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Really weird thing about Newfoundland politics. Rural-urban polarization is nothing new there, but traditionally it's the rurals that favour Liberals and St. John's favouring Tories, including at the federal level - as recently as 2006 when Harper won the two St. John's seats while losing the 5 rural seats.

To make things even weirder, if I'm not mistaken, the St. John's area is traditionally the Irish Catholic dominated part of the province, while the rest of the island is more protestant and Anglo-Saxon.

So that's urban Irish Catholics favouring Tories, and rural WASPs favouring Liberals. This unusual polarization seems to be fading and polarization is heading in a more "normal" direction, i.e. rural right and urban left. But I can't think of any other part of the Anglosphere where the Catholics were traditionally the Tories, and protestants were more anti-Tory.

https://twitter.com/academic_la/status/1794838600041001106?t=sgI2X4pydY7wJ1AVkCp...

That’s horrible, no ifs, ands, or buts.  It’s objectively not genocide, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a horrific act.  And you can’t even argue that Israel was targeting such high-ranking Hamas officials that it was worth the risk or whatever.  These were not top guys.  This strike never should’ve been launched.

According to the Palestine Red Crescent Society, the area hit is a designated "safe zone".

This isn't the first time that Israel has hit a "safe zone" either.

Time to reconsider the "objectively not genocide" part.

That’s not genocide.  A war crime?  Quite possibly, but not genocide.  Words have meaning.

Maybe you think that I looked up "genocide" in a dictionary and using the term willy-nilly.

That is not the case.

When I talking about "genocide", I am using the term as defined in the Genocide Convention.

And I am going by the definition established by the Genocide Convention as well.  The difference is you’re using it in a wildly inaccurate manner.  Whether you’re doing so deliberately or due to genuine ignorance is not for me to say, but by that definition, Israel’s actions are clearly not genocide.  It isn’t even a close call.

We both know that the ICC bring charges against individuals not against countries, but it's not much of a stretch that the charges against Netanyahu and Gallant also applies to Israel.

Let's look at these charges.

• Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(b)(xxv) of the Statute;
• Wilfully causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or health contrary to article 8(2)(a)(iii), or cruel treatment as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i);
• Wilful killing contrary to article 8(2)(a)(i), or Murder as a war crime contrary to article 8(2)(c)(i);
  
• Intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population as a war crime contrary to articles 8(2)(b)(i), or 8(2)(e)(i);
• Extermination and/or murder contrary to articles 7(1)(b) and 7(1)(a), including in the context of deaths caused by starvation, as a crime against humanity;
• Persecution as a crime against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(h);
• Other inhumane acts as crimes against humanity contrary to article 7(1)(k).

Do they not sound a whole lot like genocide to you?

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:  

(a) Killing members of the group;  

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;  

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its
physical destruction in whole or in part;  

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;  

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

The only ones of those I think you could make a serious argument are occurring are starvation of civilians as a method of war as a war crime and deaths caused by such as a crime against humanity.  What I have yet to see is compelling hard evidence that this is the result of a deliberate, willful policy sanctioned by Netanyahu and Gallant.  I have not yet seen such evidence, but if such comes out (and again, I’m talking compelling, hard evidence not some rando on Twitter or at an NGO saying “there is a famine, this must be deliberate; looks like genocide to me!”) then this would be a very different conversation.  If such evidence emerges then I will adjust my views accordingly and I think that’s perfectly reasonable.

Let look at what Netanyahu and Gallant themselves have said.

“you must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible. And we do remember”

- Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

Netanyahu was referring to the genocide of the Amalekites at the hands of the Israelites.

IDF soldiers heard the message from Netanyahu loud and clear.

They were coming to Gaza to "wipe off the seed of Amalek" and there are no "uninvolved civilians".

https://twitter.com/MiddleEastEye/status/1733116719668113618

“[Israel is] imposing a complete siege on Gaza. No electricity, no food, no water, no fuel. Everything is closed. We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.”

- Defence Minister Yoav Gallant

This one is self-evident. Nothing was left for interpretation.

