@jackspling @EliLake I see you’ve run out of logic and are resorting to feeling. Common practice. We’re done.
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Dan דניאל 🌐
1.8K posts
Dan דניאל 🌐
@DanSimal
Coloradan | Radical centrist - I’m probably cheering against your political team | YIMBY
Colorado, USA เข้าร่วม Ocak 2024
735 กำลังติดตาม93 ผู้ติดตาม
I will debate you anytime. Also your argument is deceptive. Egypt had closed the straits of Tiran, amassed an army on Israel’s border and Nasser was promising to drive the Jews into the sea. So Israel attacked first in a defensive war. I don’t have time to fact check your Begin quote, but you’ve been known to fabricate before. youtu.be/a7suHgkOYLE?si…
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Mehdi Hasan@mehdirhasan
You once wore a T-shirt with former wanted terrorist Menachem Begin’s face on it. This is what then Israeli PM Begin said in 1982 about 1967: “The Egyptian Army concentrations in the Sinai approaches do not prove that Nasser was really about to attack us. We must be honest with ourselves. We decided to attack him.” Happy to debate you, and educate you, on Middle East history anytime, Eli.
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Again, you’re twisting a semantic debate about what “attack” means into a justification for use of force. That’s disingenuous. You’re saying it means literal invasion into Israel. Maher is saying credible hostile action threaten Israeli sovereignty. If I take your definition, you’re right. If I take Maher’s definition, here’s right. His panel accepts his definition. Either way, Israel acted defensively to protect its sovereignty.
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@DanSimal @EliLake And yet, nobody debated it here on a political show that purports to be about opposing views.
x.com/StevenGWalker7…
Steve W@StevenGWalker74
Maher: "Every war Israel has fought is a war of defense, every war they were attacked first" 1948: Zionists massacred/mass raped/ethnically cleansed Palestinians before Arabs attacked 1956: Israel attacked Egypt 1967: Israel attacked Egypt/Syria. /1
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Again, you’re using “attack” to mean only a literal invasion across Israeli territory. If that’s your definition, fine — for purposes of this discussion, I’ll accept it.
But Maher is using the term more broadly: massing troops on the border, closing trade routes, and taking overtly hostile steps that put Israeli sovereignty under immediate threat. That is also a defensible use of the word.
So yes, the fight over the word “attack” is disputed, but it’s a semantic dispute. What is not semantic is this: every single time, Israel faced a real hostile threat to its sovereignty and fought in response. That is a defensive attack.
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@DanSimal @EliLake Yes, this is being disputed. Maybe you aren't paying attention.
x.com/StevenGWalker7…
Steve W@StevenGWalker74
Maher: "Every war Israel has fought is a war of defense, every war they were attacked first" 1948: Zionists massacred/mass raped/ethnically cleansed Palestinians before Arabs attacked 1956: Israel attacked Egypt 1967: Israel attacked Egypt/Syria. /1
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@jackspling @EliLake Those are two very different statements. Nobody can reasonably argue the former. Do you have evidence of someone saying this? It seems like a straw man statement.
The latter can very much be debated by reasonable people.
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Is anyone disputing that?
The issue at hand is whether it was an unprovoked attack or an attack for defensive reasons. Are you approaching this question differently?
There is a (rather large) group who seems to believe that Israel is only allowed to fight on Israeli land or the fight is unjustified. Are you in that camp?
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@King_of_Haskul @aziz0nomics @meltalkschels Are you dense? It’s not difficult to understand the difference between a religion whose followers adhere to its tenets but leave nonbelievers alone versus one that legislates and imposes its tenets on society writ large.
What are you struggling with?
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@aziz0nomics @meltalkschels What Muslims? What is "normal Islam"? Salafi Sunnis, or Sufis or Twelver Shias or Ismailis? This broad-stroking of a religion practised by 2 billion muslims in the world with such diversity is why the term "Islamist" is an Orientalist dog-whistle.
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i am once again asking what the fuck is an “Islamist”
NewsWire@NewsWire_US
Tony Blair: We must end left’s unholy alliance with the Islamists
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Hi Jack, I see you live in Portland. Imagine that Washington and California amassed troops on the Oregon border, were threatening to attack, and closed off the major highways and rail lines entering the state.
Is the only reasonable option to wait for the attack to happen, or could you make a pretty strong case that going first makes a hell of a lot of sense and is defensive?
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@EliLake "Israel attacked first" - Eli Lake
That's all, Eli. Why is it so hard to admit? Because Zionists are desperate to project a non-aggressive image of Israel that couldn't be further from the truth.
