Can we rule out some kind of transporter accident? Has anyone checked to see if his beard comes off?

I’ve literally never heard a single person refer to these 4 boxes, so I must take issue with your assertion that people are fond of doing it. You’re also seemingly discounting innumerable factors, like the hundreds of billions of dollars spent on distracting and deceiving people into both voting against their best interests, and not voting at all.

In short, your default response is a reductive and unhelpful platitude. Not trying to be a jerk (it just comes naturally). Best of luck.

Downplaying 9/11 as one of ‘a handful of retaliatory strikes against US interests.’

The language is provocative, but factually accurate.

Not even vaguely what fucking happened.

Yeah, it seemed plausible, but I couldn’t find any evidence at all that this took place. Fair enough.

Fucking all of this.

Yeah, it’s some real tanky-tonk incendiary language. And the timeline’s all wrong. The US-backed regime started in 2001, and lasted until 2021. Seems like they just grabbed the first couple of years from the wikipedia article.

That we sold to both sides of the Iran-Iraq War is undeniable; the idea that the war itself was our fault and that 9/11 is just ‘blowback’ for that is fucking insane.

It does appear that the current historical consensus is that the Carter administration did not give Saddam the proverbial green light for the invasion. However, there are more than enough contemporaneous claims to the contrary to convince anyone who’d rather believe that they did.

Christ, I don’t even know where to begin.

I mean, fuck the house of saud. And the US does share responsibility for all their depredations, just as it shares fucking bibi’s.

We were involved in the violent overthrow of many democracies throughout the years, this I agree on. But funny enough, Egypt isn’t one of them. So this had potential to be a good point, but failed by being posted by someone utterly detached from reality.

Yeah, the CIA may have helped coordinate the 1952 coup against the Egyptian monarchy, but doesn’t appear to have precipitated the 2011 overthrow of Mubarak. Happily, this gets me out of diving into whether or not Mubarak’s government could plausibly be called a democracy. Plenty of truth there, otherwise; a misstep, as you say.

'Whatabout’ing 9/11 by implicitly arguing against it as a ‘violent act of terrorism’ as originally quoted, and then trying to justify it by the implicit comparison of 9/11 with the French fucking Revolution of the oppressed lower classes finally striking back against their oppressor.

Yeah, the French Revolution parallel is a real stretch.

Do you really not see any of these as objectionable.

Oh, of course I do. I just have really low expectations when it comes to the veracity of claims made by lemmy tankies in general, inclusive of underpantsweevil. I don’t disagree with you—I was just mildly surprised to see your response, given the average factual content of any of their posts.

Thank you for taking the time to respond! I hadn’t read about some of this stuff for a while, and wouldn’t have otherwise. Best of luck to you.

Old underpantsweevil’s hinges are certainly quite wobbly, but in this particular comment they’re simply providing some historical context for the 9/11 attacks. I don’t know how fair it is to describe the NA regime as brutal, relative to Afghanistan’s current and former governments, but that’s a pretty minor quibble.

They’ve stopped short of claiming that the attacks were justified, and the assertions made are broadly true. What in particular do you find objectionable, if I may ask?

Lots of NPR affiliate stations air great shows, but their nationally syndicated programming rigorously fellates the wealthy, and staunchly defends the status quo.

I don’t attribute a lot of positive things to social media, but I will give it credit for turning me around on spiders. Arachnophobia scared the crap out of me as a kid. For years afterward, I’d never sit down on a toilet without first getting down on my hands and knees to make sure there weren’t any spiders lurking underneath the bowl. Thanks to years of spiderbro memes, now I generally view them as comrades.

Money can be exchanged for goods and services!

I think you’re right. But it’s also apparently true that there exists a critical mass of uninformed fucking dipshits flibbertigibbets, who could be swayed by this kind of thing. The true believers are unreachable, but so much political theatre is directed at that segment of the population that just can’t be bothered to assemble more than one or two data points at a time.

I’ve never visited Asheville, but I know it by reputation as the Austin of NC—a liberal enclave. Is that inaccurate? If not, that doesn’t seem to signify anything.

You’re much better off not knowing, imo. Influencers are like Tinker Bell, in that they disappear if there aren’t enough people who believe they exist.

Hey, if we can make a pencil out of leaves, cephalopods can swim through our GI tract like species 8472 through fluidic space.

I’m sure that’ll work, provided there aren’t any meddlesome kids about!

I really appreciate this take. It’s good-hearted and makes good sense. I’ll try to remember it going forward, when cynicism overwhelms.

Oh, crumb! I’ve gotten here way too late to make a joke about it not being a zero cum game. Ah, well. Next time!

No…no. See, 1+1=2, so we can see that 2 is double the amount of 1. 2+2=4.

It can be—and usually is—both.

Every single article about “gen x” this or “gen z” that is 100% bullshit. Stop reposting this garbage.

secretly

Man, everybody knows T-cucks is just a pile of worms in a suit. Worst-kept secret in media. IIRC, he had to admit it in court—in connection with that leaked texts scandal.

Honestly, where do you think you get off with this shit? Just a totally unwarranted, baseless, and factually inaccurate attack. Makes you look like a petty idiot.

H.E.B. store brand toilet paper is like that. Haven’t seen any other companies do it.