[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

Ok so now Spheric was mocking me for suggesting that American hegemony is over, and Shortcut is mocking me/americans for suggesting it's not. Which one of you is wrong?

Neither of us was mocking you*, and we're both saying the same thing.

Read it again and pretend that we're both absolutely serious.

We are.








*) if anything, I was mocking myself with the remark about pondering pics of Brandt and JFK, and waxing nostalgic over an era that I was too young to appreciate/have experienced, but in which the United States still embodied a "Great Nation" to others in the world.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by Spheric Harlot 

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

Ok so now Spheric was mocking me for suggesting that American hegemony is over, and Shortcut is mocking me/americans for suggesting it's not. Which one of you is wrong?

Neither of us was mocking you*, and we're both saying the same thing.

Read it again and pretend that we're both absolutely serious.

So you're saying the American hegemony is definitely over?

[Spheric Harlot]

I suggested that the United States no longer gives a **** since its role as Leader of the Free World ended with the Cold War.

I also suggested that the United States ACTING like it no longer gives a **** is a source of US problems.

Diplomacy is not just decorum.

You don't seem to realize what you've lost. The United States was object of glowing admiration for decades, if not centuries. Now, you're a bunch of gun-totin' racist loonies shooting up countries and treating towel-head prisoners of war like dogs, illegally kidnapping and torturing foreigners, defying scientific reality like petulant six-year-olds, and Tea Partying like it's imaginary 18th-Century-Land.

You're trying to get us to tell you that hegemony is over, so you can say that America doesn't need to give a ****.

IMO, the opposite is the case.

[Shaddim]

If we do too much, we're meddlers, if we do too little, we're deserters. I'm tired of everyone else's expectations for this country. 10-20 years of isolationism might well do the USA some good, just so other countries can try their hand at peacekeeping and we can get our fiscal and political shit together.

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by Shaddim 

If we do too much, we're meddlers, if we do too little, we're deserters. I'm tired of everyone else's expectations for this country. 10-20 years of isolationism might well do the USA some good, just so other countries can try their hand at peacekeeping and we can get our fiscal and political shit together.

FWIW, that's why there's a whole branch of professionals who deal with this stuff that you, personally, can't be bothered with. The diplomatic corps exists for a reason.

As you found out with the last president, when ordinary Joes are asked to do an expert's job and can't be arsed to deal with the details and background required, they can't even tell good advice from bad advice administered by profiteering buddies. It's a recipe for disaster.


I can't resolve the conflict the US faces between telling the world to **** off and not liking the consequences of a world saying NO YUO AND GET THE **** OUT FISRT. If you or I had the balance down, we'd probably be working as diplomats ourselves.

As it is, you're a car buff and I'm a musician, and it's probably for the better that way.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by Spheric Harlot 

I suggested that the United States no longer gives a **** since its role as Leader of the Free World ended with the Cold War.

I also suggested that the United States ACTING like it no longer gives a **** is a source of US problems.

That retcon isn't compatible with what you were responding to at the time, which was how can a US signature put more pressure on countries that already signed (see below), and how you said that the point of signing is to put pressure on other countries. If our reign is over (about which I don't care, btw), that only further erodes the influence our signature would have in "pressuring" other countries. Or to say my confusion another way, until yesterday you were saying we should sign in order to pressure other countries, and now you're saying we should sign just to suck up to other countries. Those goals seem to me to be at odds with each other. Can you make your seemingly contradictory posts more clear?

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

Or to say my confusion another way, until yesterday you were saying we should sign in order to pressure other countries, and now you're saying we should sign just to suck up to other countries. Those goals seem to me to be at odds with each other. Can you make your seemingly contradictory posts more clear?

They're not contradictory. They're self-reinforcing.

Politeness is "sucking up" to society, but unless you're a spineless git, it's quite self-serving.

Nobody takes a bully seriously. His fist may hurt as long as he's bigger, but his words carry no weight.

Abide by the rules, and people will give you more weight, which you can use to change them. To a point.

