That’s a very interesting take I haven’t heard of before. My understanding was that a primary reason Russia invaded Crimea was due to the oil reserves there that Russia wanted. I guess it extends beyond that.

What in the past 13 months that has happened makes you believe the Democrats were holding the Israelis back?

I never said that buddy.

The escalations we’re going to see over the coming months were going to happen with a Republican as President or Democrat. The past 13 months has shown Israel can get away with virtually whatever they want. They were never intending on stopping regardless of the outcome of the election.

The worst is when it’s dark. Visibility goes down so badly.

Because they can. The objective of any company is to squeeze as much profit as they can. It’s more lucrative to offer tiered services where you have to pay extra for no advertisements so they do it. If they realize enough people are leaving because of it they will reverse it.

Well it’s not like Biden/Harris actually tried for a ceasefire. There’s really not much change other than the quiet part being said out loud.

I don’t know. I haven’t heard of this song before.

This isn’t about them. A disproportionate amount of women are victims of violence, sexual assault, and rape. Their safety should take priority over the feelings of others. If a man actually sympathizes with this they wouldn’t have their self esteem take a hit and would instead understand why actions like this are necessary as we work to address this issue in our society.

You don’t have to be a rapist to make someone feel unsafe. Creeps and people who just keep hitting on women when they clearly don’t want them to exist as well.

Its not about fighting rapists, It’s about letting women have an environment where they can feel safe.

The West Bank is not off limits, it’s had incursions regularly. And Israel has tried to annex it in the past and was stopped by Trump, funnily enough. I guess we’ll find out if they can convince him this time. Don’t think for a second that the West Bank is some sort of off-limits zone. They’ll annex it when they can. Just like they will with the Golan Heights and all their other occupied territories. It’s how colonies function.

PLO, Hamas and any Palestinian are not in any way expected to respect Israel’s sovereignty or current borders. A 2 state solution will lead to nothing but more divisiveness and create more tensions. It’s ironic how we in the western nations like to preach about how we are all equal and things like religion and race don’t matter. How this is one nation and we are all equal. And then we turn around and preach about some kind of ham-fisted 2 state solution for another country halfway across the world to resolve a conflict that we enforced on them. Also, PLO does recognize Israel’s right to exist. You know since they have a gun to their head and were told accept it or else.

Those 2-3 million Palestinians are being killed and starving to death because of Biden’s spineless inaction. Not Trumps. Biden has paid for 70% of this conflict so far. Biden has allowed Israel to ban UN envoys and agencies such as the UNWRA. And all the other stupid bloodthirst crap that I’m too lazy and tired to write down that we both know happened. Don’t pretend that Biden or America had any intention of saving them.

I’d like to remind you that this 44K number is confirmed deaths only. Actual deaths are expected to be much higher, in the hundreds of thousands. Israel’s onslaught has not slowed down. Only the ability to report it has. All infrastructure including healthcare and their ability to dig through the rubble has been destroyed and journalists are not able to actually go in and report anything because Israel is killing them all in targeted assassinations. Don’t delude yourself into thinking they’ve slowed down.

Harris didn’t have to override Biden. She just had to take a firmer stance. Biden dropped out last minute due to his unpopularity. This should have been a massive sign that Harris needed to diverge from his path and make her own. But she didn’t, and Biden’s unpopularity weighed her down. On this topic and others.

A lot of Americans could have demanded that Biden and Harris to do more. You wanting to do more is irrelevant when you just accept it. You were too afraid of demanding more from your leaders when you had the most bargaining power out of fear of promoting Trump and in the end you handed Trump the white house, the senate, and congress. Because Democrats settled for mediocracy and wanted to appear as moderates when running against a fascist wanna-be dictator.

I’ll say it one last time. Harris had no intention of saving the Palestinians. That entire demographic was written off as an acceptable casualty in the name of international politics and foreign lobbying. She couldn’t even admit to say there was a genocide, but only that Israel has a right to defend itself. And then her VP nominee openly says that Israel has a right to expand it’s borders. She would have been better than Trump on virtually every other topic, but this one there is very little difference.

We’ve been going around in circles for some time so I’ll refrain myself from responding to you if you choose to. It’s clear neither of us are going to convince the other of anything. Just a note for the future, it’ll help if you didn’t reduce someone’s viewpoints as being childish or that they know only the basics when they’ve actually just pointed the series of events that led them to the conclusion they’ve articulated. I know you mean well but you just come across as condescending and dismissive.

There’s nothing even remotely political about this song. Here’s the lyrics translated to English. It skipped over a good chunk of the chorus due to its repetition of singular letters.

