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45,527 | During the debate tonight, Bernie Sanders said (from the Washington Post's transcript ): We need...a health-care system that guarantees health care to all people as every other major country does, not a system which provides $100 billion a year in profit for the drug companies and the insurance companies. What definition of "major countries" is being used? Has Sanders personally elaborated on what he means by "major country?" | You can expect truth in campaign speeches, but not scientific definitions. For an approximation of major countries, try the G7. Of course the G7 misses China, India, Russia, Brazil, which are quite important in the 21st century world. Canada: Yes. France: Yes. Germany: Yes. Italy: Yes. Japan: Yes. UK: Yes. Those "yes" are never absolute. Some procedures may be covered, others may require co-payments or are not covered. For instance, France has just decided to stop funding homeopathy, Germany requires co-payments for dentistry, etc. | {
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45,543 | Before Monday I have always taken an impartial stance when ingesting information produced by clearly pro-Leave and pro-Remain groups, to analyze the information and take time to cross-reference it with the information available on the internet. However, when I read the released Yellowhammer papers, cross-referenced them with the leaked papers published in the Sunday Times as well as the comment made by the First Minister for Scotland , I started to wonder: Why is the UK still pursuing Brexit? The only reason, politically, I can conceive is to allow the Tory party to square off the Brexit Party and siphon off all their votes - however, I cannot see how that can be the only reason. At the moment, support for Scottish Independence has gone up - Brexit contributing to the support for a second independence referendum - and Welsh Independence has a sharp increase in support over the past few weeks, posing a threat to the current structure of the union (which wouldn't be all that good for the stability of the country, especially if a Scottish indyref takes place in the next 3 years); the Yellowhammer Papers outline near-paralysis on the imports of Medicine and Food, it even states that people that are under the most financial strain will more disadvantaged than the rest of the citizenry ; the NI/ROI border issue hasn't been solved ; and, to make matters worse, there is a high possibility to a recession brought on by the US-China trade war as well as the uncertainty brought on by Brexit (and no deal) . As the Government is pressing on with what looks like the only Brexit the UK is getting, a no-deal Brexit, why are we pressing on with it? The disadvantages outweigh the advantages previously stated in the 2016 referendum, and all but no deal has been thrown out of the window for being either too soft, not fitting the Governments 'red lines', or not being Brexity enough (Customs Union, Canada deal, &c). If Brexit will do the opposite to what was promised in the official campaign, then why pursue it - when it will do so much damage to the UK? | You are making the same mistake as the remain campaign did: This is not a rational decision, at the core, it's an emotional decision . It's not about what financial, economic or whatever benefits either way brings it's about whether people want to be in or out of the union and what they emotionally consider their main political entity (i.e. "nation"). Any feeling of belonging to the political entity EU is totally missing for a large part of the population, they have no emotional connection and thus it feels wrong that the EU they "don't belong to" makes decisions that affects them. All the negative predictions, whether probable or not, will not convince most leave supporters to change their mind, but harden their decision to leave "despite all the scare mongering". Boris Johnson rides on this emotional support consciously or not. These "worst case" scenarios won't change the underlying attitude, so they have no impact on his (large-scale) decision making. Again, to supporters, it makes him even more of a hero to not be dissuaded by these "fake news" of people who want to thwart the "will of the people" by scaring them with the consequences of their actions. | {
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45,571 | In case Brexit has already happened, can it be reversed after a short time? Legally, the answer is no, I think. But I can imagine a situation where, during the first few days after Brexit, all participants unanimously agree it should not have happened. It is at least possible that the first days after Brexit create a crisis that makes all agree it went horribly wrong, and dangerously so. From the EU side, let us assume it recognizes the crisis and is willing to cooperate in any way that its laws allow. If all relevant politicians of all parties in the UK would unanimously agree that it lead to a catastrophic crisis , and should be reverted at any cost - is that possible in any controlled way ? | "Can it happen"? Sure, the laws of the EU are set by the members of the EU, if the members want to change the rules they can. They can re-admit the UK or not. If there is a law against it, the EU can just change the law. With sufficient political will on both sides it is possible. "Will it happen"? After years of causing problems, how likely is it that the political will would exist? | {
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45,636 | In following the ongoing Brexit drama, it seems everything is resolved except the question of the Northern Irish border, which is very difficult indeed to solve. Idea: draw a new border that splits Northern Ireland into two pieces of roughly 60:40 in size (this is based on a guesstimate of what the proportion of both sides are; adjust if this is inaccurate). Get all nationalists to the 40% side, all unionists to the 60% side. The 40% side joins Ireland and becomes one of its provinces; the 60% side stays in the UK. Then implement a hard border. There'll be mechanical problems to this of course (e.g. it would necessarily involve a lot of people having to buy new houses) but those should be temporary. Meanwhile if this works, it would separate the two infighting populations and hopefully solve the problem permanently. Such a solution would not necessarily have to involve forced population transfers — one could choose to stay put, and then agree to identify with & abide by the laws of the country one ends up in (whichever that is). I am wondering if can plausibly resolve the conflict. If so, has it been seriously discussed? If not, why not? Related: Would it be plausible to solve the Irish Border issue by unifying Ireland? | No, repartition will not solve the problem. In 1994 the Ulster Defence Association , a loyalist terrorist organisation active during The Troubles , threatened that if the British Army withdrew from Northern Ireland they would " repartition Ulster ", falling back to majority Protestant areas, and ethnic cleansing any Catholics left. Repartition has been suggested now and again, usually with less genocidal intent. In 1984 Margret Thatcher was briefed on the possibility of repartition, but it was and still is a ridiculous proposal. It would result in unworkable areas, like West Belfast becoming a walled ghetto. Belfast is a patchwork quilt of areas with are mostly Protestant, mostly Catholic, or a mix. See below map, it's from 1991 data but is close enough to contemporary circumstance. With regards to population transfers... with the possible exception of some small villages along the border, this is impossible. West Belfast for example has a population of 94,639 (2016), and is a republican stronghold. This was the heartland of the Provisional Irish Republican Army 's Belfast brigade, and is still overseen by their Army Council through the PIRA (which like all terrorist organisations from The Troubles still exists) and Sinn Fein . This is one of the most republican communities anywhere on the island of Ireland, north or south of the border. There is absolutely no chance whatsoever of them agreeing to move, much less to placate loyalists. This point is of critical importance; Irish Republicans believe wholly in a United Ireland free from British influence. This means the very suggestion of population transfers is antithetical to their cause. | {
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45,642 | A recent ABC article quotes National Taiwan University political scientist Shimin Chen as saying "If Taiwan's diplomatic relations reach single digits or even zero, it represents that the international community does not recognise Republic of China, and the result may not be what Beijing wants," he told the ABC. "Taiwan may give up the 'Republic of China' name and the Constitution of the Republic of China, and then what will happen? A 'Republic of Taiwan' or some other name? Probably not what Beijing wants to get." This raised a relatively simple idea I've never heard floated before: Taiwan, officially the "Republic of China" could change its name. This is essentially the solution taken between Greece and the former Republic of Macedonia, now North Macedonia. Has the People's Republic of China ever given any indication that their longtime dispute with Taiwan would be solved if Taiwan changed its official name and its constitution? | No, dropping the ROC name makes the situation worse as the PRC claims that China is indivisible and that the island of Taiwan is part of China. Hence, the usual threat is that they will launch an invasion immediately if Taiwan claims independence. By sticking to the ROC name, both sides can pretend they are working towards reconciliation and reunification. | {
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45,657 | Looking on Wikipedia , we learn that: It is generally agreed that the commander-in-chief role gives the
President power to repel attacks against the United States[3][4] and
makes the President responsible for leading the armed forces. The
President has the right to sign or veto congressional acts, such as a
declaration of war, and Congress may override any such presidential
veto. Additionally, when the president's actions (or inactions)
provide "Aid and Comfort" to enemies or levy war against the United
States, then Congress has the power to impeach and remove (convict)
the president for treason. For actions short of treason, they can
remove the president for "Bribery, or other high Crimes and
Misdemeanors", the definition of which the Supreme Court has left up
to Congress. Therefore, the war power was intentionally split between
Congress and the Executive to prevent unilateral executive action that
is contrary to the wishes of Congress. But the question is if the President can make direct orders without consulting any of his general through a phone call. For example, can the President order the U.S. military to launch a bomb against Canada without any reason? It is not explicitly stated if he can do so, but it seems that he can, but risk being impeached for such random and foolish decisions. | Yes and no. The War Powers Resolution (sometimes known as the War Powers Act) is supposed to limit it. The War Powers Resolution requires the President to notify Congress within 48 hours of committing armed forces to military action and forbids armed forces from remaining for more than 60 days, with a further 30-day withdrawal period, without a Congressional authorization for use of military force (AUMF) or a declaration of war by the United States. The resolution was passed by two-thirds of each of the House and Senate, overriding the veto of the bill from President Nixon. In theory, it limits the unilateral war actions of the President beyond 60 days. In practice, it has not really changed anything. Every President has violated the WPA since its passage, with all of them (both parties) believing it too be unconstitutional. Even Obama, who endlessly praised it President Obama, in defending the legitimacy of the Libyan operation, hasn’t actually made that argument. On Wednesday, he submitted a report to Congress arguing that his administration isn’t in violation of the act at all, despite the fact that the 60-day deadline for congressional approval of Libya operations came and went in May. President Obama is far from alone in finding creative ways around the War Powers Act. As the New York Times has noted, the Clinton administration continued the bombing campaign in Kosovo past the 60-day deadline, arguing that Congress had implicitly approved the mission when it approved funding for it. (The Act specifically says that funding doesn’t constitute authorization, the Times notes. And Obama wouldn’t be able to use that reasoning anyway—the administration is using existing funds for the Libya mission.) Does that mean the President is not constrained by Congress at all? Hardly. As the House notes, they still hold the power of the purse Congress—and in particular, the House of Representatives—is invested with the “power of the purse,” the ability to tax and spend public money for the national government. Let's say a President tried to start a war without Congress. They would quickly find out the military did not have funding to run the war for very long. As a result, the military would be hamstrung in operating without funds. It would not bode well for anyone to be squabbling politically while troops were deployed to a military theater, but at that point, the war would become a direct political question. If people felt the war should not be pursued, they could elect people who would refuse to fund it. If people felt the President was right, they could vote people in who would fund it. Let's finish this by talking about this hypothetical bombing of Canada. Without a good reason, the President would quickly find themselves on the losing end of public opinion (neither party would tolerate a direct act of aggression), and possibly facing impeachment. | {
