kava @ kava @lemmy.world

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2 yr. ago

Prices can still be rising even if inflation is going down. In fact prices should in theory always be rising because <0% inflation is essentially a death knell for an economy.

So the fed will do anything in their power to prevent that. That fed reserve rate would go down to 0% pretty quickly

If it's a choice between one geriatric who endorses genocide and another geriatric who endorses genocide, why should I be voting for either?

I still haven't decided but atm I'm leaning towards 3rd party

This "lesser evil" thing is smoke and mirrors.

your article echos pretty much the same thing as the Times one I mentioned, it's just shorter and doesn't mention military matters

The end of the counteroffensive is likely to bring a fresh focus on societal discontent and renewed calls for a more effective government

Recently, however, a significant number of critical claims against Zelensky and his administration have been voiced by political elites and representatives of civil society. These claims may soon result in the unraveling of the political consensus around the president.

Polls don't tell the full story. Last year, when Russia invaded there was a societal consensus that they needed to unite against Russia. All the bad things were blamed on Russia. However, people are getting war-weary. Big promises were made with the counter-offensive that was at first delayed and then when it finally materialized it didn't achieve anything meaningful. Up until now, the state narrative that's been pushed has been "we will win 100% and kick the russians out of the country" and that worked for a while. But when you have no military success for a year and tens of thousands of men are dying in an offensive that shows no material gain... people start getting disillusioned. This is what I mean by the adrenaline and the propaganda wearing off.

I will have to consider your claims in this quote as false.

The article you linked basically summarized what I was saying. Did you read beyond the headline? Beyond that, these aren't my claims. Advisors and members of Zelensky's administration are all growing concerned with the situation.

Who knows what they hold now, 18%?

What difference does it make? Russia holds a large chunk of Ukraine and has a) integrated the territory by annexing it and b) dug in and fortified it to the point where Ukraine recapturing is quickly leaving the realm of reality.

Now, that the world knows of Ukraine, I would be bullish on demographics and economy of Ukraine being better than it was before the war

Why do you believe this? First, nearly 100,000 men are dead. They're not coming back. The longer the war continues, the higher this number is going to be, making rebuilding progressively harder. Second, millions have left and become refugees. a little under 6 million. That's about 1 in 7 people. We don't know how many will come back, but if I escaped the poorest country in Europe with my family and made it to a 1st world country - I'm not coming back. At minimum a large chunk aren't coming back.

Now consider the amount of damage that has been done to Ukrainian cities on the frontlines. Many cities have been destroyed. Infrastructure damaged. Towns depopulated. We're talking hundreds of billions of dollars of damage. And as a cherry, Ukraine's economy has been cut by a third.

The only reason they survive is because of an IV drip line of both financial and military resources from the West. What happens when the war is over? Sure, there will be some investment and attempts to rebuild Ukraine. But you really think after spending $150+ billion (will be more by the end of this) that the West will be willing to spend 3x that? world bank estimated $350B last year. it's only gotten worse since then

Realistically, Ukraine has been destroyed for the next century. The longer we prolong this war, the longer the rebuilding will take. It's honestly so morbid how apathetic our Western leaders are to the suffering of civilians. We are willing to sacrifice Ukraine to hurt Russia. I rather like Chomsky's quote "we are fighting to the last Ukrainian"

The west is all in democracy, so Ukraine is important to the West.

Not as much as Russia. Eastern Ukraine is now effectively Russian territory. Whether Ukraine loses or wins doesn't ultimately matter to the West in the long term. It is critical to Russia. They will not give up, while our political systems will eventually lose interest. It has just started with the Israeli conflict.

Democratic people are still all in Ukraine.

Even support among Democrats are slowly going down. Republicans much more, but America is general is losing desire to continue funding this war.