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There is a strong argument to make that the IRGC colonized Lebanon.
Iran, through the IRGC and Hezbollah, has exercised a form of indirect colonization over parts of Lebanon by subordinating Lebanese sovereignty to an external power’s military, ideological, and strategic priorities. It is not settler colonialism, but colonization does not always require annexation or mass settlement.
it can also mean sustained outside domination through political and military control. Britannica defines imperialism as extending power not only by direct territorial acquisition but also by gaining political and economic control over other territories and peoples.
I wonder why the left has been so silent about this?
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@halaljew Yeah you'd get something we'd recognize as settler colonial (large numbers of favored Arabian tribes settling areas) but it was nowhere near as planned, and e.g. Lebanon was not really affected much by that, too densely populated already
And lumping in Jordan is hilarious
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This is an incredibly simplistic way to look at Arabization and the Arab conquests, which were closer to the conquests of classical empires than they were to modern colonialism. And Jordan? Arabs lived in Jordan during the time of Alexander! Petra was the capital of Roman Arabia!
🇮🇷هستی | Hasti@ahamiatnade
Arab colonization is not talked about enough. They colonized a massive region and imposed their religion, culture, language, alphabet and basically Arabized everything. North Africa is not Arab. Even countries like Jordan and Lebanon are not originally Arab. 1/
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When you say something like this, it shows me how much you believe in identity politics over actual ideas.
I remember talking to a very politically active friend about the last Denver mayoral election when she was venting about a straight white male being one of the finalists in the runoff - Everyone in the race was a Democrat, but on a scale from left-of-center to socialist. Her complaint was that the people of color and LGBTQ candidates didn’t make the final. She told me that her preference was to have those groups represented. I said ideas should be the most important criteria, not identity and was quickly told that this was a “privileged view”. Comments like this are what made me leave the Dems. When the color of your skin or sexual preference matters more to your voters than the words coming out of your mouth, we’re all in trouble.
Circling back, it’s not Walz’s identity that was the problem any more than it was Kamala’s identity that was her problem. In a time when ideas should matter, they focus more on identity. This is a major failing for the Democrats. The Republicans are a mess. Trump is a clown. He should have been so beatable. It really shows what an awful campaign they ran.
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Walz had all the things that should have coded him as red America - a humble rural old white dude who loved football, guns and fishing, nice white family etc.
But he was too positive and too liberal to truly appeal to them, even if he remained the most popular on the ballot
Peter Race@CoKeynesian
People used to say that Al Gore was an old person's idea of what a young person should be. I think Tim Walz's problem was that he was a feminist's idea of what a man should be. People thought he had more appeal to young men than he actually did.
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@JustLuai @Claire_V0ltaire Confused place as much as it’s a scary place. So odd that the leftists have thrown in with the Islamists.
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Pride flags, Hezbollah flags, ISIS flags, Hamas flags.
Britain is a scary place.
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I was far too hard on this guy when he was playing. The Jesus stuff was always a bit much for me, but in hindsight, I’ll take that 1000x over faux virtue signaling.
Tebow seems like a genuinely good human. Better than most.
Insane Clips@StreetFightsHQ
Tim Tebow hosted a red carpet event called 'Night to Shine' to celebrate and uplift individuals with special needs ❤️
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@SikhFeminist While one can understand trying to put a conflict in personal terms so you can understand it and form a narrative, it’s dangerous to do so because this conflict and this race of people have a wholly different history than the one you are comparing it to.
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I just want to reiterate again that there's more Sikhs in the world than Jews and we don't have our own country.
Drop Site@DropSiteNews
Governor Josh Shapiro tells a young Jewish attendee to “be careful” with his words when accusing Israel of genocide in Gaza.
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What on earth are you talking about?
If the Islamists laid down their weapons today, there would be peace tomorrow. If Israel laid down its weapons today, there would be millions of dead Jews tomorrow.
The Jews have no desire to “rid the Middle East of Arabs”. Where did you even get this?
The only group looking to rid the Middle East of another group are Islamists.
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@SikhFeminist @StanleyCohenLaw The whole purpose of Hitler was to rid Germany of those lacking blonde hair and blue eyes, I.e. white people. What is the difference from that and Jews wanting to rid the Middle East of Arabs?
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@mehdirhasan Is there any credible intel that he’s functionally alive?
