocent (you labelled this a basic human right) because you feel he hasn't been proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Is that it?

I would go further than presume he is innocent. I believe he has done nothing wrong, and more, I think he was right and obligated, morally and as a public servant of the country, to look into possible corruption between US and Ukrainian officials. The notion that he shouldn’t do so because it might harm a Democrat’s political chances seems absolutely absurd to me and I feel I am living in Clown World for having to argue against it.

You once mentioned that Trump is violating Biden’s due process, so that’s why I brought up the presumption of innocence: to remind you of Trump’s due process in the hopes we could come to an understanding. Due process is not a legal standard for arbitrary reasons, but because it best guarantees justice. If justice doesn’t factor into your personal judgments, there is nothing wrong with that, but I I have doubts that you can remain fair and just while doing so.

Either way, I am prepared to be proven proven foolish in all of this. I could be completely mistaken, crimes might come to light, I could be proven a dupe, and I will admit that I was wrong if it happens.

Yes, artificially changed in the sense that you can remove, replace or alter the body, including parts of the body associated with sex.

But Sex is determined through natural development of an organism which begin at the earliest stages of life, not through alterations of physical features and body parts of an adult. Such development cannot be erased.

I'm gonna disagree with you there, I have changed my sex through hormones and surgery

I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.

That's just not true. First, nature doesn't 'decide' anything (nature isn't a person). And second, the whole point is that it is not 'disguising', but altering. That's a big difference. Someone who changes their sex has changed their sex, not disguised it.

I was speaking figuratively, which is common throughout language. By “decided by nature” I mean genes and hormones, not some doctor with a steady hand, determine and develop sex at the earliest stages of a human’s life. So no, they have not changed any sex, they have merely altered the body in such a way to convince themselves that they have.

That’s their prerogative. But I appreciate when someone such as yourself seeks clarification in good faith instead of assumption and accusation. So thank you.

That’s my only point. You can only alter or disguise, through force, what nature has already decided.

Of course not. It’s quite amazing what we can do as a species, especially when it helps people.

You: yes, but if you change your sex on a Wednesday, you didn't change it on a Tuesday

That’s not even paraphrasing what I said. I said sex changes are artificial, which your pretended was contradictory even though it wasn’t. One can also artificially change their hair color, their skin color. Sex change can occur naturally in nature, but the ones you propose are artificial, man made, and there is nothing profound about pointing out the obvious.

Clearly there was, and regardless of how much desire there has been for a Trump impeachment, the impeachment trial is in fact about justice. Trying to obfuscate Trump's crimes is unpatriotic at best...

What crime would that be?

No. I said I could drag them to the store if I want. That is a type of control over their bodies. It is not absolute control, but they do not have absolute sovereignty. You are referring to some type of sovereignty of will.

I’d like to see you try. Of course it’s not as easy as you say, and can only imagine yourself more powerful than everyone to do it. You have to fantasize because you lack control, you have no authority over anyone’s body unless they bestow it to you.

Again, this is only related to autonomy of will. If I am chained up, I can THINK anything I want. But my physical sovereignty (the power I have over my own body) is taken away.

The will is the body. Thinking is an act of the body, and you cannot make anyone think a certain way, speak a certain way, to be calm, to be quiet, to go to sleep...nothing. It is their choice, their responsibility, because they have absolute authority over themselves. You have no authority save for the one you fantasize in your head. Only through force, violence and coercion can you live out that fantasy.

Why are you calling the Senate trial a "show trial"? I'd have expected you to consider the Republican-led trial to be a REAL trial. If you think he's innocent of wrongdoing, a trial is a perfect opportunity to establish that.

I call the whole charade a show trial because the process is for the purpose of politics and propaganda, not justice. They’ve been trying to impeach Trump even before he was sworn in. It’s an unjust affair. There was no crime. There was no wrong doing.

It’s less pointless than your observation that one can change their sex by altering their body. You can change someone’s skin color by giving them a tattoo. You can change their hair color by dying their hair. These are artificial, not naturally occurring.

By artificial I mean man made rather than occurring naturally. No contradiction there.

For those interested, the house just voted to send articles of impeachment to the senate. The show trial continues after a hiatus.

Of course sex can be changed, but these changes would be wholly artificial.

(I gather that you work at a NGO or a non-profit. Most capitalists, a cursed lot, wouldn't waste company time on this crap.).

You'd be surprised. Woke capitalism is good money.

I 100% agree with you, but the super social justice warriors think that just being white makes you racist, just being male makes you sexist,sometimes even just being straight makes you homophobic and just being cis makes you transphobic. They are wrong, they also beleive that not treating minorities of any kind like special little snowflakes you are (insert minority here)phobic, and a s three minorities, no just treat me like a normal person, thanks.

Racists span the color spectrum. There is a pernicious group-think in it. People want to cling to their race, perhaps so they can claim someone else’s achievements or victim hood as their own. It saves them from the necessarily time consuming work of thinking and passing judgement on the level of an individual. One dissolves his individuality in an amorphous, disparate group, identifying oneself with a single nation or other unit, placing it beyond good and evil and recognizing no other duty than that of advancing its interests.