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45,661 | It looks like nobody won a plurality in the latest round Benny Gantz's Kahol Lavan is ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud Party, according to official election results released on Wednesday after 91 percent of the vote was counted. The results show that neither of the parties have a clear path to securing a majority in Knesset. With 91 percent of the votes counted, Kahol Lavan has won 32 out of 120 Knesset seats, with Likud behind with 31 seats. Netanyahu's bloc, comprised of right-wing and ultra-Orthodox parties, currently stands at 55 seats. The center-left bloc has 56 seats. As diverse a group of winners as there are, what becomes of the Knesset if no coalition emerges? Is there another election to try and resolve it? | The process of forming a government in Israel (which never in its history saw a single party win an outright majority, so there were always coalition governments) is that Israel's president, after consulting with the party leaderships, nominates whoever he thinks has the best chance to form a government. That nominee has 42 days to put together a (coalition) government that would command a majority in the Knesset, which must give the nominee a formal vote of confidence before he/she becomes the new PM. If the nominee fails in that government/coalition-building endeavour, after the 42-day deadline, the president can nominate someone else to try. In April, Netanyahu failed to build a majority for a new government by the legal deadline, but he also preempted the president from nominating someone else by having the Knesset pass an act dissolving itself (the vote was 74 to 45), effectively calling snap elections. I'm not going to try to speculate how this process is going to work out in the present circumstances. | {
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45,691 | I live in a part of world where people of color represent a small minority of the population, and TBH the issue of racism is non-existent in my surrounding (or severely understated, I can't judge). Hence, my understanding is limited. I'm trying to understand what's wrong with costuming yourself as a fictional character? What exactly in the affair with the Canadian Prime minister's past is disrespectful? I've been to masquerades from childhood to college, it didn't come to me that masking as an Indian (and coloring yourself red) or Bruce Lee can be offending or racist? I will likely be in such a situation in the future, should I avoid such disguises? | Blackface has a history of being a method for expressing racial caricatures and stereotypes. It was intended to be humorous to white audiences and demeaning towards the black people being depicted. In a more modern context, using blackface demonstrates an ignorance of history and insensitivity even when not deployed with an intent to caricature. It also invokes the privilege of using a skin color when it is convenient, when others are discriminated against daily for having that same skin color. Reactions to blackface are not universal, but in the US and Canada it is considered very disrespectful. | {
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45,696 | This Business Insider article argues about homeopathic treatment being virtually banned from using NHS funding: Britain's government health system (NHS) had continued to pay for
thousands of patients to receive homeopathic treatment. But on July
21, the NHS included homeopathy in a lengthy report on items that
primary care doctors should not prescribe. That effectively bans
patients from using government funds for homeopathic treatment. I am wondering why including this kind of treatment in the NHS funding in the first place since it has failed to pass the scientific method: Glasziou looked at nearly 200 scientific studies about the
effectiveness of the regimen for 68 conditions, ranging from arthritis
to HIV. Overall, the treatment had "no discernible effect" on any of
those conditions , which led Glasziou to conclude that homeopathy was
"a therapeutic dead-end." While private individuals are free to chose their treatment, one expects a national health system to fund based on more "fact-based" approaches. Question: Why did UK NHS pay for homeopathic treatments? | Evidence based medicine really only dates from the 1980's. In the UK that era was dominated by the Thatcher government, which valued freedom of choice and decentralization. Having the NHS act more like the private sector was seen as a positive thing. Towards the end of the century the focus changed to promoting best available practice, in particular with the founding of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence in 1999. Since then, homeopathy has been in slow decline and regulatory attitude against it hardening. | {
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45,705 | There is a known treaty about full banning nuclear tests, from 1996. Many states have signed it, but not all ratified. I can understand, why, for example, DPRK haven't signed it - it is critical for their national security. We all know, that US foreign politics is oriented towards peace, and I remember some claims about fully banning nuclear weapons (from Obama times). But why has the US not ratified it, if so?
Were there some public claims about origin of this non-ratification? | Evidence based medicine really only dates from the 1980's. In the UK that era was dominated by the Thatcher government, which valued freedom of choice and decentralization. Having the NHS act more like the private sector was seen as a positive thing. Towards the end of the century the focus changed to promoting best available practice, in particular with the founding of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence in 1999. Since then, homeopathy has been in slow decline and regulatory attitude against it hardening. | {
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45,729 | As a casual German observer following the news, I wonder about the language used in the news. I gather that the current situation is that a whistle-blower from an important intelligence position has reported an incident that is deemed urgent and important. This report seems to be held secret by high government offices against well defined laws requiring to forward it. The reported incident is not public currently, but what is known is that it is about Donald Trump promising a favor to a foreign government. It seems to be that of Ukraine. Together with what is known about earlier events, it seems to be a plausible idea one could assume that Trump has made some kind of secret deal with Ukraine for personal gains. I'm surprised that the term treason is not commonly used to describe or speculate about the situation. It is certainly a big deal to use the term, and I do not see how that can be not treason. Do I misunderstand the situation, so that treason just does not apply? | In the U.S. Constitution, Article 3 Section 3 reads: Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. and in federal law treason is defined as: The offense of attempting to overthrow the government of one's country or of assisting its enemies in war; specifically: the act of levying war against the United States or adhering to or giving aid and comfort to its enemies by one who owes it allegiance. This statement explicitly limits the allowable definition of treason to be very very narrow, due to overuse of "treason" by the English. Importantly, you have to either go to war against the U.S. or aid enemies , not "merely" aid another state or act against the interests of the U.S. Therefore, there is a distinction between acts that would be reasonably described as treasonous based on a dictionary definition (for example "the betrayal of a trust" ) and those that are legally treason according to the U.S. Constitution. Merriam-Webster has a whole article on the use of the term in the U.S. context. Only one person has been tried, convicted, and executed for treason in the U.S. since the Constitution was ratified. | {
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45,800 | After the fall of the Soviet Union, many modern European states gain independence: the Baltic republics, Ukraine, Belarus. But there is something common among nearly all of them: their populations has been declining directly from the fall of the USSR up to today: Latvia , Estonia , Lithuania , Belarus , Ukraine . The population decline in Belarus is comparatively slower, but it's still declining. It seems strange, because most of those countries have now western economics, and are integrated into western structures: EU and WTO. What's the explanation for this? | Economic migration (temporary or more permanent) is considered the main factor. This is quite apparent in the Eastern EU countries. Note that the official EU terminology is "mobility" not migration, inside the Single Market. ( Source .) Bruegel has roughly the same info as a graph over time. Something a bit similar happens to Ukraine's workforce, even though they're not in the EU, but in a certain partnership. I did find some expert opinions : Eastern Europe is set to have all but one of the world’s fastest-shrinking populations over the coming decades, according to official estimates. The number of people in Bulgaria will tumble the quickest, says the United Nations, from 7.08 million now to 5.42m by 2050. A swathe of other eastern European countries will suffer a similar fate: from Latvia and Lithuania in the north to Romania and Moldova further south. Experts say falling fertility rates and economic emigration are combining to reduce the number of people in some eastern European countries. The fertility rate of European Union states has fallen from 2.6 births per woman in 1960 to 1.6 in 2015. Poland, whose population is predicted to fall by six million over the next three decades, had a fertility rate of 1.32 in 2015. It is one of the lowest levels in the European Union - only Portugal’s was smaller. It has prompted a rather drastic — if comic — remedy: the country's health ministry released a video urging its citizens to 'breed like rabbits'. Emigration has also played a major role in the falling populations. [...] This has especially been the case for the most-recent countries to join the EU, such as Bulgaria and Romania. Brussels-based economic think-tank Bruegel claimed in a recent report that the population of young people in Latvia and Lithuania dropped by up to 25% between 2008-2014 as a result of emigration. “Emigration is certainly a major factor,” Bernd Parusel, a migration expert with the European Migration Network told Euronews. “Especially young people tend to leave, to study or work in other EU member states or even farther abroad. The drop in fertility itself is probably correlated to that age profile of those who leave, i.e. the older people who stay probably aren't as likely to have as many children. If that's not convincing enough, I'll try to find some studies that actually correlate depopulation with the aforementioned processes. Some IMF researchers had a paper on this (which I found via an article in The Economist) which apportions migration effects on population growth. Alas their data only goes up to 2012 (despite the paper being published in 2016): The scale of emigration from CESEE countries since the early 1990s has been
staggering. During the past 25 years, nearly 20 million people (5½ percent of the CESEE
population) are estimated to have left the region (Figure 2). By end 2012, Southeastern Europe (SEE)
had experienced the largest outflows, amounting to about 16 percent of the early-1990s population.
