IAEA is the international body responsible for standardizations on nuclear energy.

Four years is not a long span of time in the context of nuclear energy, where technological developments take the scale of decades.

This press release pertains to the newly announced western strategy for nuclear, low-carbon energy. That strategy is still current.

By working to ensure that everyone can benefit from nuclear science, the IAEA underpins rights enshrined in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in 1976. These include the right to benefit from scientific progress; the right to an adequate standard of living and the right to the highest-attainable standard of health.

The Agency does this by using nuclear science to combat zoonotic diseases; bolster food safety; protect fruits from pests; strengthen water management; treat cancer; and of course, to help countries mitigate climate change.

Disappointment is the feeling that I experience when looking at the right-side-up flag, so I feel for ya.

Well, then, you better start handing out hazmat suits and respirators to everyone before you start burning.

What would rise from the ashes?

they ‘commit suicide’, or commit a crime that gets them sent to prison in Siberia

Like I said, arguably. Show me some data that says that the opposition has grown above 25% (arbitrary, you may understand what I mean) and then I’ll come down on the side that he probably doesn’t speak for the majority of the country.

That’s like asking if Texas can choose to secede. They can not. Nor can the rest of the US vote to expel Texas without triggering a constitutional crisis.

The only way that they can secede is if we make a constitutional amendment to allow states to secede, yes. Personally, I’d vote for letting Texas secede, if they wanted to.

Now, if an entire country votes to allow a region of their country to be annexed, then sure. Even if elections in Crimea were free and fair–and the evidence strongly suggests that most of the people voting were coerced–it would need to be all of Ukraine voting to allow the annexation.

Now we are seeing eye-to-eye, Helix - that’s pretty much my point. There are diplomatic avenues to solve this problem, so maybe Ukraine can solve the whole thing, in the interest of preventing future wars. I say “solve” in the sense that they may be able to negotiate a plan for how to handle this in the future for the whole old Soviet bloc.

concern trolling

No argument with this paragraph, I agree, in principle.

The whole thing reeks of Putin trolling the West.

rather than the victim accepting a little victimizing

Point taken, however, instead of a little victimizing (by way of that hypothetical peaceful path that we outlined earlier) they are now getting a lot of victimizing (vis a vis, death and destruction).

Again, for the sake of argument, assuming that Russia itself was victimized during the fall of the USSR, and assuming that Putin is seeking to redress that, rather than him trying to take over the whole old-bloc, then is there any other peaceful path?

if we assume that he is trying to take over the whole old-bloc, then I’d be entirely in agreement with you on this topic.

I’m just not willing to make blanket assumptions like that - I prefer the probabilistic approach.

Thanks, by the way, for taking the time to discuss this with me. I’ll keep replying if you do.

word

https://www.aclu.org/documents/aclu-history-flag-burning

You are so very welcome, friend. I totally agree.

I appreciate your enthusiasm! You do make solid points, some of which I am well aware of, but as Russia is not a specific area of interest for me, I can’t match your level of enthusiasm.

However, in the interest of the spirit of brotherhood and interestimg conversation, I would ask this of you:

That’s entirely due to Vladimir Putin.

Having been in power for so long and with arguably a strong level of domestic support for decades, isn’t it fair to say that we ought to continue to operate as-if he did speak for the whole country?

Building on that semi-rhetorical question, and especially in regard to your concession that the West could have helped more, and in a larger, more historical perspective, might we perhaps give Russia slight leniency to make minor readjustments to borders, if (hypothetically) the local regions did legitimately vote in agreement?

Recall, being “ethnic Russian” is of key interest and, in my opinion, it might be the case that there are border towns that legitimately prefer to be part of Russia, given their local history, but were never represented properly at the fall of the USSR.

You’ve definitely piqued my interest in the specific mechanism by which the USSR was dismantled.

NATO is strictly a defensive organization.

No argument there. Again, though, I’d ask: when exactly would we start to repair our relationship with Russia by loosening up on them a little?

At this juncture, I presume it would be a long ways away, but one never knows what can come out of diplomatic negotiations, so maybe Ukraine solves the whole thing, if we are lucky.