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"There is no intel, certainly no credible intel, indicating [Mojtaba Khamenei, Iran's new supreme leader] is gay – the idea was fabricated and pushed behind the scenes in the past several weeks by a cohort of Trump advisers...and MAGAworld associates"
zeteo.com/p/gay-ayatolla…
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@RJSWtrilogyWhen @Econ_Marshall @Noahpinion Hardly. I have watched petty crime and public drug use make the city less than it was and I have watched conservatives overstate it and liberal downplay it.
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@DanSimal @Econ_Marshall @Noahpinion But here you are, just giving in to a viewpoint you agree is at least somewhat overplayed
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Incredible admission that the purpose of Yimbyism is to build housing for rich people.
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@RJSWtrilogyWhen @Econ_Marshall @Noahpinion Oh yeah, they’re awful at that, but to fair liberals are also awful at downplaying it. I live in a city that ids very guilty of that.
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@DanSimal @Econ_Marshall @Noahpinion The issue is more that anti urban anti transit conservatives are very good at stoking peoples fear of crime, rather than accurately portraying crime.
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@RJSWtrilogyWhen @Econ_Marshall @Noahpinion RTD is still rough. It’s better, but after things get bad, it takes time to rebuild the businesses that closed and the confidence that was broken. You don’t get to flip a switch overnight.
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@DanSimal @Econ_Marshall @Noahpinion its interesting that you highlight denver, whos crime rate is in decline. If crime actually motivated this behavior, youd see transit ridership increasing.
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Sorry man, you’re still acting like the only evidence that matters is people literally leaving a city. That’s too narrow. The first thing people do is change behavior.
Transit is the clearest example.
In SF, only 44% rated safety from crime on Muni as excellent/good. On BART, crime dropped 17% in 2024 and 41% in 2025, and satisfaction improved as safety did. Polling shows 79% want more police on BART and 50% say better safety would make them ride more.
Same story in Denver where I live. RTD ridership is still well below pre-COVID levels, and safety concerns have been THE major issue. RTD has had to increase police presence, fare enforcement, and security contracts specifically to address crime and drug use on trains and buses. They don’t spend that money if it doesn’t matter to riders.
Here’s my point, and it’s what you’re missing. People don’t need to move to respond. They ride less, avoid certain lines, stop going downtown. It becomes a downward spiral.
When safety improves, usage improves. When it doesn’t, people disappear and stay in safer places. Your “people need to tolerate it” line is garbage. Would you ride a train that was frequented by people who are howling at the ceiling? Would you bring your kids in that train?
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@DanSimal @Econ_Marshall @Noahpinion SF is one of the most expensive places in america to live, even though the city is dense it has remained mostly low and medium low density even as demand to live there has risen. Expensiveness is the real culprit in people moving out, followed by the boom-bust tech cycles
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@RezaNasri1 All they need to do is stop using said weapons against Israel and the demand goes away.
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The idea that every sovereign country near Israel must cap its conventional weapons, limit its defensive capabilities, restrict missile and fighter jet ranges, and even dismantle its own military industries—just so Israel can "feel safe"—is completely absurd.
Which other nation on Earth demands and receives this kind of privilege?
This exceptionalism is especially ridiculous coming from a regime with such an inherently aggressive posture and track record in the region.
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Of course macro trends matter. But pretending a lack of law and order doesn’t matter is just foolish.
Just look at San Francisco…. Crime, drugs, homelessness, and downtown recovery are now THE central political and economic issues, and city leaders are finally openly treating public safety as a prerequisite for the city’s recovery. Hardly some made-up rich guy threat.
We can also look at more micro examples. Target closed nine stores in 2023 and said organized retail crime was threatening the safety of employees and customers. In-N-Out closed its only Oakland location, despite it being profitable, because of break-ins, theft, and robberies affecting customers and staff. This stuff is happening in real time and has nothing to do with the collapse of manufacturing in 1978. 😂
Milwaukee actually helps my point. I just looked and Milwaukee’s downtown BID explicitly says its mission is to “create a clean, safe, friendly, and economically thriving downtown, covering about 150 blocks and 400+ commercial property owners.” In other words, the success story is not “ignore disorder and tell capital to shut up.” They found the only way to get investment was to clean their shit up.
Very clearly, the choice is not “listen to rich assholes or prosper.” The lesson is when cities stop being livable, people and businesses with options leave. There is no historical example of a counterpoint.
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@DanSimal @Econ_Marshall @Noahpinion the problem with your question at the end is that its a false one. it assumes people will leave because they say they will, when all other data shows us they probably wont.
The cities that experienced capital declines usually did through macro economic trends-
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