Emigration has also been persistent—annually, reaching as high as ½–1 percent of the 1990s
population—and has tended to pick up following each new wave of EU expansion in 2004 (Estonia,
Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic and Slovenia), 2007 (Romania
and Bulgaria), and 2013 (Croatia). The non-EU SEE (SEE-XEU) countries have seen easing access for
their citizens for travel to Western Europe, and thus stay and work. Emigration significantly lowered population growth in sending countries, in some
cases worsening already negative demographic trends. Between 1990 and 2012, outward
migration from SEE shaved off more than 8 percentage points from cumulative population growth.
While these trends were partly offset by strong population growth in some CE-5 (CE-5 refers to the
Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovak Republic, and Slovenia) and SEE countries, emigration has
aggravated already pronounced negative demographic trends in the Baltics and some
Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries. As a result, local populations in most
countries in the region have been stagnant or shrinking. | {
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45,813 | I am curious as to why Nancy Pelosi (until 9/24/2019 17:00 EDT) seemed to be so reluctant to push for Donald Trump's impeachment. It seems that the Democratic Party is becoming increasingly outraged by what they perceive as Trump's corruption; lack of respect for the law and continued stonewalling of Congressional oversight. So, it appears that she is quite at odds with a large contingent of her party. Has Nancy Pelosi made any public statements about why she is not supporting a push for impeachment, or what line Trump would have to cross, before she would support it? The obvious answer is that she is concerned any push for impeachment would galvanize Trump's support base. But, is it that simple? What has she said? | Has Nancy Pelosi made any public statements about why she is not supporting a push for impeachment, or what line Trump would have to cross, before she would support it? On September 20, 2019, House Speaker Pelosi gave an interview to NPR, Pelosi Says Congress Should Pass New Laws So Sitting Presidents Can Be Indicted . But despite the growing chants among Democrats for an impeachment inquiry in the House, Pelosi has remained reluctant about recourse. She fears it could alienate swing voters ahead of next year's elections and imperil moderate Democrats who were critical to her party's taking back the House last November. Pelosi did not shift her position on impeachment and said Congress would continue to follow "the facts and the law." From an earlier, linked, article, Who In The House Is Calling For Impeachment? updated September 17, 2019: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., now stands apart from most of her caucus in opposing such a move, at least for now. She recently cited ongoing litigation as a reason she is not ready to advance an impeachment process. "My position has always been: Whatever decision we made [regarding impeachment] would have to be done with our strongest possible hand, and we still have some outstanding matters in the courts," Pelosi said during a news conference in July. "We have subpoenas in the courts. ... When we get that information we can make that judgment. ... This isn't endless, understand that. But we have live cases in the courts." Pelosi, who has the most influential voice in the decision whether to move forward, has repeatedly stated that she is focused on public sentiment on the issue. She also stresses the need to focus on current congressional committee investigations into Trump before considering impeachment articles. There is no line President Trump would have to cross; rather, it depends on facts and public sentiment. From What Nancy Pelosi Learned From the Clinton Impeachment , June 19, 2019: Drew Hammill, Pelosi’s deputy chief of staff, told me she was too busy to talk about her own takeaways from the Clinton impeachment. But the House speaker has hardly kept her broader views a secret, making it clear that she prefers to have the relevant House committees continue their investigations into Trump’s potential misdeeds, and pressing the courts for access to documents and witnesses as needed in the face of the White House’s stonewalling. She hasn’t totally ruled out impeachment, but unlike some of her colleagues, she has been wary to commit. “Well, it’s not off the table,” Pelosi told CNN’s Manu Raju on Wednesday. “I don’t think you should impeach for political reasons, and I don’t think you should not impeach for political reasons. It’s not about politics. It’s not about Democrats and Republicans. It’s not about partisanship. It’s about patriotism to our country.” Quotes reported after 5 PM, September 24, 2019 Pelosi launches formal Trump impeachment inquiry -- live updates , UPDATED ON: SEPTEMBER 24, 2019 / 6:40 PM / CBS NEWS: 5:43 p.m.: "I'm directing our six committees to proceed with their investigations under that umbrella of impeachment inquiry," Pelosi said in her announcement. 5:57 p.m.: Pelosi on Tuesday outlined the rationale behind her decision to launch a formal impeachment inquiry, a shift from her earlier reluctance to do so. "The president must be held accountable," she said. "No one is above the law." 6:13 p.m.: Later in the Capitol, Pelosi told reporters the Ukraine episode marked a "sea change" in how she approached the question of impeachment, and said it was a "sad day" for the country. "The president of the United States has admitted that he spoke to the president of another country -- that would be the Ukraine -- about something that would assist him in his election," she said. "So, that has changed everything." Pelosi said the inspector general's determination that the whistleblower complaint constitutes an "urgent concern" meant she "accelerated the pace of how we go forward" with the inquiry. 6:40 p.m. Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the House is launching a formal impeachment inquiry into President Trump, setting up a dramatic constitutional clash just over a year before the presidential election. "Today I'm announcing the House of Representatives is moving forward with an official impeachment inquiry," Pelosi said in a scathing statement at the Capitol late Tuesday afternoon. The speaker has long resisted calls from many progressive lawmakers to initiate impeachment proceedings against the president, but Democrats appear to have reached a breaking point over the administration's refusal to hand over a whistleblower complaint related to Mr. Trump's interaction with a foreign leader. | {
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45,845 | The First Amendment to the US Constitution reads: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the
freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people
peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of
grievances. (Emphasis Mine) Since the Amendment begins with the clause "Congress shall make no law...," does that mean the president is free to pass executive orders infringing on the specific rights enumerated? I'm reading it as as long as Congress doesn't pass the law, then violations are permissible, subject only to impeachment. | The reason this isn't a loophole is that The President doesn't have the power to make laws at all, only Congress can do that. Thanks to the vast expansion in the power of the Executive branch in recent decades, Executive Orders certainly seem like laws which The President can make on their own. Legally, though, they are actually just instructions to employees of the Executive Branch on how to interpret laws passed by Congress. So, while The President could attempt to use Executive Orders to limit Constitutional rights, the authority of that order would be rooted, however tenuously, in a law passed by Congress – and it could be found to violate the Constitution by the courts. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that all executive orders from the president of the United States must be supported by the Constitution, whether from a clause granting specific power, or by Congress delegating such to the executive branch. Specifically, such orders must be rooted in Article II of the US Constitution or enacted by the congress in statutes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_order#Basis_in_the_United_States_Constitution | {
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45,895 | Since the UK Supreme Court has ruled that the proroguing of the UK Parliament was illegal, is Boris Johnson personally culpable? Does this depend on whether the UK Parliament and its democratic representatives reconvene themselves? If it is reliant on their reconvening, does the criminality or non-criminality of Boris Johnson or other related parties depend on who took what action, and when and why? Details very useful here. | IANAL, but probably the only thing he could be charged with is misconduct in public office . I haven't seen anyone suggest that he should be charged (for this, this time). The charge does not require one to break some explicit statute. It also applies "where there is no relevant statutory offence, but the behaviour or the circumstances are such that they should nevertheless be treated as criminal". The criteria are: a public officer acting as such; wilfully neglects to perform his duty and/or wilfully misconducts himself; to such a degree as to amount to an abuse of the public's trust in the office holder; without reasonable excuse or justification. However, last time Johnson was charged with this offence, by a private prosecutor, and for some political statements, it failed fairly quickly, when the granting of summons was appealed to the High Court. Of course, the circumstances this time involve more than a statement, but insofar I haven't seen suggestions that he should be charged. I don't know if the following argument meets all the legal criteria to be a good defence, but conceptually at least, the fact that the High Court of England ruled in favor of Johnson's government, could be used as an argument that "hey, it wasn't obviously unlawful before the Supreme Court decided so", i.e. this could be a valid excuse under bullet #4 from the criteria above. | {
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45,914 | A couple of days ago, the UK Supreme Court ruled that Boris Johnson's advice to the Queen, which led to the prorogation of Parliament for 5 weeks ahead of the October 31st Brexit date, was unlawful. Therefore, the prorogation has been cancelled and Parliament has been recalled. However, my understanding (which may be incorrect) is that the act of proroguing Parliament is a royal prerogative power of the monarch. Although, they are supposed to take guidance on the matter from their Government. So, does that mean, at least in theory, that the Queen could overrule the Supreme Court's decision to cancel the prorogation, by citing her royal prerogative. Essentially: "Yes, the advice given to me may have been unlawful, but I still want Parliament prorogued anyway." | No. I suggest the best source for this is probably the ruling of the Supreme Court itself . I'd encourage you to read it in full - it's not long and surprisingly readable. The legal argument the Court made starts by establishing that courts have the right to limit the use of the Royal Prerogative (for example, see paragraph 32). It further establishes that such limits also apply to prorogation (see, for example, paragraphs 41-44). It then moves on to discuss where exactly the limit on the power of prorogation is, finding in Paragraph 50 that: a decision to prorogue Parliament (or to advise the monarch to prorogue Parliament) will be unlawful if the prorogation has the effect of frustrating or preventing, without reasonable justification, the ability of Parliament to carry out its constitutional functions as a legislature and as the body responsible for the supervision of the executive. In such a situation, the court will intervene if the effect is sufficiently serious to justify such an exceptional course. The Queen is as bound by this as the Prime Minister. (In case of any doubt, note that I am not a lawyer. I probably don't need to say that, but I feel better saying it just in case.) | {
