0xdeadfa65

> 1. The data/emails were most likely stolen and the media was trying not to make the same mistake as reporting DNC hacked emails, which was a Russian intelligence operation.

This is a complete assumption on their part if that happened. Instead of researching and taking time to assess the finding, they assume foul play. Why does it happen conveniently when the Democrat Joe Biden would suffer from investigating this clearly? Why would they assume it was stolen? Why would they assume it was Russian disinfo? Do you not see the clear profile of ideological politicing at play here? It's all conveniently explained away and meanwhile they get to keep playing politics and pretending to be bipartisan.

> 2. Hunter Biden is not a politician, unlike the Trump kids (who are all hopeless cocaine addicts but no one seems to care) he never worked in the White House. And there's 0 proof Biden was a part of any of Hunter's bullshit. So outside of muckraking and dirty politics, there was nothing newsworthy about it.

So being a cocaine addict is newsworthy when it's the Trump kids but not when its a Biden kid?

>So outside of muckraking and dirty politics, there was nothing newsworthy about it.

Strong disagree. This is exactly the thing that muckraking should uncover. Again, if this was about a Trump kid, everyone would want to know and investigate it. Including you and me.

"I have no idea what you are trying to say." I don't know. Maybe try reading it then? Are you seriously denying that journalists have ideological commitments that eclipse their journalistic integrity? In 2023? After we've seen so many examples of their collusion with corporations, either with Silicon Valley or Big Pharma. Do you actually have an argument against this?

"It strikes me as a codeword, like "elite". Trump isn't part of the elite somehow despite being a NYC billionaire. I bet you don't consider Tucker Carlson a "corporate journalist" (or "elite") despite being a perfect example of both. You give these labels based on ideology." I don't care what you consider it. The phenomenon is real. Do you truly believe there to be no shared interest between journalists and corporations? Calling it a code word doesn't make it go away conveniently for you. What is your argument here?

"Trump isn't part of the elite somehow despite being a NYC billionaire" Don't give a crap about trump.

" I bet you don't consider Tucker Carlson a "corporate journalist" (or "elite") despite being a perfect example of both." You really need stop projecting. I don't give up a crap about Tucker. He's just as much a corporate hack as anyone else. Don't know why you give him special privilege. Again, do you actually have an argument here? Or is this another failed gotcha?

"Yep here we go. You mean where Russia offered to help Trump's campaign, and he accepted?" "It's worth noting, however, that many other claims in the dossier remain unverified or disputed, and the document as a whole continues to be the subject of much debate and investigation." <- Straight from the mouth of ChatGPT :). Your fait accompli is no such thing.

"It was opposition research paid for by a Republicans" LOL. Imagine thinking that PBS is a neutral, unbiased source lol. This is my point. This is the thing that I am talking about. How can you pretend they are unbiased? Again, from the mouth of ChatGPT,

"Yes, it is widely believed that the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) funded the research that led to the creation of the Steele Dossier. In April 2016, the law firm Perkins Coie retained the opposition research firm Fusion GPS to conduct research on Donald Trump's connections to Russia. Fusion GPS then hired former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele to conduct the research. According to campaign finance filings, the Clinton campaign and the DNC paid Perkins Coie over $12 million for legal services, including opposition research." Thoughts?

"National security is famously a conservative profession" LOL. Proof? Or are you we saying things now?

"Lol. Truly. Laugh out loud. With no self-awareness you claim all "corporate journalists" are compromised and hold up Glenn Greenwald, a flaming ball of partisan grievance as a source? My word." Thank you for proving my point. Progressives hate his guts; I know this. You shown yourself to be the progressive partisan. You have no interest in neutrality. No interest in making our political environment more bipartisan. All you know is "Trump bad >:(". That's really sad. I have no love for the guy but people like you remind me why Americans deserve such a pathetic excuse for a president.

Do your links prevent the opposite argument from being made? I have heard more often that crime causes poverty.