United States support of Israel is not unconditional

Unfortunately it is

look up the latest article from the Times for some insight about the domestic situation in Ukraine. i thought it was a good read. zelensky is experiencing a lot of internal dissent with a war-weary population. corruption scandals, key advisors criticizing military strategies ( like focusing on political objectives while ignoring military advice), etc.

unfortunately for ukraine, russia still holds 20% of ukrainian territory. ukraine demographics and economy is much more compromised than russia. Russia has more or less recovered from the sanctions with exports reaching pre-invasion levels earlier this year. the rising price of oil has only helped russia stabilize the situation. they're not immune, with them having to raise interest rates to 15% to try and curb inflation, but the fact of the matter is russia is a big country that can eat itself for a while before it collapses.

much bigger than ukraine

they have basically decided to go all-in after the Israel v Gaza thing popped off. They've been throwing bodies at the meat grinder at Avdiivka. Everybody thought they were out of reserves and couldn't continue - they show that they don't really care about the losses and are going to push. They're making ground bit by bit inch by inch.

Look at livemapua, they're about to encircle the city. does it succeed? who knows. but the main point is that russia can afford to throw offensive after offensive and sit on their ass. ukraine doesn't have that luxury. if they don't launch a successful offensive, they don't get their territory back. and every day that goes by that they don't capture the territory, russia digs in. they've filled land with an absurd amount of mines. it's hard to fathom the ridiculous stockpile the paranoid USSR had built up of mines, preparing for WW3.

ukraine had the initiative and their counter offensive has failed to achieve any meaningful results besides using up a lot of their resources. now the pendulum swings and it's unclear whether they survive the winter

russia is betting that western eyes are going to now focus on israel and that this is their chance to make a breakthrough, so they're slamming ukraine. and russia is willing to sacrifice a lot of manpower to do this. they've been pulling people out of jail, literally hundreds of thousands, taking a page from Wagner.

the unfortunate reality is that

a) ukraine could have never beat off russia, let alone win this war, without western help

b) this war is infinitely more important to russia than it is to the west

west has only reached 30% of the production goals for ammo that they set. us aid is already starting to slow

ukrainian aid last year was unanimously supported. today it gets debated and questioned. tomorrow it won't even be a consideration.

also, btw, I'm not sure if you're reading the same ISW that I am but they do not say Ukraine is winning and sometimes I cannot take them seriously. example from their update yesterday

"The October 29 riots in Dagestan highlight the growing radicalization and factionalism of Russian society resulting from the hyper-nationalist ideologies that the war in Ukraine has empowered."

really? a muslim province of russia riots because Israelis are carpet bombing Gaza and it's somehow connected to war in Ukraine? All over Muslim world they've been storming embassies and having mass protests. Is that connected to Ukraine too?

ISW is a good source but I wouldn't solely rely on them for a clear picture of what's going on

Russian forces continued ground attacks near Avdiivka on October 30 and made a confirmed advance. Geolocated footage posted on October 30 shows a Russian TOS-1A thermobaric artillery system operating in Novoselivka Druha (5km northeast of Avdiivka), confirming that Russian forces occupy the settlement

here's their bit about the assault on Adviivka yesterday. and keep in mind ISW has been incredibly conservative about russian advances

It doesn't matter if Ukraine gets aid or not, Israel is getting it regardless. Senate voted 97-0 in a "symbolic bill" stating Israel has a right to self defense. Something similar in the House only got 10 no votes. Trump moved embassy to Jerusalem, Biden just gave Netanyahu a big hug. If there's anything that American politicians agree on, it's that God's chosen people deserve everything they ask for.

I think the propaganda and adrenaline over the Ukraine war is finally starting to wear off and people are realizing that Ukraine was never going to win this war.

Parallels is good for running Windows. It's heavily optimized for Windows. I have both Fedora & Windows on my MacBook Pro through Parallels.

But it's nowhere nead native speed and you're still using an ARM version of Win / Linux which comes with its own set of issues.

Having said that, Parallels is good for when you need to run a specific Windows program. I haven't run into anything that runs on Linux that I can't set up on MacOS so I haven't really needed the Fedora.

On my desktop I use Fedora and it's my favorite OS / Linux distro. But MacOS works. The M2 is worth it

Virtually any computer that isn't Apple Silicon can install Linux on it and it'll run smoother and faster than Win or Mac.

People who are anti-Linux either don't understand computers or are traumatized from the early 2000s

I'm a citizen now. I was illegal from 5-22

This country, especially specific states, wouldn't run without labor from illegals. Inflation would go up because Americans simply don't work as hard and demand more $. The people running this country don't actually want that to happen so they play a game where they're anti-illegal but don't make any significant moves to get rid of them.