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45,918 | By attempting to impeach Trump, Democrats will accomplish either of two things. They will succeed in removing him from office. Mike Pence takes over. A career politician, well liked by conservatives, and somebody who will take on the 2020 elections with confidence. At this point, one must wonder whether facing Trump in the 2020 elections is the better choice than facing Pence... They will fail in impeaching him, thus serving Trump yet another victory, and possibly giving him a boost for the 2020 elections. It's a lose-lose situation, it seems. So what is there to gain politically for the Democrats here? | "What is accomplished" depends on whether you look at impeachment as a process that is strictly evaluated on partisan political gain, or whether you view it under its intended framework - as a tool for a co-equal branch of government to rein in potential abuses by the Executive Branch. If the President has committed abuses of the powers of office, removing him upholds the oath of office and duty to the Constitution that every Congressional member swore when taking office. It reins in, punishes and discourages future abuses of office. Whether that helps them or not in the next election should be secondary considerations for public servants who pretend to be statesmen/women. Sadly, it isn't, but that is how it is supposed to be, so questioning the value is to question the fundamental design of our democratic institution of divided, co-equal branches of government checking and balancing each other. At the very least, if you think the party leadership is only interested in selfish, short-term gain, then consider the backlash among the voters who want their government to serve them, if they sit back and do nothing in response to a growing pile of abuses, because "it will help us win the next election." Voter enthusiasm for one's party is what drives turnout. If you are viewed as intentionally enabling the "evildoers," you lose the ability to be seen as an alternative in the eyes of the voters - you're just a different aspect of the problem. It may be that Pelosi feels she has no choice but to act. Or, as pointed out in discussion at the original question, if there is the recognition of a major political component to the impeachment process, the delay could be the by-product of waiting until conditions were better for successful action - a critical mass of evidence combined with a critical mass of public sentiment. In which case the political calculation serves the higher ideals of duty to democratic principles. {thanks given to Andrew for laying a lot of this out}. | {
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45,953 | Background 2019-07-25 US President Donald Trump had a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that is central to the recent Trump–Ukraine controversy . 2019-09-24 Nancy Pelosi , the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, initiated an impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump . As I understand it, this was triggered by recent news about the Trump–Ukraine controversy. 2019-09-25 The Trump administration released a "memorandum of telephone conversation" (PDF) , described by some as a " rough transcript " of the 2019-07-25 phone call. Kerri Kupec, US Department of Justice (DOJ) spokesperson, stated : Relying on established procedures set forth in the Justice Manual, the Department’s Criminal Division reviewed the official record of the call and determined, based on the facts and applicable law, that there was no campaign finance violation and that no further action was warranted. All relevant components of the Department agreed with this legal conclusion, and the Department has concluded the matter. Questions Does the DOJ's declining to investigate the 2019-07-25 phone call between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky mean that Trump didn't break the law in the phone call? Does the DOJ's statement debase the impeachment inquiry against Donald Trump? Please understand that I'm not trying to make a political statement either way. Instead, I'm interested in the political dynamics involved, much like watching a game of chess. This seems like an interesting topic, especially as the story is quickly developing. | Please, understand me in a right way - I'm not position myself as pro-Trump/pro-democrat - it is inner deals of foreign country for me, like a chess party. But this is just interesting question, I think - as things start going fast. Given this, I’m going to take a step back here and look at a fundamental underlying question here: Does [anything at all] ruin the basis for impeachment? DOJ rejected to start an investigation on it. This means (as I presume), that there was no law breaking [...]. Am I right? Impeachment and the following Senate deliberation looks a lot like a court trial—there’s investigations, witnesses examined by prosecutors and cross-examined by defense attorneys, there’s a jury is deciding whether or not someone has done something wrong and if so what the punishment for that should be, and so on. Impeachment itself is very analogous to indictment, and then the Senate sits to determine something quite like conviction. It is very much like a trial. And the Department of Justice is, in general, in charge of prosecuting federal crimes, that is, taking them to trial. But impeachment is fundamentally not a trial. In a trial, there are extremely specific and exacting rules to follow, governing procedure, evidence, witnesses, the burden of proof, and sentencing. Learning all of that takes years of schooling. The rules for impeachment, on the other hand, are just these: The House of Representatives ... shall have the sole Power of Impeachment. — Article I, Section 2, Clause 5 of the United States Constitution The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two-thirds of the Members present. Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States; but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law. —Article I, Section 3, Clauses 6 and 7 of the United States Constitution [The President] ... shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment. —Article II, Section 2 of the United States Constitution The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors. —Article II, Section 4 of the United States Constitution That’s it , the entire thing. Impeachment is reserved for cases of “Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors,” the House does the impeaching, the Senate tries the president (or other officer) for the charges they were impeached on, and if two-thirds of them agree, the only things the Senate can sentence them to are losing their office and/or losing the privilege to seek another office in the future. There are no rules beyond these. Two points in particular make the proceedings very much not a trial: The House doesn’t impeach over the violation of a criminal statute. The word “misdemeanor” meant, in the founding fathers’ day, wrongdoing not explicitly made illegal, either because it was less bad or because it was so bad that it could not be handled by a simple law (hence the impeachment proceedings in the latter case, a “high misdemeanor”). That means that “high Crimes and Misdemeanors” can include behavior that isn’t actually illegal. Instead, “high Crimes and Misdemeanors” refers to abuse of power and position, whether it is explicitly illegal or not. The purpose of impeachment is to protect the country, not to achieve justice. The Senate does not convict anyone of a crime, and does not impose any criminal sentence: no fine or imprisonment or execution. The Constitution explicitly notes that any criminal trial relating to the “high Crimes and Misdemeanors” occurs after the officer is removed. In the United States, no one can be tried for the same thing twice—but an officer removed via impeachment can still be tried, because they have not been tried at all yet. The impeachment proceedings didn’t count because they were not a trial. And it is precisely because impeachment is not a trial, and is instead a check on the power of the executive branch, that things are left wholly open-ended. The founding fathers wanted the ultimate authority to lie with the legislature—arguably the branch they trusted the most. This open-endedness would be a hideous miscarriage of justice in the case of a civil or criminal trial. Much of the rules regarding procedure, witnesses and evidence, and particularly the burden of proof are there to protect the defendant and their rights. An impeached president does not get such protections—because they are not defending their freedom, that is, their right to not be in prison, but rather they are defending their fitness to continue holding the privilege of serving as the president of the United States. The United States holds that everyone in the entire world is “innocent until proven guilty.” It does not hold that everyone in the world is fit for the presidency until proven guilty. Likewise, criminal trials demand that the defendant be found guilty “beyond a reasonable doubt” before any sentence is applied. The Constitution doesn’t demand anything of Congress when impeaching an officer—one of the founding fathers, Benjamin Franklin, famously stated that impeachment was there in case a president has “rendered himself obnoxious,” which is a rather low standard, all things considered (even if the word “obnoxious” was stronger in his day than it is now). To my mind, it’s not at all unreasonable to expect that the president be “ innocent beyond a reasonable doubt” of something like, say, disloyalty. If there is any reasonable suspicion that a president might be acting in the interests of a hostile foreign power and in opposition to the USA’s own interests, well, that person shouldn’t be trusted with nuclear launch codes. Whether Congress agrees with me on that or not, the Constitution allows them to set any standard they feel is appropriate. In summary, the Constitution gave the ultimate power to decide when and why to remove someone from the presidency to Congress, and left it entirely up to them to decide, because Congress is supposed to be the will of the people. If it is, then it should have that power: the people put the president there, so the people (or, in this case, the people’s representatives) should be able to rescind that if it becomes necessary. If Congress doesn’t actually represent the will of the people, then none of it matters because the government as a whole doesn’t work. In many ways, the Constitution was an experiment at the time, but at the end of the day they put their faith behind it. The Department of Justice, in contrast, is just how the government of the United States has chosen to organize the executive branch’s lawyers and delegate the executive branch’s authority and responsibility to conduct civil and criminal trials. The concerns of laws, “regular” crimes and misdemeanors. “High crimes and misdemeanors” are way, way above their pay-grade, so to speak. Indeed, Department of Justice regulations bars their prosecutors from indicting a sitting president—in their view, that is Congress’s job, via impeachment, and it is beyond their authority to do so. After all, the Department of Justice derives all of its authority from the executive branch’s delegation, and the impeachment of presidents isn’t an authority the executive branch has to delegate—that authority is with Congress. | {
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45,993 | When talking about impeaching Trump, everyone mentions a whistleblower. I am under the impression that this means that who he is is not public information.