Also, the specific connection with crime and poverty inequality, not poverty itself.

How does this exonerate progressive policies? Didn’t no one bother to stop and help him out? You’re jumping the logic there

Journalists will chime in on leaks/hacks when their is a way to leverage them ideologically. What is considered whistleblowing is part of the political process. If the same journalists jump on calling something whistleblowing when it serves democrats yet calling something else an unfortunate leak, it is an example of serving corporate/political interests above the public.

Do you not know what corporate journalists are? You can put it in the scary quotations but it doesn't make the term go away. It is an understood term. It exists. You can't scare-quote out of existence.

"you clearly believe that every journalist should be anti-USG by default" What in the world are you talking about? And you're accusing me of projection?

"Ex-intel officials don't speak up often, if at all. They hate having a public opinion, it goes against all their training. They only do so in extreme situations" Incorrect. They were happy to chime in in the fake Russia hoax scandal. The Steel dossier was poofed into existence by Hillary Clinton and our intelligence institutions were giddy to grind their ideological axes against Trump. It really shot their reputation. Read what the journalist Glenn Greenwald has to say about how agents in those institutions use their status to confer status to spurious claims for the purposes of politics.

Are you really going to say that our intelligence apparatus are trustworthy? The FBI, CIA, NSA, etc. They're trustworthy; is that what you're saying? I would love to hear your logic and any evidence you have in that direction.

Again, what does owning slaves have to do with founding a country? Owning slaves was an unequivocal evil. It did not contribute anything good. I cannot make that clear enough. It is a net loss to their reputation for having owned slaves. If they did not own slaves, they would have been better people for it. Are we done with this point?

Apparently you do not understand Mao that well. You admitted that you don't read books about him because the authors supposed have an agenda. And supposed all biographers of Mao share this agenda? I have read one, remember? I listed one you said it was not reliable. Name a book I can read. Do it. Stop playing the "selective historiography" card you keep playing. Pick a book you think provides an honest account of this failed statesmen.

Please link the "World Bank China report on Socialist Economic Development Vol1 1983" so I can read it then.

"Mao massively overdelivered relative to peers with same/better/easier starting conditions" This is laughably wrong I don't even know where to start. I'm starting to think you will keep making excuses for this wreck of a man no matter what. He's responsible for more deaths than Hitler and somehow you worship the man. Again, what changes to the economy did he make that explains your line: "PRC compound overperforming under Deng due to base effect of PRC under Mao"

"Deng good meme is peak misunderstanding" Very weak argument. Calling something a meme does not dismiss it. Actually cite evidence.

"Deng's hard work was contingent on Mao doing the even harder work" I can't believe someone believes this. Again, cite evidence.

Deng was responsible for making market reforms that did not exist under Mao. Do you understand that? Are you claiming he did not do that? What is your argument. Besides dismissing Deng so easily, you have not provided any substantive argument against Deng being superior.

Are you just some Mao fanboy? Because if you are, then I am wasting my time. Ostensibly, you will not listen to reason since you are too busy worshiping a genocidal psychopath.

"small demerits" Lol. Tell me, what is a big demerit then? Is killing millions of Jews also a "small demerit?"

In the interest of fairness, I will naturally cite any provide for any argument I have argued here WITH evidence, something you have failed to do. Let me know so I can provide it and put this sorry discussion to rest.

Why do I care what some discredited right-wing outlet covers? They have no credibility to begin with; I am not going to begin questioning their motives. I'll leave that as an assignment for you if you're so interested

You're not understanding. My claim is that great evil can come with no benefit. Owning slaves is indeed evil. Are you arguing that the nation benefited from the founding fathers owning slaves?

These books are not "agenda driven" but honest and compelling historiography of the account of Mao's life. You have not even read them so how would you know that they are biased in anyway? Tell me, what is a book that is not "Agenda driven" that you would recommend then?