Some gross demagoguery, but no more than that.  Pretty sure Netanyahu is simply talking about Hamas as I believe the Amalekites tried to wipe out the Jewish people and if so, then I have no problem with that tbh.  Wiping out Hamas is what wild success looks like here from a military standpoint.  The “human animals” bit of the Gallant quote is pretty bad though, no two ways about it.

The Israeli soldiers chanting that are bad people, but actual actions and/or written evidence (ex: government or military documents, memos, etc) speaking to the intent and direct knowledge/sign-off of specific individuals is far more important than words, even odious words like Gallant’s (which I am in no way defending, to be clear)

Edit: Yeah, “Amalek” is often used in Israel as a catch all term for folks like the Iranian regime, the Nazis, Hamas, etc who seek to wipe out the Jewish people.

Race: White
Gender: Female
Age: 44
Occupation: Restaurant hostess
Personal income: $29k
Education: High school graduate
Current city: Houston, TX
Hometown: Small town in East Texas
Marital Status: Divorced, has two ex-husbands
Children: Has 4 kids
Religion: Baptist

Add to that it's not even like this is liberal arts or something. It's pretty damn important that you have the most competent doctors possible, not ones who flunk basic anatomy exams.

 For who is it important? We know that when Black people have Black doctors they have better patient outcomes across all types of medicine.

Do Black patients fare better with Black doctors?

Funnily enough, the Liberals are running a federal Conservative in the race

This is what the Liberal candidate had to say in a CBC interview:

"I think Mr. Furey is the man of the hour," Bury told CBC News in a recent interview.

...

Burt said he hasn't hidden his ties to the Conservative Party or his friendship with [CPC MP Clifford] Small. His issue, he said, is with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
"I don't like the way that our prime minister is taking the country, and I think the Liberals need to make a change at the top there."

So it sounds like he's not exactly a fire breathing conservative, more like an ancestral Newfoundland Liberal who's not too happy with Trudeau's LPC. He lost the byelection, but he seems pretty representative of political trends in NL right now.

Because what liberal is dying to move to the state of Oklahoma? Same reason why Florida and Texas cities aren’t as blue as similar sized cities.

Very few people decide where to move because of the politics of their destination. Lots of liberals have been moving to Austin despite Texas being a red state and young people who want to work in Republican politics move to DC even though Biden got 94% of the vote there. People go where their jobs take them.

I usually try to watch them both in their entirety (gotta love the drama if nothing else), but sometimes they're right around Labor Day, which is a holiday I like to spend traveling if I can, so sometimes I'll miss one or the other.

I'm not saying weed should be illegal or anything but there are a lot of problems with it that are often ignored because it's "better than drinking" and people think that it can be a cash cow for government if it's legal (an assumption that has its own share of problems)

Exacerbates anxiety and depression issues - unfortunately, often among people who seek it out to self-medicate for those issues
Shown to be a potential contributor to psychosis in some cases
Not good for brain development - bad for teens, but DEFINITELY bad for children whose parents smoke in the house because they don't understand why that's as bad as smoking cigarettes in the house. There's a woman who lives on the first floor of my building who has two young children and their apartment constantly smells like weed when you walk past. I'm afraid this is going to have a negative effect on those children's development through no fault of their own.
Expensive - almost literally flushing money down the toilet
Smelly and trashy

[The Subhumans]

Thank you Punxsutawney Phil for creating a thread.

I just logged on today to create a similar themed thread.

As I have posted previously on Atlas on Memorial day in memory of my friend Eric joined the Oregon National Guard in an era where typically this might involve fighting forest fires, responding to flooding, etc...

Donald Rumsfeld and "Stop Loss" combined with mobilization of some of the highest quality State National Guard Units caused him to get shipped out to Iraq.

I saw him at the coffee shop in a small Oregon City where we would hang out and he told me he was getting deployed for training at Fort Hood, Texas where he was getting assigned to an Air Cav unit for "basic training".

Saw him after he came back from the training and he told me he was getting deployed to Iraq within a few Months.