If he knew such sensitive information, was he required by law to turn it over? | At the very least there is an ethical obligation to report. Standards of Ethical Conduct for Employees of the Executive Branch : § 2635.101 Basic obligation of public service. (b) General principles. The following general principles apply to every employee and may form the basis for the standards contained in this part. (11) Employees shall disclose waste, fraud, abuse, and corruption to appropriate authorities. However, there is, apparently, no legal requirement, except for certain individuals. (Note that the following applies to felonies.) In the article Misprision of felony , specifically: United States federal law : "Misprision of felony" is still an offense under United States federal law after being codified in 1909 under 18 U.S.C. § 4 : Whoever, having knowledge of the actual commission of a felony cognizable by a court of the United States, conceals and does not as soon as possible make known the same to some judge or other person in civil or military authority under the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both. This offense, however, requires active concealment of a known felony rather than merely failing to report it. ... The federal misprision of felony statute is usually used only in prosecutions against defendants who have a special duty to report a crime, such as a government official. It appears that, if the whistleblower is a government official, there is a legal obligation to report; otherwise, no. Additional information - Employees of the Intelligence Community. (This relates to matters of urgent concern .) § 8H. Additional provisions with respect to Inspectors General of the Intelligence Community (a) (1) (A) An employee of the Defense Intelligence Agency, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, or the National Security Agency, or of a contractor of any of those Agencies, who intends to report to Congress a complaint or information with respect to an urgent concern may report the complaint or information to the Inspector General of the Department of Defense (or designee). (B) An employee of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, or of a contractor of the Bureau, who intends to report to Congress a complaint or information with respect to an urgent concern may report the complaint or information to the Inspector General of the Department of Justice (or designee). (C) Any other employee of, or contractor to, an executive agency, or element or unit thereof, determined by the President under section 2302 (a)(2)(C)(ii) of title 5, United States Code, to have as its principal function the conduct of foreign intelligence or counterintelligence activities, who intends to report to Congress a complaint or information with respect to an urgent concern may report the complaint or information to the appropriate Inspector General (or designee) under this Act or section 17 of the Central Intelligence Agency Act of 1949 [50 U.S.C. 403q]. [Emphasis added.] For employees of the Intelligence Community, reporting is not legally required. | {
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46,069 | According to fivethirtyeight.com , Donald Trump's popularity seems to be rather constant over time, in contrast to his predecessors Barack Obama and George W. Bush who suffered a popularity erosion quicker than the current president. How has he managed to keep his popularity so consistent over time? This article suggests that being more intuitive than analytical is an important factor in explaining his popularity: A study published in the journal Translational Issues in Psychological
Science suggests that Donald Trump stands out amongst other
politicians, including fellow Republicans and past presidents, as
being exceptionally low in "analytic thinking." However, this is only one dimension and I sense there are multiple factors that helps him to remain popular. Question: How has Donald Trump managed to keep his approval levels so consistent? I am particularly interested in articles or studies that provide more insight into this. | It's actually surprisingly hard to find surveys that also ask the "why" question of the supporters. I did find one on-line survey by "SurveyMonkey", although I'm not sure of its reliability; even the date is unclear. It used open ended questions. a large majority of Republicans (85%) approve of the job Trump is doing as president. When asked why, they highlight that he has “kept promises” made during the campaign, “put America first,” “tried to get things done,” and “reversed the last eight years” of Obama administration policies. Many respondents cite specific campaign slogans (“MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!” in some form or another is used by about 8% of all respondents) in their responses. As the chart above shows, college grads tend to zero in on more tangible goals (top mentioned topic was “reduced regulations”) whereas those without college degrees focus on vaguer ambitions like “making America great again.” Many college grads applaud Trump for “reinvigorating the economy” by removing “intrusive” regulations on business that do more harm than good. This group also advocates another time-tested Trumpism: “Draining the Swamp.” However, the college grads who cited this reason for approving of Trump also acknowledged that while Trump is “trying” to drain the swamp and accomplish his other campaign promises, he is “being blocked by others,” including both Democrats and members of his own party. One topic that emerged equally from non-college grads and college grads was the feeling that while Trump has “good positions,” he also has a “flawed personality” that does not lend itself to effective communicating or strategizing. On the other hand, those with less than a college degree praise Trump using some of his more amorphous campaign slogans: “Making America Great Again” and “Putting America First.” These supporters also appreciate Trump for his plain-speaking (“Tells it like it is”) and for the fact that he is “doing his best” despite facing adversity. There is one Pew "thermometer" survey of Trump supporters, which does seem to show that Trump has not disappointed much his base, and on the contrary those who voted for him while being skeptical have warmed up to Trump in the aftermath. It's harder to say why this happened, just from that survey. Where they happy with his policies, and which ones in particular? Or has he become more likeable for another, less direct reason, like the economy doing well? (Of course Trump draws a direct and immediate connection between the two, but let's not get into that here. In general a US president's approval rating is tied to the stock market .) Fivethirtyeight has managed to point to one event that apparently did impact (or at least correlated) with a noticeable change in Trump's approval, namely the government shutdown from last winter. But after that shutdown ended, Trump's rating recovered and has been more or less stable since. So from that at least it looks like there was not much popular reaction to the Mueller report this spring. (That article is from Sep 13, so before the Ukraine/impeachment event, it's probably too early to tell how [much] this is going to affect Trump approval.) Another interesting issue is that Trump's approval rating is "underperforming" the popular perception of the economy (doing well). In contrast, there was a narrower difference between Obama's approval rating and the perception of the economy in his time. But Trump's approval rating just on his "handling" of the economy is actually better than his overall job approval rating. Finally, there are a lot of papers that try to profile his supporters in one aspect or another, but that's perhaps too long to go over here. But out of all that work, I did like a 2017 study that identified/clustered four major profiles for Trump voters. You can use their priorities expressed in the graph below to cross-check how some of Trump's later executive actions satisfied one group or another in this electoral alliance of sorts. E.g. tax cuts satisfied some groups, deportations satisfied others, and Trump's climate-change position(s) apparently satisfied all. (Alas there's no follow-up study, like for example determining for each of these groups how much they liked Trump then and now/later.) | {
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46,119 | I am reading this article. Therein it is stated that: Under national security grounds (Section 232), Trump applied tariffs of 25% on steel and 10% on aluminium in March 2018, covering $ 10.2 bn and $ 7.7 bn of US steel and aluminium imports, respectively The paper further explains: Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 gives authority to impose or increase tariffs on imports that are thought to threaten national security It might be due to my complete unfamiliarity with the subject, but I fail to see any connection. How do Mr. Trump and other adherents of this policy reason that steel Imports threaten national security? | By allowing the import of steel, you encourage the dissolution through insolvency of native steel firms (because they often struggle to compete economically with imported steel). This means that you now rely on imported steel for things like tanks and what have you. During times of conflict, there's now the risk that your enemy will cut your supply chains through either use of force or diplomatic pressure and render you incapable of building those machines which are vital for national defence. If you maintain the native capacity to fill those requirements, you are at significantly less risk of being rendered suddenly incapable to build war material. Note that the other metal targeted here, aluminium, is used heavily in the construction of aircraft and naval vessels. While I don't know whether this argument was actually advanced by President Trump, it is one that I have heard for considering steel industry as vital to national security. | {
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46,195 | According to latest Brexit news, UK is offering a 'compromise' to EU . An article on Bloomberg quotes the British PM as saying “I hope very much that our friends understand that and compromise in
their turn,” Johnson told his audience in Manchester, northern
England, on Wednesday. But so far one of the greatest roadblocks to an agreement has been the internal disagreements in UK parliament about what kind of agreement is acceptable. So from that perspective it looks like the PM should probably present this latest compromise to his own parliament first and get an agreement from them. But it seems that the approach now is for the UK government to bypass the parliament and negotiate only with the EU in a take-it-or-leave-it fashion. This article quoted a senior British government official as saying: The EU is obliged by EU law only to negotiate with member state
governments, they cannot negotiate with parliament, and this
government will not negotiate delay. Question: Can the UK PM legally bypass the parliament when making a decision with EU based on the reason that "EU is obliged to negotiate directly with the UK government"? | He can negotiate and sign agreements without involving parliament yes, but Parliament will need to ratify the agreement once signed for it to come into force. So far he's negotiating with the EU just as Theresa May did. Once his negotiations were complete and an agreement was signed, it would then need to be brought to Parliament. In May's case she managed to negotiate and signed an agreement with the EU, but in her case Parliament refused to ratify it. Whether it's wise for him to present negotiating points when he has no idea whether or not Parliament will ratify them is another matter, but he can certainly legally do it. | {
