CutDice

The Left’s Turn to Repression A thread 🧵

Perhaps. Or, maybe there is another reality. A reality where the regime's identity no longer matter to the great powers of the world. Where Iran will continue to face severe consequences for it's behavior. A reality that eventually exerts enough of a cost where the regime ceases to be a player at all.

The fundamental problem here is your limited understanding regarding Iran’s nuclear strategy. Let me briefly clarify for you several key points: A. As long as the current regime remains in power, it is highly unlikely that Iran would agree to relinquish its right to uranium enrichment. This position is deeply entrenched. B. Enrichment, for Iran, is not solely a technical question related to nuclear weapons capability. It is also tied to national identity and regime ideology. Expecting Iran to abandon it entirely would, in practice, imply a fundamental change in the nature of the regime. C. Under the previous nuclear agreement, Iran did meet its commitments in a way that extended its breakout time to roughly one year. Given the inherent lack of trust, any future agreement would need to include a robust monitoring and verification regime that is both effective and perceived as credible from all sides. D. On the issue of inspections, the prior monitoring framework proved to be highly effective. Its absence today represents one of the most significant gaps compared to the earlier agreement. E. Regarding “snapback” sanctions, expectations were always limited. The mechanism was viewed primarily as a preferable alternative to inaction, rather than a decisive tool for constraining Iran’s nuclear program. F. An agreement that includes strict monitoring, limits Iran’s enrichment to 3.67%, and allows only a minimal stockpile, combined with a freeze of at least ten years given that existing material is sufficient for the Tehran Research Reactor, such an agreement keeps Iran meaningfully far from a nuclear weapon. The reason is straightforward: without sufficient fissile material, Iran cannot produce a bomb, regardless of its technical capabilities. G. By contrast, under current conditions, there are no meaningful constraints on Iran’s program. It can advance toward higher enrichment levels much more rapidly, without effective oversight, leaving the international community almost entirely dependent on intelligence assessments rather than on-ground verification. In practical terms, this is a far less stable and far more dangerous situation. H. It is also important to recall that Iran’s nuclear program predates the current regime, originating during the Shah’s era. In the present context, any viable agreement will likely resemble the previous framework: constraints on nuclear activities in exchange for economic relief. I. One of the core challenges these days is that many "experts" lack a deep familiarity with Iran’s nuclear doctrine and the history of efforts to address it. Instead of engaging with that complexity, it is often replaced by simplified narratives that suggest there are easy solutions. There aren’t. As long as the current regime remains in power, it is important to be realistic about the limits of what can be achieved. Certain expectations, particularly those that assume Iran will fundamentally abandon core elements of its nuclear program, are simply not grounded in how the regime operates or how it has behaved historically The Iran issue is highly complex and requires a well-informed and nuanced understanding to address it effectively. All the best. #IranWar‌

@AtlanticCouncil @ACMideast @citrinowicz This is projecting a narrative. Iran is in a terrible position. It's using its last leverage point and it won't be able to hold that for longer. The sunset of the revolution is probably closer than most people realize.

WATCH | “The attack on Iran changed the course of the Iranian revolution for the worse,” @ACMideast’s @citrinowicz told Nate Swanson as the war in Iran reached its 60-day mark. Watch the full conversation now: ➡️ bit.ly/4w6HFod

@NickKristof Perhaps you're wrong. Perhaps this is playing out strategically. US is in a far better position today than it was last week. Iran is feeling pressure, they've overplayed their hand, another round of offensive may well change the reality on the ground.

Just so. And a larger lesson is that the Trump White House should seek policy advice from actual experts, rather than from a ideologically driven coterie that tells Trump what he wants to hear and offers silver bullets.

@mattyglesias The framing matters. Progressives (and conservatives) are driven by the ideology that x is moral and just. Moderates are driven by the ideology that governance requires compromise. How do you describe the politician that cares whether a given policy actually works?

But if ideology can matter to the progressives who want to recruit an eclectic slate of varied personalities who all agree with Elizabeth Warren about everyone, why shouldn’t it matter to swing voters too?

Okay but this is exactly the point — what do you call a Democrat who rather than being a down-the-line progressive appeals to voters who have a less cohesive ideology? That’s a moderate, right? Someone who breaks with the left on some salient issues.

@YoucanAxel @AndyMasley Psuedoscience is live and well!

@cut_dice @AndyMasley India has malnourishment due to POVERTY meaning they can't afford enough food, more meat wouldn't help that meat is more expensive than peas and soy?? You're just wrong about the protein thing it's a myth. Here's another video with even more studies. youtu.be/Fhyfa48bK28?is…

Farming animals requires huge amounts of additional vegetables and grains being grown in bad conditions to feed animals. These arguments don't apply at all. 50k likes on these completely fake ideas.

@OctopusIllusion @Noahpinion They are higher, but seemingly stable now. It's over $5. Wish it was lower. Of course, that has nothing to do with the thread....but now you know.

