Too little, too late as usual.

I do follow this issue, but how is this US-internal topic relevant to the fediverse community?

I say this as someone who opposes oligarchs and has a rather critical attitude towards local perceptions of corruption in the US.

Don’t get me wrong, I recognize it’s a solid instance and I am going to continue engaging in their communities.

Just the admin reaction was a bit strange. I think mods/admins need to try and take a neutral position as much as possible (exceptions notwithstanding).

Why nearly? They are just as bad, if not worse.

That thread is wild. I had no clue slrpunk was like that (I only go to some non-political communities on slrpunk).

Come on. This is a delusional take.

And insightcrime is not “imperial news”, I read them a lot. They clearly aim for a factual perspective, almost academic in a sense.

And by bringing up imperialism in this context, you really are condoning the actions of those degenerate gang members.

Sounds like this is the work of the Islamic State.

I wonder if the Taliban thugs are able to see the irony of the situation.

More than 100 mostly elderly people were murdered between December 6 and 7 by a gang operating in the Cité Soleil neighborhood, one of the capital’s poorest, according to Haiti’s government and human rights groups. Gang members shot or stabbed victims to death with machetes and knives, and burned bodies in the streets, according to a statement released by the National Human Rights Defense Network (Réseau National de Défense des Droits Humains – RNDDH).

The gang’s leader reportedly ordered the slaughter after being told that elderly people in the area were practicing witchcraft to harm his young son, who had fallen ill. He subsequently died on December 7, according to the RNDDH.

This is intense brutality, chaos and collapse of government authority.

This isn’t political violence in the sense of supporters of different parties killing each other.

These are Mexican drug cartels killing and intimidating politicians to protect their turf, enable corruption and make it more difficult to fight them.

I am not necessarily arguing against what you’re saying, just pointing out that what’s going on in Mexico is primarily linked to drug cartels and not violent conflict based on ideology or political goals.

That’s not good. I was hoping they would move towards more open, inclusive governance.

I guess we’ll see how things develop, but this is not good sign.

I do believe this is true to some degree.

NK may be more fundamentally more aligned with China, but I do think NK at least tries to play them against each.

This does seem very strange. I don’t understand why they would even bother with such a specific, minor tariff.

Perhaps some senior goon (i.e. pretty close to putin, not just a regular oligarch or a regional fief) has money in the furniture business? Still I would imagine it would be easier to implement some sort of local subsidy or corruption scheme as opposed to a tariff against China. It just doesn’t seem worth it.

This is honestly a tiny tariff that has no real impact on trade between russia and China.

Conduct a thought experiment and imagine the article wasn’t written by that think tank.

What part of the article is wrong and why? I will note, it doesn’t exactly embrace HTS. Please be specific. Happy to agree it is a bad source if you provide reasoned arguments and alternative data/analysis.

The BBC article doesn’t provide any context beyond the following two sentences:

For some time now, HTS has established its power base in the north-western province of Idlib where it is the de facto local administration, although its efforts towards legitimacy have been tarnished by alleged human rights abuses. … Since breaking with Al Qaeda, its goal has been limited to trying to establish fundamentalist Islamic rule in Syria rather than a wider caliphate, as IS tried and failed to do.

The BBC article does not discuss public policy in rebel controlled areas or address HTS’s recent statements.

I am not claiming to know the right answer. I don’t speak Arabic, I’ve never been to Syria and my in-person knowledge is largely limited to Syrian friends and acquaintances with whom I’ve lost contact with.

I am genuinely curious about more in-depth information.

They try really hard rebranding in name, not Ideas. Asad is bad, the people trying to get in power now are not better.

Do you have any specifics on this? Reports, analysis with reference to facts and data. Something along the lines of this article:

How Syria’s ‘Diversity-Friendly’ Jihadists Plan on Building a State

Not saying you are wrong, HTS and the rebels may well fracture. I guess we’ll find out.

This is a re-occurring theme in russian history:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Japanese_War

While the russian economic model evolves with times (Tsarist feudalism, state managed economy under socialism, oligarchic capitalist plutocracy), attitudes around imperialism and governance unfortunately will not change until russians start being treated as they treat others.

Let’s see what comes out of this.

It would have been better to put him on trial and execute him for crimes against humanity.

For what it’s worth, HTS has seemingly moderated both its public statements and governance (in the areas it controlled) in the last few years.

Not saying we won’t have Islamic revanchism, but it’s too early to tell and there are some signs that moderate governance is not outside the realm of possibility.

Ironically, on Feb. 26, 20[1]1, two days after the fall of Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak to protesters and just before the wave of Arab Spring protests swept into Syria — in an email released by Wikileaks as part of a cache in 2012 — Assad e-mailed a joke he’d run across mocking the Egyptian leader’s stubborn refusal to step down.

“NEW WORD ADDED TO DICTIONARY: Mubarak (verb): To stick something, or to glue something. … Mubarak (adjective): slow to learn or understand,” it read.

This is going to be a strange little footnote in history.

John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt

These two are just as bad AIPAC. They just shill for a different group. And unlike AIPAC leaders, who at least have some sort of connection to Israel, these two live in the US and don’t seem to want to reject their US citizenship and move to russia (while supporting russian genocidal imperialism). I would almost say them criticizing TWI, adds legitimacy to the organization.

If you actually read the article, it is mostly descriptive and informative, with very little opinion or even analytical conclusions. I would have no issues with sharing it with someone interested in learning more about HTS public policy. If anything, I would have preferred the article to be longer and more in-depth (a mini report of sorts). Did not even notice the org until I went to the comments section.

Is there something specific that bothers you about the article?