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46,206 | Why is it considered a crime if you lie while testifying before Congress, but Representatives seem to be able to say whatever they want without repercussions? | Why Lying to Congress is a Crime Congress needs to be able to investigate to be able to properly draft legislation. One of the most important nonlegislative functions of the Congress is the power to investigate. This power is usually delegated to committees -- either the standing committees, special committees set up for a specific purpose, or joint committees composed of members of both houses. Investigations are conducted to gather information on the need for future legislation, to test the effectiveness of laws already passed, to inquire into the qualifications and performance of members and officials of the other branches, and on rare occasions, to lay the groundwork for impeachment proceedings. Frequently, committees call on outside experts to assist in conducting investigative hearings and to make detailed studies of issues. And lying in effect nullifies or thwarts the power of investigation. In in effect defeats this special purpose. The investigative power of Congress is extended to impeachment proceedings as well. Why Can Congressmen Lie? Because of Article 1, Section 6, the Free Speech and Debate Clause of the Constitution. They [ed note: Congressmen] shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place. Jim Wilson, one of the Constitutional Framers, put it this way: In order to enable and encourage a representative of the publick to discharge his publick trust with firmness and success, it is indispensably necessary, that he should enjoy the fullest liberty of speech, and that he should be protected from the resentment of every one, however powerful, to whom the exercise of that liberty may occasion offence. Lecture on Law (1791). A good contemporary summary: The speech or debate clause is a clause in the U.S Constitution protects members of Congress from prosecution for any speech or debate in the House, other than treason, breach of peace, or felony. The protection of this clause is not limited to words spoken in debate. Its protection extends to committee reports, resolutions, and the act of voting, and any things generally done in a session of the House by one of its members in relation to the business before it. Thus, so long as legislators are ''acting in the sphere of legitimate legislative activity,'' they are protected not only from the consequence of litigation's results but also from the burden of defending themselves. The protection allows the legislators to do their job without fear of blowback or retribution from the executive mostly, and from individuals with agendas. It promotes the separation of powers and ensures an open forum and safe space for Congressmen. It is very close to absolute, even if the Congressmen is committing a crime while in the process of legislating. (Continuation from the Wilson link above.) If a Member's actions meet the "legislative process" test, his immunity is absolute; and that is so even if he has acted contrary to law. Accordingly, although the government may prosecute a Member for a criminal act, such as accepting a bribe, it may not pursue the case if proof of the crime "depend[s] on his legislative acts or his motive for performing them." United States v. Brewster. In Eastland , the Supreme Court acknowledged that the clause may shield Members from civil or criminal liability "even though their conduct, if performed in other than legislative contexts, would in itself be unconstitutional or otherwise contrary to criminal or civil statutes." The risk of such abuse, however, "was the conscious choice of the Framers' buttressed and justified by history." Errant Members nevertheless remain subject to disciplinary action by their respective Houses for "disorderly behavior"—and, of course, by their constituents on Election Day. | {
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46,314 | I have just read a tiny fraction of a huge amount of content generated by the apparent abusive dismissal of an important moderator from the Stack Exchange network. An answer that tries to explain one of the main reasons behind all this includes this: Cultural Background: In the United States there has been a push to use
gender-neutral language and gender pronouns when given. This topic has created quite a storm across the network and a lot of moderators resigned or took similar actions . I am wondering if this "push" is also important in the US politics. Question: In the United States, has there been a push to use gender-neutral language and gender pronouns when a person expresses a preference for a particular third-person pronoun to use to refer to her/him/them? | Yes, but as a small part of the larger US culture wars The push to use gender neutral pronouns, or to insist that people must use the pronouns that they are explicitly told to use or face ostracism and/or criminal penalty, is an extremely recent phenomenon. The recentness of this is primarily a result of the broader LGBT movement successfully making gay marriage legal. Any given movement with an interest in shaping public policy usually starts by trying to pass the most broadly popular policy changes first and work their way down the list as they accomplish things, simply because the more popular things are easier to do. Legalizing gay marriage was the higest policy priority of the LGBT movement in the United States between 2003 and 2015, and with that being legal, there is now greater focus on the issues of transgender people among activists and people who care about these issues. It is hard to quantify exactly how "important" this particular push is, especially because there are multiple ways to say if and how something is "important." But it is certainly gaining in importance; 5+ years ago there was very little attention paid to transgender issues outside of the people who care the most about it. One thing that is certain though, is that support for these issues is not uniform across the entire United States. Support for these issues tends to be highest among affluent, educated white suburban and urbanites. Thus, it is part of the larger "culture war" that goes on in America between those people and their opposites on the other side of the aisle. That "culture war" is, unfortunately, rather important, as it explains a lot of recent dysfunction in US politics. One of the most important one being the insistence that everyone must be in one political tribe or another, as well as insistence on agreeing with every aspect of that tribe's agenda. EDIT: The other answers have suggested that there is no "push" here, that there is nothing new about gender-neutral language, and that this is all really a question of evolving standards of common courtesy. I think that misses what is novel about current political efforts, which is that there is a new belief (not necessarily shared by everyone it is claimed to help) that it is desirable or necessary to punish people who get pronouns wrong or otherwise misgender someone in order to provide safety. "Punish" meaning, to be fired from a job, get fined, be jailed, or in the case that prompted the question, lose Stack Exchange moderator status. | {
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46,322 | It appears that the UK will indeed ask for another extension in the Brexit process, as mandated by the Benn act. But what is the purpose of asking for another extension? Does Parliament expect the EU to budge in terms of finalizing a better exit deal? Or do they hope to get more time for an orderly no-deal exit? I'm primarily interested in the official position of MPs voting for the Benn act. | The Parliament doesn't have a single opinion. It probably has 650 different opinions (perhaps more!). Individual members may be hoping to achieve different things by an extension: Strong remainers, such as Jo Swinson, are hoping that the UK will eventually have to retract its article 50 request, and remain in the EU. Requesting another extension is the first step towards this. Some want to get Theresa May's agreement passed, though most supporters of May's agreement voted against the Benn Act (party loyalty still counts for something). Others, perhaps including Philip Hammond and Nicholas Soames, are hoping that the government will be forced to negotiate a much closer relationship with Europe, including membership of the Single Market. Others are principally hoping to cause Boris Johnson's government to fail and to benefit in the election that would ultimately follow. This probably includes Jeremy Corbyn. Unlike a government, individual MPs don't have an "official position". | {
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46,384 | Why is it such a big deal that President Trump has not released his tax returns? Also, why would he make such a big deal about not releasing them, given that this just makes everyone more interested? | There's a whole wikipedia article on the topic . In a nutshell, he has been the first major party nominee since 1976 not to make his tax returns public. And he did not release them in spite of promising during the campaign that he would. When he reneged on the promise, he put forward that they were complex enough that lay people wouldn't understand them or something to that effect if memory serves me well. He also purported that he couldn't release them because they were being audited -- but that doesn't actually preclude releasing them. US voters care about this, and rightly so. There's the matter of transparency for starters. More importantly, it's the only way to know whether Trump was profiteering while holding his office. Incidentally, and contrary to what usually happens, Trump refused to divest from his business while president. One consequence of this is that foreign dignitaries stay at Trump properties to try to get favors from or access to Trump. (See the call transcript that ended up at the center of Trump's impeachment investigation among many , many other stories .) Further contributing to the poor optics of the situation, Trump asked McConnell to prioritize confirmation of the IRS counsel early in his presidency. Desmond, his nominee, had briefly advised the Trump Organization on tax issues before Trump took office. At this point the most charitable explanation is that Trump is not as wealthy as he claims to be and is withholding the returns to protect his ego. The less charitable one is that there might be a few rats in the returns that he'd rather keep away from public scrutiny. Lending further credence to the latter, a whistleblower brought attention to possible improper " efforts to influence " the mandatory IRS audits of Trump's (or Pence's) tax returns. | {
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46,415 | Does the US require a House vote to begin an impeachment inquiry? News sources such as this CNN article seem to show a disagreement between the White House saying that a House vote is required, while the Speaker of the House holds that they have the power to declare one on their own. | Some answers look at whether there is a historical precedent. That is irrelevant. The question is what is required and what is not. There is no current requirement that a resolution be voted on by the House in order to initiate a formal, official impeachment inquiry. If a president were caught by eye-witnesses and on video performing blood sacrifices of infants in the Lincoln Bedroom, surely it would be unprecedented to remove a President from office for those actions. The fact that it was unprecedented would really have no bearing on whether such actions should proceed or whether they were authorized. The Constitution doesn’t offer specific guidance on rules for impeachment inquiries and the House determines its own rules of parliamentary conduct. According to the CRS (Congressional Research Service), the House’s rules allow for an impeachment inquiry to go forward without an initial resolution but the matter would move on the Judiciary Committee at some point. National Constitution Center: The House’s role in the impeachment inquiry process and Congressional Research Service: The Impeachment Process in the House of
Representatives (referenced in the previous link) As pointed out in a since-deleted answer, part of why, historically, the process of an authorizing resolution was followed, in part, was because that authorizing resolution would create the authorization for subpoena and other investigative powers. Those powers now exist with the House majority on a permanent basis. One of the main reasons why the precedent was to go via resolution no longer exists. In addition, Pelosi doesn't need the House vote authorizing an inquiry because her caucus already has extra legal authority compared to past inquiries. During the Clinton and Nixon impeachment inquiries, the House passed their inquiry resolutions so they could gain tools like more subpoena power and depositions, and included in those resolutions were nods to bipartisanship that gave the minority party subpoena power, too. But the House rules have changed since the last impeachment of a president more than two decades ago. In this Congress, the House majority already has unilateral subpoena power, a rule change that was made when Republicans last controlled the House, so Democrats don't need to pass any resolution to grant those powers. CNN: Why Democrats aren't planning to vote on an impeachment inquiry | {
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46,456 | As a German, it seems to me that No Deal Brexit without preparations would hurt so much that it makes no sense to prefer it. That is so clear that it should be the case for any conceivable expectation for what happens. It makes sense that a participant in the negotiations of the kind of Brexit states he wants No Deal Brexit for strategic reasons as part of the negotiation. But I would not understand that anybody honestly wants a No Deal Brexit as the result. Note the term "honest" is not used as a rhetorical filler word or so, it is actually about honesty. Again, I assume the results of No Deal without preparations are so bad in both short and long term in any conceivable future that it is bad in an objective way. My political views should not be relevant here. I excluded anything political to reach the assumption about the severity. Are there participants expecting No Deal to have a better outcome than any other options ?