@cut_dice @Noahpinion Hey what are gas prices like near you? Did Trump’s war push it close to $5 yet

Trump is out here literally nationalizing American industry. Anyone who ignores that and complains about Elizabeth Warren is just a pure partisan Republican.

K - not true about protein. And, India has mass malnutrition. There are no scalable vegan/vegetarian food systems that aren't susceptible to mass disruption that cause starvation and malnourishment. Livestock is a cornerstone of food systems across the globe to ensure consistent supply of food throughout the year.

@cut_dice @AndyMasley Billions of vegans on live healthy lives it's not a problem. I eat animal products because it's imo tastier than vegan meals, but it's not 'better" than just eating chickpeas, beans... directly. Protein completeness is largely a myth. youtu.be/psAlJtgeQsY?is…

It’s not that simple. Protein from chicken and eggs is far superior in quality and completeness to the protein inputs chickens consume. Moreover, chickens are an important part of scalable food and farm systems. Big industrial poultry skews the data. It should not be treated as representative of chicken production as a whole.

@cut_dice @AndyMasley I eat meat but it's obviously wasting calories and protein 🤷

Aggregate chicken-feed data is heavily shaped by industrial chicken farming. That does not mean every chicken system functions the same way. There are commercial-scale egg and meat systems where chickens are integrated into land, pasture, rotation, waste use, soil fertility, and pest pressure. Factory poultry is one model. There are others.

@cut_dice @AndyMasley When you’re raising tens of billions of chickens each year, the amount of feed needed adds up, along with feeding cows, pigs, etc The estimates vary, but usually claim about a third of the world’s farmed crops are used for animal feed

Who does "y'all" apply to? The point has nothing to do with party or ideology. It has to do with empirical reality. The government buying a single failing business IS substantively different than nationalizing an industry. Moreover - the Democrats have an increasing number of adherents that are openly antagonistic towards free markets and privately owned businesses as a whole. That also carries weight.

@cut_dice @Noahpinion Omg if a Democrat did the exact same same, y’all would say it was Soviet communism

There are always disruptions that affect prices. The point is - the prognosis that Irans actions vis a vis the straight will cripple the world economy is not playing out. And if it started to, I would imagine that there would be more incentive to re-open through escalating force.

@cut_dice @colwight World economy is the point. If the places we import from don’t have the oil necessary to make/mine/grow what we import we will absolutely suffer.

Trump banging on about how militarily defeated Iran is, about how their navy is destroyed is all meaningless BS if the US can’t force them to open up the straits. It’s that simple. The rest is fluff.

I think you could take this a step further. This isn't just about waste - its that injecting more money into government is actively hurting society. There are effective policies and approaches that could be implemented with the current resources that would improve schools, reduce addiction and homelessness, and create more vibrant cities and towns. However - the problem with the abundance dems is that they aren't able to take on the interests that keep good policies from being implemented: their core constituency, public sector unions. Until public sector unions are removed or reformed, there is little that can be done by government to improve conditions.

The Reasonable Centrists play the role of sane-washing the progressive apparatus and making reasonable-sounding appeals for increased tax revenue. But once the money goes in it gets wasted or is spent on crazy things and the public ends up getting very little in return for what it pays in. Any focus on ‘outputs,’ on things actually being built, will be met with hostility, because expenditures the public would actually benefit from are in zero sum competition with vast patronage networks feeding at the trough.

We're not relying on reserves - we are the biggest oil producer in the world. We are an oil exporter. Regarding the nukes - Iran had actively enriched their uranium up to 60% and were further developing their conventional capacity so that they could make the final sprint to the bomb (a la North Korea).

@cut_dice @colwight Hegseth himself said in Congress that the Iranians didn't have a nuclear program in progress - we attacked because they had "ambitions." But in any case, reserves can cover a month but not years.

Well - we'll see. But to date, the economic impact of the closure has been far below what experts believed would be the impact. On the flipside - what would a nuclear armed Iran have done to global stability - freely arming it' terrorist proxies around the globe without constraint?

@cut_dice @colwight How many years will it take to build sufficient pipelines and explain how the lack of the gulf’s full output will have no affect the global economy over those years.

@mattyglesias @davidsirota I think most voters care about a D or an R - or and L or a C. Ignorance around policy is mainstream.

@davidsirota I think voters mostly care about policy and not candidate archetypes at all.

It's so funny - cause most would read this as hyperbole...but its not. There is a very earnest element of progressives that appreciate this being part of the city because it makes the city more authentic. It also gives them a perch to be self-righteous when a normal human points out how terrible the situation is.

Democrats “progressives” love this shit.

The fundamental disconnect is that they believe firmly in expanding the bureaucratic state, which in and of itself is killing business and growth. The left, including the abundance guys, are trapped by one of their core constituencies - public sector unions. And so they are only advocating for one side of the development coin - reduce regulation. They are not tackling the other core ingredient - the size and waste of government. Both are required for more economically viable cities.

Why listening to Ezra and Derek reflecting on abundance made me pessimistic. They want a movement that builds things. But in their coalition is a huge faction that hates business, the people who build things! It's a wild contradiction.