Until we ratify the International Covenant on Economic Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) in the US, I’m inclined to agree.

If one were to take Russia at face-value, then one would be an idiot

I’ll bite, as one would be an asshole to think one was an idiot for understanding a basic of diplomacy - engage with the opposite side in a constructive manner.

At face-value, recall, Russia is currently explicitly dedicated to being an enemy of the West. Do you want them to always be our enemy?

They get worse every time they lose elections because they’re able to sell their voter base on all the “we need to do these horrible things to win” arguments.

For real.

And enough with the social justice fakery, embrace UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, fully, or shut the f*** up about it.

Preaching generic “omg this is so wrong!” to the choir doesn’t really do any good when the social conservatives really only need to be educated about human rights. They’ll join that UN party when they figure out what’s really up with human rights.

But an end to NATO would be an unambiguously good thing

If one were to take Russia at face-value, they might lighten up a bit with less NATO.

A UN where the US couldn’t veto a hundred demands for peace in Palestine, backed by threat of sanctions is also an unambiguously good thing.

The US is one of like, what, two countries in the entirety of the UN that haven’t yet ratified ICESCR after 50+ years. So, making some more sense there, too.

I’d not see us leave the UN, though, because then we would truly be screwed. The US would officially no longer embrace human rights, not being a member-state.

But point well taken.

If I genuinely believed Trump would bring about a peaceful dismantling of the American Empire, I’d have to campaign for him.

I’d genuinely be right there with you if he came out as 100% in favor of UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Not having that is an automatic disqualifier for me.

haha yes you did lmao

fwiw, my hyperfocus, coupled with an autistic interest in how the mind works, enabled me to get a degree in mathematics and degree in psychology.

i have other co-occuring disorders that compounded things though such that i can’t really work or do anything economically productive with those degrees, sadly

but your message just put a smile on my face, so thank you :D

edit: such that I can’t YET really work or do anything economically productive with those degrees

I’m not trying to make a statement for one versus the other, I’m trying to convince you to vote at all.

appreciated

But, if you haven’t voted, they have no clue what platform you support or what policies they can adopt to win you over next time.

I get what you are saying, but I’m not yet convinced. You did make a dent, though. I’ll let it percolate a while.

They look at who else got votes, and investigate what their platform was. They realize they could co-opt some of those ideas to try and get some of those voters next time.

I spent 20 years voting like that and the democrats have utterly failed to listen to anything other than the social justice issues.

The republicans are fundamentally right about some things (this is a democratic REPUBLIC, afterall) but so fundamentally wrong about other things, that they similarly failed to listen to.

So now, I’m mostly content being in the “no one is listening to me” category.

edit: fwiw, i do occasionally write to representatives about topics that i am knowledgeable about

uh wrong, “bud” started it. get blocked.

these flippant “just let them secede and suffer and die” comments are sad to read.

it’s sad to read that you think that Texas couldn’t survive on it’s own. I believe in Texas. Remember the Alamo.

You’re also not allowed to complain about him calling you “bro” after you ended with “babe“ previously.

Excuse me? Butting in where it’s not necessary is not appreciated. This fellow started out using the terms of endearment of “bud”, so piss off.

bud

seriously?

After that news on research that a Trump victory would likely spell the end of NATO, don’t be surprised if the rightists starts to see this election as being about ending NATO and withdrawing from the UN.

Typical right-wing goals that maybe leftists don’t appreciate the strength of conviction that the hard-liners have.

That (and the obvious social conservative goals) are the only legitimacy that Drumpf really has.

edit: also, Trump trumped Biden on the Palestenian genocide when he moved the Israeli embassy. i’m sure that that emboldened Netanyahu to press even harder rightwards. Now look at it.

I might register to vote just to write in “thanks for counting the votes” for president - or I guess I could vote for Cornel West, but what’s the point? The abstention would be more representative of my views, at this time, I believe.

For the little it will be worth to you, i am a radical moderate and we can find common ground in fixing the broke in radical ways.