Asked what he was trained on and he told me weapons depots demolitions, and supporting operations for regular US Military forces etc...

Told him that he should be aware that he didn't have to go, and that I knew people in the Peace Movement and Faith Based communities that could help him get to Canada if he wanted to apply as a conscientious objector.

His reply was that he couldn't do that because he would be letting his buddies down, and as someone with a 3rd Generation US Military background also had to do it for his family.

That was the last time I talked to him in person and not so many months later am walking down on the main corridors of the Factory where a mutual friend broke the news.

He died on 6/13/05 hit by an IED outside of Taji / Camp Cooke with a Humvee that had not been up-armored because Rumsfeld was skipping on the $$$.

From what I understand he likely died very quickly as the Gunner so hopefully it was relatively painless.

His funeral was held shortly afterwards with hundreds attending, Fire Trucks with huge American Flags, even the Helicopter formation missing one.

I spent a $100 which was a lot of money back then for what I was making, to buy a brand new suit, tie, and shoes with many mutual friends in attendance.

I could barely speak a word to anyone, even though there were so many others in mourning, and all I could do was to hug his Fiancé, since sometimes words cannot express the emotions that people are feeling.

Ended up going through a multiple year Mental Health issue scene, asking myself could I have done something different so that he would not have ended up in that hellhole called Iraq.

Went through a couple years of a Cocaine addiction to help me numb myself from internal guilt, until finally some of my best friends gave me a bit of a reality check that I should not live with that burden for choices that were not mine to make.

This included one of best friends, and later best man at my second wedding who had lost his favorite Uncle in Vietnam.

Eric did not directly choose to go to Iraq, he was indirectly drafted but ultimately he chose to go regardless of the BS he knew was behind Bush's War.

I still miss him... RIP Eric. 😭



https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/gazettetimes/name/eric-mckinley-obituary?id=13542681

Went up to an Anti-War punk gig in PDX listening to the The Subhumans while he had his three months back after Basic Training.

One of their favorite bands was Flogging Mollies .

Ended up buying an album from a Hip-Hop band serving in Iraq a year after...

[and]

Furthermore, the word "genocide" has sort of become a byword in our discourse for the ultimate evil. This isn't true at all. There's no hierarchy here with war crimes and then crimes against humanity and then genocide at the top. Genocide is a specific legal term defined in the Genocide Convention, it's not meant to define the absolute evil. Just because Israel isn't committing a genocide doesn't mean we shouldn't be outraged. I do not believe Israel is committing a genocide, yet still I am outraged! No more bombing of Gaza, no more invasion of Rafah, cease-fire immediately!

The problem is that Hamas refuses to release the hostages alive. Should Israel just give up on them?

I don’t necessarily buy that Hamas has to be removed from power militarily- after all, only a suicidal Ukraine  would support military action to remove the Russian government because of their invasion of Ukraine- but at the same time, anything less than a full defeat of the Nazis was considered the only acceptable outcome during WW2.

I continue to believe that negotiation is the only way to free the hostages, it may require concessions but it's the only way that doesn't result in the death of the hostages and thousands more of Gazan civilians. I believe that ideally, Hamas would be removed from power, it is, after all, the only way to resurrect a two-state solution, but the current Israeli government has no intention to pursue this solution. My perspective is that Israel has no idea how to, or no intention to, construct a lasting peace in the region, so the overwhelming majority of the present violence (which is caused by the IDF) must be brought to an end via a humanitarian cease-fire. I'll put it like this, we need a total and complete shutdown on the war until we can figure out what the hell is going on.

I don’t think you can have an end to this round of fighting until Hamas is crushed and completely out of power in Gaza permanently and Deif as well as both of the Sinwar brothers are dead.  You can certainly do a temporary humanitarian ceasefire before then, but definitely not a long-term or permanent shutdown of the war.  

Also, I disagree that the present violence is being caused primarily by the IDF.  At the end of the day, this is ultimately a defensive war caused by Hamas’ unprovoked campaign of rape, murder, and kidnapping against Israeli civilians on 10/7.  There is no equivalency there.