• Hello_there@kbin.social
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    11 months ago

    I have an issue when the same people who were cheering during the Bush years, gave grudging acceptance at drone strikes during Obama, and were silent during the Trump years, pipe up and say drone strikes are bad now.
    Progressives have been saying this the whole time.

    Also, a reminder that Obama tried to write regs limiting the use of drone strikes at the end of his presidency. Trump promptly threw them out on entering.

    • Aesthesiaphilia@kbin.social
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      11 months ago

      As always, when a Republican does something, it’s good and just. When a Democrat does literally the same thing, they’re the devil incarnate.

    • Zpiritual@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      Drone strikes are the holy grail of the military-industrial complex. They are cheap to run meaning that the air force doesn’t have to give them a huge budget yet consume precision bombs and missiles at a steady rate meaning that the weapon industry get a secure revenue stream. And they can be scaled up almost infinitely since there is no bad news coverage of wounded veterans or crying widows on us television.

    • dingleberry@discuss.tchncs.de
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      11 months ago

      Also, a reminder that Obama tried to write regs limiting the use of drone strikes at the end of his presidency

      That doesn’t sound good.

    • ox0r@jlai.lu
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      11 months ago

      People who have a large following and magic emojis next to their name will keep using it because it gives them their validation. Twitter celebs are really in a sad state of existence

    • 00@kbin.social
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      11 months ago

      Oh you are saying we shouldn’t communicate and instead rely on aesthetics to signal each other? Thats literally fascism but you do you.

  • UFODivebomb@programming.dev
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    11 months ago

    Observation selection bias is an easy one the GOP likes to take advantage of. Eg: not testing for covid to show covid went down.

    Also: drone strike civilian casualties.

    • Ajen@sh.itjust.works
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      11 months ago

      Also: drone strike civilian casualties.

      When did they change how they count civilian casualties? I heard it was under Obama’s administration, but I’d be happy to be proven wrong.

      • UFODivebomb@programming.dev
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        11 months ago

        There is quite the back and forth between Democrats pushing for accountability and the GOP pushing against.

        From Wikipedia, which has all the references one might need:

        "On July 1, 2016, President Barack Obama signed an executive order requiring annual accounting of civilian and enemy casualties in U.S. drone strikes outside war zones (“Areas Outside of Active Hostilities”), and setting a deadline of May 1 each year for the release of such report. However, soon after taking office, President Donald Trump designated large areas in Yemen and Somalia to be “areas of active hostilities,” thus exempting them from disclosure. The Trump administration also ignored the 2017 and 2018 deadlines for an annual accounting, and on March 6, 2019, Trump issued an order revoking the requirement. "

        The executive order:

        https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2017-title3-vol1/pdf/CFR-2017-title3-vol1-eo13732.pdf

        Trump recinding the order:

        https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/06/us/politics/trump-civilian-casualties-rule-revoked.html

        Plus some other dumb shit by Trump:

        "During the Obama administration, proposed U.S. drone strikes in locations outside active war zones (i.e., in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia) required high-level approval. The Obama administration process for approving drone strikes in such locations featured centralized, high-level oversight, based on intelligence about individuals suspected of terrorism activity. Obama’s approval was required for every strike in Yemen and Somalia, as well as “the more complex and risky strikes in Pakistan” (about one-third of the total as of 2012), and insisted on deciding whether to approve a strike unless the CIA had a “near certainty” that no civilian deaths would result.

        October 2017, Trump abolished the Obama-era approval system in favor of a looser, decentralized approach, which gave the military and CIA officials the discretion to decide to launch drone strikes against targets without White House approval. "

        All sorts of references corroborating those summary:

        https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/05/22/obama-drones-trump-killings-count/

        The short version is: Obama demanded accountability and his approval. Which did not exist before and was revoked after. Hence, the different counts of casualties is not representative of an actually difference. Only representative of the GOP being shit.

      • UFODivebomb@programming.dev
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        11 months ago

        Lol. Look at this galaxy brain equivicating there start of a pandemic with an endemic with vaccine.

        I mean, obviously the covid hospital occupancy rates would be identical if the actual case rate was the same.

        Oh wait…

        https://ourworldindata.org/covid-hospitalizations

        What’s that? Less then 10k vs over 140k? Definitely the exact same situation! /s

        Don’t trip over yourself making excuses now

        • Dirt_Owl [comrade/them, they/them]@hexbear.net
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          11 months ago

          Hospital rates are down because we killed a lot of people and the rest aren’t being recorded as covid.

          I know people who very recently have caught and have had their bodies permanently damaged by this disease within the last few months, one of them being a family member who did everything right, so the whole “lol no big deal it’s endemic now” shit is really fucking depressing, ngl. It kind of handwaves away a very real pain people are going through.

  • zifnab25 [he/him, any]@hexbear.net
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    11 months ago

    Natalie should know better. But also… the really nasty shit under Obama was heavily under-reported and only ever seemed to penetrate media in a select few circuits. Casually tossing off a “What even did Obama do that was so bad?” is almost forgivable if you’re not a terminally online 30-year-old who makes hour long YouTube videos about politics, history, and culture.