They're a perfect population. A silent group that pays taxes, doesn't pull from welfare, commits much less crime than Americans, and isn't politically active.

That's why people like Trump will shout on and on about a wall when he actually knows the majority of illegals are visa overstays coming on planes. If ICE wanted to, they could deport every illegal tomorrow. I've seen the files from an immigration attorney. They have profiles of everyone.

As for Israel v Gaza. Your same argument can be made to justify Hamas's terror attack. Israel has been killing Palestinians for decades. Therefore in self defense they attack Israel and the dead civilians are an unnecessary evil to pay because the Palestinians have a right to exist.

I personally think that civilians don't deserve to die. Especially thousands of children. There are diplomatic solutions here.

Reality is though, Israel is the aggressor and doesn't want a diplomatic solution. The Hamas terror attack was appalling but if you look at the numbers, the number of dead Palestinian civilians dwarfs whatever Hamas did.

The Palestinians are simply not strong enough to break free on their own. They will continue to get slowly exterminated unless something changes. This is the logic behind Hamas's suicide attack. They either do something now or die.

this is the type of country we support? Russia bombed a hospital and killed 4 people the president is talking about war crimes this and collective punishment that. Putin even got tried in the ICC.

But when Israel does it the best he can do is say that Israel has a right to "self-defense" and give Netanyahu a big hug? Why do we bend over backwards and risk WW3 for such a country?

yeah i guess i'm just dense.

when biden says one thing and does another, i guess really he's not breaking a promise. like with the saudis or with the border wall. i must be misunderstanding

I support gay rights, trans rights, whatever you wanna call yourself rights.

But the 12+ million people living here illegally being promised immigration reform for decades, including by Biden, have it much harder than the gays and are continously ignored and lately the government has been increasingly hostile to them

Biden, the supposed reformer, even did a photoshoot at the border with border patrol agents to inaugurate the expansion of the wall he promised to halt construction of.

I grew up illegal. I was under DACA. I trusted Biden to do something, because he said he would. I realize now (I knew before but chose to believe) that it's all a scam. And the worst part is. The kicker is.. that I'm probably going to vote for him anyways.

This country is a cruel uncaring machine that systematically crushes any sliver of hope.

Reagan did more for illegals than any democrat ever did. Ronald fuckin Reagan. I'll give Obama credit for DACA. I assumed Biden would continue in those steps, but instead he's gone Full Trump.

As for Israel, what they're doing is genocide. If you read the facts and have any sliver of empathy or reason then you would see that. Biden knows. Trump knew. They don't care. Because we actually don't hold any humanitarian values. It's all secondary to money and power

Neither do you. We do both know, however, what they are doing. Like sending thousands of bombs to Israel so that they can kill more Palestinians. I believe the latest shipment was about 8,000 bombs. At the rate they're, going that's enough for a bit over a week.

I understand there's nuance to the situation that I'm ignoring to make a sparky comment. It's obvious the US is trying to pull back the chain on Israel a little more tightly, especially after the hospital explosion, but at the end of the day Israel is an extension of the US.

The ethnic cleansing and apartheid did not start Oct 7th. Both Biden and Trump have made it clear they are very pro-Israel. Probably Biden wouldn't have moved the embassy, I think.

for many matters trump and biden are identical

trump moved the embassy to jerusalem, legitimizing israel's violation of international law

biden goes over and gives netanyahu a big hug on TV in order to make it clear to the whole world he openly endorses genocide

trump started the border wall

biden expanded construction on it

trump unilaterally broke the iranian nuclear deal

biden makes no real effort to reinstate it

trump puts tariffs on chinese steel and other imports from china

biden continues the same tariffs

trump used "temporary" covid measures in order to refuse people at the border seeking asylum and separate families

biden uses the same exact policies, again in violation of both international and internal laws

the difference between them is narrow and focused on specific topics. for example biden is nice to the rainbow flag.

i'm just glad i'm not draft age anymore. i'm worried this israel-gaza conflict explodes into something way bigger and out of control

What I do know is that what we have now isn’t working.