Even if it is only better for the person itself (Which may or may not be malicious)? The question is not whether somebody has publicly stated he wants No Deal, but whether somebody actually think No Deal is the best option. This person probably also has stated it publicly. Alternatively, it would be interesting if somebody would choose No Deal as backup option. But it may not be deeply reflected what it means if it is a backup, and less relevant. | There are various reasons to prefer an exit without a deal. They can be broadly divided into ideological reasons, and pragmatic reasons. Pragmatic Reasons It is possible to make money from the decline of an economy. By shorting sterling and shares in UK businesses, some people could enrich themselves. There are also those who seek to use the divergence from European standards to roll back the rights and protections of workers, and to produce goods more cheaply. They are betting that the damage done by a no deal brexit would be less than the opportunities created by this divergence in standards and regulation. Some people also believe (correctly or incorrectly) that Britain will be in a better negotiating position once it has left the EU, so they support a sort of "no deal for now". In the same vein, some people simply think the economic damage is overstated, and that Britain will flourish under such conditions. Ideological Reasons There is a contingent in the UK that sincerely believes that, given the result of the 2016 referendum, the country has a moral obligation to leave the EU as soon as possible. If one also believes that staying in the single market or customs union wouldn't really be leaving, and that any potential deal which divides the UK in any way is unacceptable, there are really no options other than leaving without a deal. Their belief really is that despite the economic damage, to preserve faith in democracy and the Union, we must leave. Of course, all these reasons can be mixed and matched and used to justify one another - but it is certain there are both malicious and benign reasons to support this position. It is therefore difficult to say with any certainty whether any of the politicians advocating for this course of action (such as Boris Johnson, Nigel Farage and many others) have malicious intentions. One can certainly accuse them of that, but they have many good justifications with which to defend themselves, and without reading their minds, we cannot say whether they are telling the truth. What we do have are their public statements, which naturally skew toward the arguments that are politically acceptable. | {
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46,475 | I'm wondering why the news media focuses on the problem of whether or not Adam Schiff talked to the whistleblower before filing the complaint or not such as this . I would appreciate it if somebody could explain it. | On Trump-leaning side of the media, it's taken as evidence of some big Democratic conspiracy to bring down Trump. Trump himself claimed that Schiff "helped write" the whistleblower's complaint. This has been repeated by pro-Trump media personalities like Tucker Carlson, although even Carlson only presented the collaborative writing bit as "credible rumours"; but Carlson nevertheless claimed that Schiff "orchestrated" the whole thing "in secret". Similarly, Hannity said that the impeachment effort was "totally based on the whistleblower complaint that the shifty Schiff himself had a hand in creating, clearly." (Carlson and Hannity are two Fox News hosts/personalities with a big audience.) On the other side, it was more of an issue that Schiff wasn't exactly transparent about those contacts, at least initially. And that was seen as a problem because procedural issues can provide ammunition to the pro-Trump side. As CNN put it for Schiff, there is no room for error. Every move he makes, every word he utters, is scrutinized by Republicans and combed for mistakes -- however minor. | {
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46,506 | The result of gerrymandering is a set of voting districts that are not representative of the overall ideology of a larger region. Gerrymandering refers specifically to obtaining that result by redrawing district boundaries, but do we have a word to describe this result , whether achieved through redistricting or not? For example, the United States Senate has two votes from every state, regardless of population. Since Republicans tend to dominate in rural and suburban areas, and the number of states dominated by rural and suburban areas is more than the number of states dominated by urban centers, and states with urban centers tend to have higher populations, the Senate is functionally gerrymandered, but not by virtue of redrawing state boundaries. The ideological makeup of the Senate leans more to the right than the overall US population does. But it wouldn't be appropriate to call it gerrymandering, since state boundaries are essentially fixed. Is there any terminology that is already in the literature or in public discourse for the result I'm describing or the means of achieving this result without redistricting? | "Disproportionate representation" describes the result without making any reference to the cause. For example, States have disproportionate representation in the Senate is a perfectly reasonable description. If you want to be more specific as to what kind of proportionality you're talking about, you could specify with States have disproportionate representation in the Senate relative to population. | {
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46,551 | This other question asks whether the House requires a vote to begin an impeachment inquiry, but several of the answers (including the accepted one) point out that the rules have changed since Clinton's impeachment, and thus a vote by the whole House is no longer required. However, I don't see a what or why for those rule changes. Aside from the expiry of the position of Independent Counsel , what House rule(s) have changed to permit an inquiry-without-vote? When were they changed, and what reasons (if any) were cited for doing so at the time? | As the answers in Does the US require a House vote to begin an impeachment inquiry? point out, House rules never required a vote to start an impeachment inquiry. In both previous impeachments, however, the House did pass an inquiry resolution in order to give themselves additional subpoena power in order to better carry out the inquiry. This is not necessary now, however, as House rules already give the majority unilateral subpoena power. CNN states that this actually dates from rule changes made by the previous Republican controlled House: In addition, Pelosi doesn't need the House vote authorizing an inquiry because her caucus already has extra legal authority compared to past inquiries. During the Clinton and Nixon impeachment inquiries, the House passed their inquiry resolutions so they could gain tools like more subpoena power and depositions, and included in those resolutions were nods to bipartisanship that gave the minority party subpoena power, too. But the House rules have changed since the last impeachment of a president more than two decades ago. In this Congress, the House majority already has unilateral subpoena power, a rule change that was made when Republicans last controlled the House , so Democrats don't need to pass any resolution to grant those powers. https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/08/politics/nancy-pelosi-letter-impeachment/index.html An article on Lawfare provides more detail on the specific rule changes involved: What Powers Does a Formal Impeachment Inquiry Give the House? The impeachment proceedings against both Presidents Nixon and Clinton began with a vote by the full House of Representatives ... In both cases, the resolution granted several specific powers to the committee for it to use in the course of completing the investigation with which it was charged by the full House. ... until recent years, unilateral subpoena power was relatively rare for House committee chairs. But between the 113th and 114th Congresses, the number of chairs given this power by their committees doubled —and the judiciary committee was among them. The judiciary committee chair retains this authority in the current Congress; its rules stipulate that “a subpoena may be authorized and issued by the Chairman … following consultation with the Ranking Minority Member.” ... Under practices in place in 1974 and 1998, deposition power for committee staff was periodically authorized by the full House for the purpose of specific investigations. ... Since 1998, however, the rules of the House governing staff depositions have evolved to give committees access to the tool more regularly. In 2007, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform was given the ability to set its own rules “ authorizing and regulating the taking of depositions by a member or counsel of the committee .” ... In 2017, the rule permitting staff depositions was extended to cover almost all standing committees , and the member attendance requirement was modified such that it did not apply if the committee authorized the staff deposition to take place when the House was not in session. ... So the judiciary committee already has the power to conduct staff depositions and does not need a special grant of authority to do so. | {
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46,571 | Wikipedia defnes liberalism as follows: Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on liberty, consent of the governed, and equality before the law. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but they generally support limited government, individual rights (including civil rights and human rights), capitalism (free markets), democracy, secularism, gender equality, racial equality, internationalism, freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom of religion . However, the word liberalism can mean many things, it seems. If I understand correctly, classical liberalism is essentially libertarianism , which includes a strong focus on limiting government in all variations. I've also seen liberalism used to describe left-wing politics (like using liberal-conservative in place of left-right ), which some people criticize for fighting against freedom of speech, which is a prominent part of the above definition of liberalism. Is there an unambiguous term that describes a philosophy with a strong focus on individual rights, equality of opportunity and freedoms, that is also centrist on the socialism vs. capitalism spectrum? P. S. I live in Russia and have no political education, so my perception of language and politics may be incorrect. Here in Russia, liberalism is synonymous with anti-Putin , it seems sometimes, which is yet another problem with colloquial usage. | This all resolves if you realise that the term sought is: liberalism ! The linked Wiki page makes no mention of liberalism being a leftist thing. liberalism (n.) "liberal principles," especially the political principles of a liberal party, 1819, from liberal (adj.) in the political sense + -ism. and liberalism The quality of being liberal. (politics) Any political movement founded on the autonomy and personal freedom of the individual, progress and reform, and government by law with the consent of the governed. quotations ▼ (economics) An economic ideology in favour of laissez faire and the free market (related to economic liberalism). The term is not completely unambiguous. But the only confusion about the term concerning that a few people would consider this now to have anything to do with 'left' is that that 'reading' is a right-wing Americanism. Don't use that word without explanation with Americans. And you'll be fine without complicated explanations in UK, Germany, France etc. The word liberal has been so debased in America by right-wing demagogues that liberals have for at least two decades preferred to call themselves progressives. –– Liberal? Are we talking about the same thing? , BBC Exemplified in Wikipedia by making this necessary: Modern liberalism in the United States This article discusses liberalism as the term has been used in the United States since the 20th century. For the development of American liberalism, see Liberalism in the United States. For the origin and worldwide use of the term liberalism, see Liberalism . | {
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46,628 | My understanding of polling is that it is done to gauge public perception and opinion of political actors and policies in order to further shape a candidate's actions. In order to do that, one would expect a moderately rigorous polling apparatus. I would expect clear cut questions with obviously applicable answers from most possible viewpoints. Sometimes, though, candidates or organizations will run polls about their own actions that seem to be designed to get a certain outcome. As an example, the Trump organization regularly posts polls that have been widely criticized online for asking leading questions or only giving supportive options. Here's an example of one such poll which seems to have all the scientific rigor of a wet noodle. What purpose does it serve for an organization to publish polls about themselves? Because of the leading questions, I would assume very little action can be taken based on them? What purpose does issuing such a bunk poll serve? | One purpose of the type of poll that you linked to is to develop a list of potential donors and campaign volunteers and supporters. The one-sided nature of the poll language serves to a) motivate the potential reader to respond and b) screen out anyone likely to disagree or be disinterested. Since the poll form then asks the submitter to include their name, email address, ZIP code, and mobile phone number, it's a tool well-suited for building up a pre-screened contact list for future mailings and solicitations. | {