You are engaging in a very weak line of argumentation. The Great Leap Forward was a failed disaster. It was not planned with any intelligence in mind and without understanding of economics. Collectivized industries, but especially farming failed. Mao was not a economist and did not organize labor accordingly. Setting up backyard furnaces caused massive famines. He pathetic policies lead to not just starving to death of millions of Chinese peasants but rape, torture and cannibalism in the countryside. The Cultural Revolution was him attempting to save face and purge top brass from pointing out his stupid failed policies. Collectivized farming produced weak-incentive structures for productive farms. The most productive farms were those where the most productive workers were allowed to reap rewards from their efforts. Deng Xiaoping, an actual great man, knew this and set China up for success. In fact Xiaoping is infinitely better a person in just about every way than the genocidal, psychotic dullard that was Mao.

In fact, if you're looking to champion a Chinese leader, Deng Xiaoping is your man. China only started befitting from authoritarian rule once they got an actual smart person that knew what they were doing. He was great because he was able to release his grip and let China adopt more liberal-market reforms. It was only then that China started seeing economic growth.

Mao was not great because he was a psychopath. He was just a psychopath. He was a net loss for humanity and the Chinese people. His death was the greatest thing that happened for China.

They should not be receiving public funds if they are going to continue to produce ideologically inclined content. At this point, they are no different than a little neoliberal/progressive think tank. And an honest assessment of the content means that they lean heavily to the left.

Nope it was definitely a lie. Corporate journalist along with their connections in our intelligence institutions colluded to tarnish and bury the story before an election before it had a chance to be assessed properly. I understand not believing the story to begin with and even believing that there was no incriminating content within the laptop (other than Hunter’s dysfunctional life), but there was definitely a campaign to bury the story so that it would not affect Joe Biden’s chances of being elected. The campaign was to call it Russian disinformation. Do you at least admit this much?

And that’s why our intelligence apparatus is not a trusted source. Individuals within this institution are willing to game their status for reputation and sell it to the highest bidder. Look how the Pentagon is handling the leak of the Ukrainian papers, not to mention corporate journalist condemning the leak.

The story was mentioned as an example of NPR editorializing. What is your point?

Do you not see how this is editorializing? They refuse to cover story having to do with the son of the Democratic candidate. And they pretended the story was not real.

This is quite a terrible take, considering the story has been proven to be true. Your sarcastic tone really annoys me since the media spent half a year, pretending the story wasn’t real.

You can commit atrocious evil without reaping rewards. It is extremely doubtful that Mao contributed any good. Read any book like Mao’s Great Famine or any other book detailing Maos life and exploits. He was a psychopath who refused to admit he did anything wrong. He was also an ephebophile, sleeping with girls as young as 14. Did that contribute any good?

Yes but there are many wannabe aspirants competing to be the next Mao

Was this supposed to be a gotcha?

I had the same response. What exactly should I be outraged about?

You like changing your language because you convinced yourself that you’re part of the crew getting to make the changes. Just wait until you’re on the receiving end. Or even better forced to speak a different language, you don’t know, which has happened before under the banner of progress.

I think you missed the point completely. Rioting affects the political and cultural ambience of our times. It does not need to affect you directly or be a nuisance in your local communities for one to voice displeasure. Your take feels very dense in this regard and concern trolling is not a sufficient description of the post your responding to.

This is not the first time I have heard about police departments infiltrated by supposed fascist elements. Unfortunately, these accusations never seem to come from honest actors; usually from agents with a dedicated agenda to push.

I don’t doubt that there is a presence. I’m sure there is some symbiosis between the police departments and right-wing elements and I’m open to understanding the severity of the issue.

The question now is do you have any evidence of the severity that isn’t from paid political agitators? Keep in mind, snarling out invectives like “nazi” is currently in vogue; I expect the evidence to be excellent and demonstrable irrespective of political affiliation.

Is this a gotcha comment?