Why isn't it working? What is the harm in people seeing beheadings? Reading the media of the opposite side? We start outlawing "misinformation" and the only information allowed is the official state narrative. People are so quick to forget that governments lie all the time. Weapons of mass destruction was an elaborate lie perpetuated by both governments and the media. When the US blew up a hospital in 2014~2015 in Afghanistan, they immediately denied it and blamed in on the Afghanis. There's multiple examples of Israel killing journalists or bombing civilians and then lying about it.

We live in a post-truth age. Outlawing one lie simply allows the other to proliferate more easily. It's dangerous and we're looking more and more like authoritarian China every passing day.

People should have the right to decide for themselves what sort of media they want to consume. They should be able to decide for themselves what lies they want to believe.

EU is starting to more heavily censor things. Social media that is "terrorist sympathizing", "misinformation", or "pro-hamas protests" when in reality what they're doing is cutting off access to information from the other side.

Even on Twitter we're seeing certain accounts get banned. I followed a guy who's part of Hezbollah that would give on the ground updates. He got banned. Many other accounts have too.

Is this what we want? An iron curtain around the internet? So we can't see the other side and they can't see us? It's a dangerous path we're walking towards.

I actually don't mind subscription services in general. I would rather pay a monthly fee and not get any ads.

The issue is of course with Google is that your subscription cost is not only the money you pay per month. You're also giving them your data and many YouTubers end up putting ads inside their videos anyways.

Really what we need is a sort of Peertube service with a model that uses ads and optional subscription service (to remove ads) to generate revenue.

This revenue would first pay for all expenses to run the service and then the remainder be split between all content creators relative to how many views or subscribers each content creator manages get.

The issue with current Peertube is that video hosting is expensive. Video hosting at scale is even more so. However, with enough subscribers the math starts to even out. I don't know at what # this becomes viable.

Open source and transparent services ran by non-profits

I would be more than happy to pay a subscription for this. I donate regularly to lichess and Wikipedia for this reason. We need to support these projects because they're the only viable path forward, I believe, that doesn't end in inevitable enshittification.

Doesn't take much thought to see what's happening here. There's a reason virtually the entire world outside of US + western Europe is appalled.

He works for the Israeli Government. Netanyahu is his direct boss. His job is to produce online content that shows the Israeli government in a positive light.

It is not a celeb meeting a celeb at a wedding. When I get home I'll find my bookmark and send you. I'm not trying to lie or mislead. You are very skeptical of me - which you should be because everybody is full of shit these days

But this guy is Israeli government employee. My theory is that he was told to send that at a specific time (he even had a little "too bad so sad we had to kill a few civilians because Hamas" ready to go), but then Israelis realized the world was about to freak out about the hospital so they quickly tried to cover up.. but that's pure speculation without any basis in evidence

I just think because he posted it so quick and there was no reuters article.

https://m.youtube.com/shorts/MvogHimGuWo

Here is Netanyahu at his wedding congratulating him and making the statement: "he works for me"

At this point, can you admit I wasn't telling "straight up lies"? Has providing sources for my claims given me any credibility? Because you accused me of being a liar, I would like to say

Anyhow..

Hamas has rockets that are powerful. For example, the Iranian supplied onces that go up to 125kg can do much more damage than the picture you sent. A well placed 125kg bomb can topple a building.

It's a question of the average. In the last 20 years, Hamas has killed less than 100 Israeli civilians with rockets. They've fired thousands of rockets. Most of them are going to be the Qammas ~20kg ones. People get injured but you have to be unlucky to get killed.

This is what I mean. If Hamas sends out 9 small rockets (which is the majority of their supply) and then 1 big rocket, the more likely outcome is that one of the small ones fail. Simply because there are many more of them. For the damage we saw at the hospital, it would have to be a big one.

He's part of Israeli government. Netanyahu hired him. He was popular influencer and became government propagandist.

I didn't say Israel used small bomb. I'm saying at hospital the damage was from bomb at least 250lb payload. Majority of Hamas rockets are much less. They only have a handful of the big ones that could do the damage at the hospital.

Show me a Hamas rocket that has killed more than 100 people.