    • Aabbcc@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      Am I reading this wrong? I assume Natalie is making a joke about how people under report Obama’s nasty shits

      • tuga [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        11 months ago

        You’re reading it wrong, she’s stating you can’t make a moral equivalence between Obama and, say, Trump or something because supposedly the worst things obama did were silly.

      • zifnab25 [he/him, any]@hexbear.net
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        11 months ago

        I think she’s joking about how people over-report his trivial shit. But it can be read as blithely ignoring the monstrous crimes Obama did commit while in office, because it echoes a lot of the liberal apologia of the administration that amounted to “The worst thing Obama ever did was wear a tan suit”.

        • OrnateLuna@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          11 months ago

          While I don’t think she has talked about Obama’s war crimes or things adjacent to it, I find it hard to believe that she would be saying that seriously especially the both sides part. Tho her response to the criticism doesn’t make it better.

  • ThereRisesARedStar [she/her, they/them]@hexbear.net
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    11 months ago

    Remember when Obama saw the largest transfer of wealth away from black US citizens to the wealthy in the history of the United States?

    Remember when he set the precedent that it us cool to assassinate US citizens in the open (as opposed to covertly) without trial?

    Honestly I get being mad at “Obama’s biggest controversy was the mustard”

    • epicspongee [they/them or he/him]@midwest.socialOP
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      11 months ago

      Obama’s biggest controversy was the mustard

      That’s not what she said lol. Sorry as a neurodivergent person I get that this tweet might be hard to read possibly, but she’s being sarcastic here. Maybe in poor taste, but it’s a joke. She’s well-aware of the shit Obama’s done and isn’t a fan of him.

      • sawne128 [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        11 months ago

        She says that Obama was bad. Everyone understands she was being sarcastic. Since she was being sarcastic it means that she is trying to say that Obama wasn’t bad (because that’s how sarcasm works).

        • epicspongee [they/them or he/him]@midwest.socialOP
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          11 months ago

          Since she was being sarcastic it means that she is trying to say that Obama wasn’t bad (because that’s how sarcasm works).

          I mean… no? Sarcasm works in multiple ways lol. This is like a children’s picture book-level of understanding of sarcasm.

            • azertyfun@sh.itjust.works
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              11 months ago

              Every US president is a War Criminal.

              However, most sane people would agree that Obama was, as far as U.S. presidents go, very uncontroversial. Well spoken, very few scandals, centrist policies, didn’t make a fool of himself every time he met a head of state, etc.

              So the conservatives latched onto the WEIRDEST shit. Made him up as a Kenyan citizen (???), actually made a big deal about his choices of condiments or suit colors, etc. These were all real things that made the mainstream news cycles, because Obama wasn’t livetweeting his every thought or being indicted every day, but US conservatives had to complain about something.

              This is to be contrasted to the mainstream Republican figureheads, who are unbelievably crass&corrupt traitors yet receive nothing but praise from the same media/pundits that thrashed Obama for his choice of mustard.

              Absurdist contrast like this is, indeed, comedic. I rest my case.


              (Also Natalie has talked in-depth about how shitty this faux-leftist “the democrat candidate is actually center-right and imperfect, therefore I shall not vote for them even if it gives the win to the literal rapist who will absolutely jail me for my political beliefs, gender expression, or sexual orientation if given the chance” in her videos, most notably the 2020 campaign video, but of course none of that fits in 240 characters, also comedy doesn’t tend to work when overexplained, thank you for coming to my TED talk)

          • GarbageShoot [he/him]@hexbear.net
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            11 months ago

            This is absolutely just a regurgitation of people saying Obama’s biggest scandals was the pants he wore. The joke doesn’t have a punchline otherwise, barring missing context that you should have led with if there was a misunderstanding.

            • OrnateLuna@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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              11 months ago

              Isn’t the punch line holding that belief? As in she was being sarcastic in saying that the sauce was the worst thing he did. It is an absolutely absurd belief to hold and thus humorous

          • sawne128 [he/him]@hexbear.net
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            11 months ago

            I mean… sure? But that comment written by that particular person I can not see how it can be interpreted as a criticism against Obama. Unless it’s a kind of 4chan humor, which is shameful to understand anyway.

          • Leate Woncelsace@lemm.ee
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            11 months ago

            Never argue with someone from Hexbear. They’re all at least comfortable with being in a community overrun by tankie trolls.

        • JackbyDev@programming.dev
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          11 months ago

          I see it as mocking conservative news networks that acted like it was a controversy. Which you absolutely can do and still believe Obama was a bad president or whatever.

      • ThereRisesARedStar [she/her, they/them]@hexbear.net
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        11 months ago

        Are you just looking to dunk without actually absorbing what was actually said? If so, go back to reddit.

        If you’ve actually misunderstood me, I never claimed Obama caused the recession. His policies after just massively looted the proletariat to benefit the bourgeoisie, and in particular looted black proletariat.