[Uncle Skeleton]

That's a stretch. How is the character who's lost all dominance a bully? You keep waffling on whether we're leaders or not based on whatever serves your narrative.

[Spheric Harlot]

No, that's your government, not me:

We keep waffling on whether we're leaders or not based on whatever serves our narrative

And that is exactly the problem.

[Uncle Skeleton]

I don't like it when they do it either, but I'm not going to pick their least important decisions as the time to pick a fight over it. Like I said from the start, there are priorities, and we have much higher ones that we're dropping the ball on right now than this.

A waffler second-guessing another waffler for waffling isn't terribly compelling to me.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

I don't like it when they do it either, but I'm not going to pick their least important decisions as the time to pick a fight over it. Like I said from the start, there are priorities, and we have much higher ones that we're dropping the ball on right now than this.

You're a logical fellow, so you know the obvious fallacy with this line of thinking - there's no evidence that by not doing this, you're magically going to do those other "more important" things, is there? As in, this isn't an either/or situation?

So instead of getting something done - something productive I might add, since you don't seem to be arguing against the validity of this treaty, merely the usefulness of it - you would rather that you completely ignore the one good thing that can be accomplished, and return to bickering about the larger problems and ultimately not reaching any solution on them (which has been the result thus far)....and therefore, nothing at all getting accomplished?

To which I respond: "start small; one thing at a time".

[Spheric Harlot]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

Like I said from the start, there are priorities, and we have much higher ones that we're dropping the ball on right now than this.

Like I've said, I agree.

All the sillier not to follow through IMO, but as we've noted, this discussion has become one about a bigger, underlying issue.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by ShortcutToMoncton 

there's no evidence that by not doing this, you're magically going to do those other "more important" things, is there? As in, this isn't an either/or situation?

Maybe you missed this, but I went over it with Dakar already. Eating vegetables vs cake isn't an either/or situation either, but the sentiment that you don't get your cake until you eat your vegetables first is still pervasive and logical. I wouldn't necessarily be hard nosed about this fluff piece of a treaty, but I can understand the inclination for someone to do so.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

But that presumption is based on the idea that the eater wants to eat the cake.

In this case, the eater doesn't like the vegetables, but doesn't like the lemon pie for dessert, either. So they just sit at the table and bitch and whine throughout the meal, spoiling it for the rest of the family.

[Uncle Skeleton]

I don't know what you're referring to. Lots of American politicians were enthusiastic about this treaty.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Not the ones who effectively killed it. Isn't that the point?

[Uncle Skeleton]

Yeah those are the angels on Uncle Sam's shoulder saying no fluff until you solve at least one substantive problem. The devils on the other shoulder are saying to just eat the fluff and don't worry about your total failure at the hard problems.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

But aren't they the same "angels" who are contributing to the non-solving of the hard problems? Especially if those hard problems require both parties to work together (which they do)? How does that in any way foster a spirit of cooperation?

I mean, I guess it's simply a matter of how one looks at it. Personally, my view is that the more parties work together, the easier it gets. It would make sense to me to start small on issues everyone agree upon, complete those, and then work towards the tougher issues having already built a measure of trust and understanding.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by ShortcutToMoncton 

But aren't they the same "angels" who are contributing to the non-solving of the hard problems? Especially if those hard problems require both parties to work together (which they do)? How does that in any way foster a spirit of cooperation?

Ok what I should have said is you're judging desire based on action, which is invalid. If I challenge myself to eat no cake until I take out the trash, then you can't know whether I actually like cake based on the fact that I don't eat it. It could just be that it wasn't worth taking out the trash for.

I mean, I guess it's simply a matter of how one looks at it. Personally, my view is that the more parties work together, the easier it gets. It would make sense to me to start small on issues everyone agree upon, complete those, and then work towards the tougher issues having already built a measure of trust and understanding.

That's rarely how it works when you're right up against a deadline. I suspected maybe the treaty was a bargaining chip, and all we saw was the aftermath of someone not wanting to trade for it.