Organized does not necessarily mean brimming with marketing material about their organizational structure. Antifa obviously has members and planning. They make great effort to counter who they perceive to be their political rivals. Analyzing from the outside, I imagine they would prefer their structure remain as opaque as possible for pragmatic reasons. I can’t point you to a “starter link” of my local Catholics; yet they exist and are organized.

Your curt inquiry should be directed at journalists, who for whatever reason are delinquent in their duty to investigate this organization.

So was your comment supposed to be cute? An invitation to a purported dead-end investiture? I assume you think yourself adjacent politically to Antifa. I find that most “fellow-travelers” tend to be the most vocal defenders of them online. Would you be this cavalier and flippant if your political rivals were doing the same thing Antifa is doing but for the opposite political “team?”

Just a thought.

Can't help but feel this article was written in bad-faith. It feels desperate to counter the narrative of rising crime being an issue. Truth is crime has risen in the last couple of years and it has resulted in the severe deterioration of the quality of life in affected populations. The facts are clear and are not on the crime-downplaying side.

I wish crime would be a bipartisan issue since it leads to severe consequence for everyone alike. Alas, the partisan calculus being played demands inconvenient narratives be shut down, without any exploration of the causes.

I guess they wouldn't. I honestly don't know how to get public discourse back on track to an appreciation for truth. I can only hope the partisans that weaponized social media as their pet angry mob eventually get their comeuppance; preferably in a way that leaves us with more transparency into how these platforms operate and the agents that leverage it.

It’s crazy to me that there is still people that refuse to acknowledge the collusion. I imagine it’s because they perceive a benefit from this arrangement and see it as an opportunity to hurt their political rivals. Good luck getting them to admit anything.

Thank you for this comment. Too much gleeful malice distracting from the message.

Thank you for the laugh. I’m not convinced though that this is not their though process.

Thank you for the very thoughtful comment. The required login I think is enough to scare me off. Which is a shame. It’s the first time I’ve heard of this terminal and the features listed intrigue me enough to want to explore more.

I have to burst your bubble here. Conservative institutions suffer from much less child abuse accounts than progressive, "leftist" institutions. If you want a good example, compare rates of child abuse between the Catholic Church and US public schools. The latter is rife with such accounts, both in relative and absolute terms. I say there is an association where the greater the deviation from conservative, traditional values, the more scandalous idiosyncrasies of the individuals manifest.

Is this funny to you? Or are you using some rhetorical flourish to morally grandstand? Either way, your style of retort is what I dearly hate about the present world. Maybe spend less time laughing at strangers on the internet and consuming raw propaganda; and more time education yourself on the statistics of the topic your are weaponizing.

Just a thought. Let me know if you want me to substantiate any of the points I mentioned.

https://sites.law.duq.edu/juris/2019/03/16/catholic-priest-s...

I am too but I don’t think you’ll get it, even on HN. Good luck though

This comment is the perfect storm of all things pernicious with a lot of modern discourse I see surrounding wokeism. Let's see; * liberal interpretation of the word "voluntary," * presenting Nikole Hanna Jones as a martyr for social justice when in reality she is no such thing, * no mention of the political allegiance or ideology of the people behind those awards as if they were objective and neutral third-parties (they're not), * no elaboration on the 1619 Project and its MANY faults, chief among them being its status of more of a work of fan-fiction than historical reality as attested by the author herself, * exaggerating the degree to which American universities are neutral; they are not, they are fully captured institutions of the left for better or worse (note that I am neutral on this point) * mandatory mention of Donald Trump for maximum effect, * all of the above presented with an aggravating demeanor of a petulant apologist for bad politics, all while pretending to be some sort of centrist(?) (or at least that is how I interpreted your attitude. I could be wrong. Let me know.)

If you do consider yourself some kind of leftist or at least an advocate for social justice, can you stop with this manner of addressing your purported adversaries online? I can't think of anything more frustrating than crypto-wokeists. It fans the flames of animosity and strengthens the spirit of reaction. You're not fooling anyone with this plausibly-deniable posturing.

Of course I could be wrong myself and read into your comment more than you intended :).