Is this peace?

The movie Peace

And a look that hurts my heart in a dream

Words after words

And an eye that bleeds water

In a space between spaces

No place for it in existence …

Why not …

Canada has 10% of the world’s top-tier AI researchers, the second most in the world.

Canada ranks third in the G7 in total funding per capita raised for AI companies, with more than 670 Canadian AI start-ups and 30 Canadian generative AI companies receiving at least one investment deal valued at more than US$1 million since 2019.

Didn’t know we were one of the more active participants in AI. Interesting.

You bring up a good point regarding the Jewish voters but there’s still strong evidence that claims she would have gained more than she would have lost. There’s a lot of hypotheticals regarding this situation and some factors that don’t come into play like the lobbying money that the Harris campaign would have lost and the crap Trump would have said (other than what he already did). So I’m sure we can talk about this topic for a very long time.

If Vice-President Harris were to demand an immediate ceasefire that would allow unimpeded aid into Gaza, such a move would be strongly supported by her voters while being opposed by only a scant number. A detailed view of the cross-tabulations shows significant gain and very little risk for Harris by taking this stand - including very positive outcomes and few negatives among most key groups, including a plurality of Jewish voters. It would also win her the support of a plurality of those voters who are currently supporting third party candidates or who remain undecided.

Overall, if Harris where to take this stand, her vote tally would increase from 44% to 50%.

The same results hold true if Harris were to suspend arms shipments and withhold diplomatic support for Israel until there was a ceasefire and withdrawal of forces from Gaza. Such a stand would also increase her support from 44% to 49%

Aside from that, I just wanted to say that I remember you and I had a brief conversation in the Political Discussion community a few weeks back and you mentioned how much Trump and MAGA had affected your personal life. I just wanted to say I’m sorry you’re going through this again and wish you the best, for whatever it’s worth. Neither of us wanted another Trump presidency (and I’m not even American), and I hope the next 4 years are good to you.

I thought the same as well, for a time at least. I’m not sure if it was just me being hopeful or what. I got the impression that she was slightly more sympathetic to the whole situation than Biden was for sure though. That being said, I definitely think her stance hurt her more than helped her. There’s polls saying she would have won a lot of votes in several swing states if she changed her stance. And we know that the war was unpopular with majority of Americans, especially Democrats. My guess is that lobbying money seemed to good to pass up. It’s shitty that the world has to deal with a fascist wanna-be dictator because of these kinds of stupid situations and decisions.

There’s a lot I don’t know true. But there’s a lot I know as well. For example, I know that in Israel Netanyahu is ridiculously unpopular at the moment and is under criminal investigation. I know the only reason he’s still in power is because of a group of hard-right fanatics in the Knesset like Ben Gvir. I know this group has been pushing for the complete eradication of the Palestinians for some time now, including annexing the West Bank, and they are finally seizing on the moment. I also know that they are the ones pushing for a regional war with Iran. I know that the only one in Netanyahu’s war council who vocally said this war shouldn’t continue was the recently fired Defence Minister Yoav Gallant and was replaced with someone who wanted to continue the war. I know that lobbying groups such as AIPAC have spent a ridiculous amount of money lobbying the American Senate and Congress to let Israel do what they want. I know that Biden has received more money from these groups than any other senator in history. I know that Harris has repeatedly said that “Israel has a right to defend itself” even as they slaughter their way through innocents. I know that Tim Walz has said that he supports Israels right to expand it’s borders as they escalate the conflict with Lebanon and Iran. I know that Harris chose to campaign with war hawks like Liz Cheney in an effort to win Republican voters while ignoring a lot of Democrat voters.

You started this thread by implying that voting for Harris would have saved the Palestinians. I’m telling you that everything points to her not doing a dam thing. You want to sit there and talk about how maybe she would have talked them down from creating a regional war with Iran? Sure, go for it buddy. Maybe she would have. But don’t sit there and pretend like she, or the majority of Democrats, actually cared enough to stop Israel from performing their little genocide. Or the invasion of Lebanon for that matter. If they did, they would have done so by now. They chose to stick their head in the sand and pretend it wasn’t an issue. Meanwhile they literally lost all 7 of the swing states because of this attitude. The Arabs definitely made her lose Michigan, and there’s a strong case to be made that they could have helped her win Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.

Well hopefully it continues and this incident doesn’t make the city reverse it. Thanks for the added context.

Is this a new measure for Portland? I’m guessing people didn’t know about it? The link doesn’t really give details.

Me too. She’s like a Bernie 2.0. She deserves a lot of respect for standing up for what’s right.