I’ve already provided you exculpatory evidence which you dismissed and/or pooh-poohed. I attempted to refute your opinion on the facts, but when I did so you claimed I was incapable of having a reasonable discussion, which suspiciously allowed you to avoid my arguments entirely.

That’s false, I did not dismiss “the facts” because they were partisan or expressed by democrats, but because they did not suggest any criminal intent or wrong doing or criminal activity. This is evidenced by my direct response to your list of facts, which you then used to accuse me of “denying the obvious”. I explicitly asked for evidence of motivations, ie any statement from the accused that might suggest he wanted investigations into political opponents so as to influence the 2020 elections, and your “facts” provided nothing of the sort.

It was you who accused me of writing things that sounded like I got it from Hannity and Levin, none of whom I watch, and which I proved to be false by showing where I actually heard the idea: the Wallstreet Journal Editorial Board. The partisan bickering was yours all along.

I think the irony here is that their insistence that their “whiteness” is harmful is itself a form of white supremacy. They see themselves and their “whiteness” as a force supreme and primary to other similar qualia. So it’s taking white supremacy and attempting to run with it in another direction.

Yes, his art criticism and defense of beauty were very important to me. I’m not a religious man but he showed me that I need not be spiritually impoverished because of it, that I need not vanquish the sacred and the beautiful because I do not believe in gods. He reminded me that with beauty life can be worth living.

And yet if I want to physically assault another human, it is easy...what am I missing? I can easily violate their sovereignty...? You say I have no control...but if I am significantly physically stronger than you, I can literally control you for as long as I care to. I can't make you cure cancer, but I can certainly make you go to the store (as I drag you there).

Yes, you can attempt to violate someone’s sovereignty through violence and coercion. But even so they would need to acquiesce to your demands and willingly give you what you want. They could also spit in your face and defy you to the bitter end. This is because you have no authority over their bodies and actions.

I don't need anyone to stand still to violate their sovereignty. And "choosing" is only one limited aspect of sovereignty. Absolute sovereignty would mean no one (and no-thing) has power over my body but myself. A hurricane could take away my sovereignty just as any human could. Aren't their millions of bacteria living in my body? Did I approve their residence? Even if we suggest that most of those are helpful, I still want the bad ones out.

Yes, only you have power over your body. Even if you were chained to a wall and left for dead you could still resist any impositions. Only you are responsible for your actions. Only you can choose how to live your life.

Nice try, but I noted the need to make an effort to understand all the available facts, whereas Trump clearly ignores evidence when making his accusations. Besides, it's one thing to make a private judgment and quite another to publicly defame someone with an accusation.

Nice try but you just publicly stated why you assume his guilt, and did so while suppressing exculpatory evidence, dismissing the testimony of the accused and other witnesses with a hand wave while accepting as faith the testimony of the accusers. Believe it or not but there are strong reasons why this sort of reasoning is unacceptable in criminal trials.

A “best explanation” may be plausible, but not necessarily correct, especially when these “facts” are derived from a one-sided, political show trial and not any sober and fair examination.

Good read, thanks for writing that.

A lot of morality is traditional. The wisdom of generations attest to their merits and faults in a process that develops an ethics over time, a sort of historical trial and error. In that sense it is organic. There is an effort at the individual level to act out these ethics whether by habit or societal pressure, but there is still this traditional relationship between the dead, the living, and the yet to be born. For the individual it might be best to cultivate rather than destroy these traditions.

I suppose to avoid all out war one ethics may best supersede another through leading by example rather than imposing an ethics by force.

The argument is that infinite regresses are impossible. So that leads to there must only be finite regresses in reality. At the base of each such regress, there must be an uncaused cause; there is no other logical explanation.

To be uncaused means to be beyond time (there is no 'before' for a timeless thing - it has no cause).

There are quite a few ways to show that time must have a start (eg do you believe a greater than finite number of days has elapsed?) and if that is true, then logic points to the reality of something atemporal.

I’m aware of the argument but I do not see how it makes the case that infinite regresses are impossible. A first element presupposes finitude, so why would we apply it to an infinite regress? I agree that a finite regress would require a first element, but disagree that an infinite regress does.

That's laughable to call a presumption of innocence a "precious human right, considering your support for President who so frequently accuses people of crimes with little or no basis.

The presumption of innocence is a legal standard in a criminal trial. It's an appropriate standard for that, because of the consequences of conviction. That doesn't mean it's a good, general epistemic standard. Imagine being on the jury of an alleged child molester. You decide the evidence did not rise to the "beyond a reasonable doubt" level, and because of your decision he's acquitted. Would you consider hiring this person to babysit your children? Would you even want that person living nearby? If not, what became of your presumption of innocence?

We are within our epistemic rights to judge people on the basis of a preponderance of the evidence if we've made an effort to understand all the available facts.

Likewise, considering your disdain for the president, I find it surprising you adopt his thinking.

It is a good standard because one cannot correctly judge if another is guilty until it is proven. Assuming innocence could be wrong, of course, but it is at least just. Assuming guilt is unjust.

Thanks for the explanation.

So then to what do we owe the reality of the first element, a first tuner, if not an anterior one? Sure a finite regress all elements owe their reality to the first element, but I cannot see how that is true of an infinite one.