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46,651 | Probably in an effort to embrace or promote transfeminism , some US politicians now list their pronouns on their twitter pages, e.g. Elizabeth Warren lists "she/her". (It's a big cultural trend to ask and tell it in many US campuses at least in the Democratic-leaning states .) Do European politicians typically do this too, i.e. list their pronouns on their social media pages? If the answer depends on where the particular politician sits on the political spectrum in Europe, please qualify. I see that Juncker is not listing it. And neither does Ursula von der Leyen (she does have "Mother of seven" in her brief profile though, but I'm not sure that qualifies as a pronoun [hint].) Hopefully there's some kind of survey on this pronoun declaration issue among (European) politicians. | Do European politicians typically do this too (Emphasis mine) Politicians who sport a pronoun in their profile are not typical in the US. I'm struggling to imagine how they might be more common in Europe. If we consider the Democratic candidates for 2020 as a sample, only Warren, Booker, Castro, and Steyer have a pronoun tucked into their Twitter profiles as I write this answer. Biden, Sanders, Harris, Buttigieg, O'Rourke, Bennet, Bullock, Delaney, Gabbard, Klobuchar, Messam, Ryan, Sestak, Williamson, and Yang do not. (I'm sure I forgot a few others.) Even among the more progressive Democrats it's not the rule. AOC and Pressley sport a she/her; Omar and Tlaib do not. I can't think of any Republican that might boast a pronoun on their profile off the top of my head. But there might be a few outliers that do. As to the other side of the pond, I sincerely doubt you'll find many European politicians that sport a pronoun either. You could arguably check by compiling a big list of European politicians and going through their profiles for pronouns one by one. If you try this, I'd be sincerely surprised if you find more than a few across the entire continent. | {
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46,686 | The Wikipedia definition of democracy states: Democracy (Greek: δημοκρατία dēmokratía, literally "rule by people") is a form of government in which the people have the authority to choose their governing legislature. Similarly, the Wikipedia definition of ochlocracy states: Ochlocracy (Greek: ὀχλοκρατία, romanized: okhlokratía; Latin: ochlocratia) or mob rule is the rule of government by mob or a mass of people, or, the intimidation of legitimate authorities. Is there any commonly recognised set of criteria that can be used to determine whether an act is one or the other? There are several, nominally democratic, things going on in the UK at the moment: the Extinction Rebellion demonstrations and Brexit, that could conceivably be considered more akin to mob rule; how might I determine, for the sake of argument, whether they (or similar occurrences) are one or the other? | Both democracy and ochlocracy are forms of government where political activism by citizens is tolerated as part of politics. The difference is that a democratic state follows its legislative, executive and legal processes and follows the rule of law, while an ochlocratic state ignores these in order to appease public sentiments. A couple tests you can use to determine whether you live in a democracy or an ochlocracy: Do actions by the executive follow the law or the public sentiment? Example: The public opinion demands that donuts are outlawed. Law says producing, owning, trading and eating donuts is legal. Does the executive seize and destroy all donuts nevertheless because that's what the public demands? Ochlocracy. Does the executive refuse to do anything unless the legislature makes a law which tells them to? Democracy. Are decisions by elected officials due to fear of their personal safety instead of just their political safety? Example: There is a proposed law to outlaw donuts. How do the members of parliament decide how to vote on this proposal? "I have to vote for this or I won't get reelected": Democracy. "I have to vote for this or people will literally kill me": Ochlocracy. Does the judiciary follow the letter of the law instead of public opinion? Example: A baker is on trial for possession of donuts with intent to supply. There is no proof beyond reasonable doubt that the defendant ever touched a donut after the law went into effect, but public opinion demands that the baker is punished nevertheless. In a democracy, that person would go free. In an ochlocracy, that person would be convicted. Is following the Brexit referendum a form of mob rule? Not really. Parliament voted to have a public referendum on the question and parliament also voted to ratify the result of that referendum. Also, the general consensus of constitutional law is that due to the principle of parliamentary sovereignty, the parliament could choose to ignore the results of the referendum if they wanted to. Are public protests like the Extinction Rebellion a form of mob rule? Not as long as protests are either peaceful or contained by law enforcement. Peaceful public protests are a form of free speech used by citizens to inform their elected and unelected representatives of their grievances. A democratic society tolerates this form of activism and considers the demands of protesters unbinding requests which the government can choose to either fulfill or ignore. If protests turn so violent that representatives adopt their demands out of fear that law enforcement will be unable to maintain public order, then you have mob rule. | {
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46,697 | Preface Ever since the communist revolution in China, Taiwan aka the Republic Of China (ROC) has maintained that they are the rightful government of mainland China. The People's Republic of China (PRC), controlled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), however, has actual possession of mainland China. Making the question irrelevant as to which government is the rightful government. This is especially challenging for the ROC, since their greatest ally, the USA, officially recognizes the PRC as the official government of China. It seems unlikely that the Government in Taiwan will ever be able to reassert control over the mainland again, even if for some reason the CCP and PRC lose their grip on power. Nonetheless, the ROC maintains their claim, but in recent years the PRC has increased their pressure on ROC by employing as much soft power as possible and threatening the use of hard power if the ROC declares independence. The PRC have shifted numerous diplomatic allies away from ROC, further isolating them within the international community. The ROC is now in a position where they will continue to lose international support, becoming even further isolated and economically weakened. Alternatively, if the ROC declare themselves an independent nation, apart from China, they may enjoy greater international support and acceptance into the UN, but this move creates a whole host of other issues. Chief among them, being the PRC's explicit threat of invasion if ROC declares independence. Not to mention, if they do declare independence and the PRC does not invade, who knows if it would even change anything for the ROC with respect to their relations with other nations. Exiled Chinese billionaire Guo Wengui, claims that the CCP's hold on power is highly tenuous and will be lost entirely if they fail to limit the negative effects of an economic recession / depression within China. Question Assuming the ROC declares independence and the PRC is unable to invade, would that mean the ROC is relinquishing their claim over mainland China? Hypothetically, lets suppose: the ROC currently has a legitimate claim to the mainland, and the CCP loses power due to an economic downturn and a subsequent civilian uprising. Could the ROC later legally assert their claim if they decide today to declare themselves an independent nation? | Let me first address the incorrect picture of the cross-strait relations that underlies your question. You assume that there are actual, realistic claims to mainland China. Let me put this straight: there is basically no sane Taiwanese, politician or non-politician, who believes in such claims at their face value. The last person who might have believed that that Taiwan and mainland China would at some point unite as the Republic of China was president Chiang Ching-kuo, who died in 1988. The only time I've seen a modern Taiwanese claiming the mainland was in a satirical TV show. If there is a claim, it is only because most Taiwanese are OK with the status quo, and removing the claim from the constitution would make Taiwan look more like an actual country different from China, and Beijing doesn't want that. As paradoxical as it may seem, Beijing wants Taiwan to claim mainland China, because it makes the cross-strait relations look more like an internal Chinese affair. On the other hand, there is basically no one in Taiwan who wants to make the Taipei government rule over whole China, and there are less than 5% who would like to unify with PRC any time soon. The latter want unification under the leadership of Beijing, so the ROC claims are irrelevant for them. The remaining ~95% of the people in Taiwan want to continue the de facto separation between Taiwan and China, and are simply disagreeing about the means: Most Taiwanese seem OK with keeping the status quo infinitely. In other words, they don't really care if their country is formally recognised, as long as they can travel abroad with their ROC passports and as long as Taiwan can have its embassies (called "Taipei Economic and Cultural Office" so as not to anger China) abroad. And those Taiwanese are also OK with keeping the phony claims, which let Beijing "save face" by saying: "see, Taiwan is China, even the Taipei government admits that". Some Taiwanese would be OK with uniting with China under some unrealistic assumptions (e.g. China getting democratic). This is not going to happen anytime soon, so there is not much to discuss here. In any case, they don't understand unification as "taking the mainland under the control of the Taipei government", so the claims are not relevant for them. Some Taiwanese believe Taiwan should declare independence. And here is the answer to your question: Yes, that would mean relinquishing the phony claims, but as I have stressed, nobody cares about them anyway . The problem with declaring independence is that it will anger Beijing, and may lead to a Chinese invasion. And even if there is no invasion, China will not let the Republic of Taiwan enter the UN, so the international position of Taiwan won't really improve. | {
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46,724 | I woke up today to reports that climate activists have disrupted public transport in my home city: https://www.cityam.com/tube-delays-city-commuters-face-rush-hour-chaos-on-dlr-and-jubilee-line/ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/10/17/commuters-drag-extinction-rebellion-protester-roof-train-activists/ https://metro.co.uk/2019/10/17/angry-commuters-drag-xr-protesters-off-tube-try-glue-10933003/ This is a repeat of an incident that occurred earlier this year. I have been trying to reason about the motivation of these activists and I have done some google searches to try and find the what they say is the reason behind this. But my search have not come up with any reasons as to why they are taking this action. I can understand blocking the roads and airports as to tackle climate change we do need to do something about these methods of transport, but I believe that the general consensus is that public transport is the solution to many climate change problems. Note: By understand I do not mean agree with | The stated intention on their website is to bring economic disruption to the capital as part of the ongoing campaign to convince the Government to take meaningful action on the Climate and Ecological Emergency. Time will tell what the Government takes meaningful action on. The Guardian article to which Denis linked says that "the results of an internal poll of XR members, shared with the Guardian, showed 72% opposed action on London’s underground network under any circumstances." | {
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46,749 | According to the Mexico's Citizens' Council for Public Security 's annual ranking, about 80% of the most dangerous cities are in the American continent. Is there a political explanation to this? Are the people there more aggressive? Drugs are a worldwide problem, why are so many of these countries in a drug war (against the government, or among criminal organizations)? | Cocaine Coca leaf is native to South America and grows best there, so that's where the cocaine comes from. Not only does this produce a huge amount of profit for organised crime, the drug itself promotes aggression. Almost all the drug wars are primarily concerned with cocaine and secondly with marijuana which also grows well there. Colonialism, Communism and Coups Latin America suffered brutality from Cortez onwards. Many of the smaller states had to fight wars of independence; Haiti was made to pay reparations to France for freeing its slaves, for example. After World War 2, the US made a practice of opposing any government in the south that it considered too left wing. Frequently a democratically elected socialist government would be violently overthrown by CIA-backed forces and replaced with a dictatorship. See e.g. Guatemala from Wikipedia : In 1954, the democratically elected Guatemalan government of Colonel Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán was toppled by U.S.-backed forces led by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas who invaded from Honduras. Assigned by the Eisenhower administration, this military opposition was armed, trained and organized by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (see Operation PBSUCCESS). The directors of United Fruit Company (UFCO) had lobbied to convince the Truman and Eisenhower administrations that Colonel Arbenz intended to align Guatemala with the Soviet Bloc. The resulting weak but brutal governments and ongoing wars with rebel groups have consumed many of the past decades. The war with FARC has been going on since 1964, for example. The Colombian right-wing militia are strong enough to kill a lot of people but not strong enough to actually end the conflict. Perhaps unsurprising in a large country of trackless jungle. | {
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46,855 | It seems that, in practice, the US Presidency is limited to rich people. For example, elections are extremely expensive when you are trying to win and getting attention during the primaries and general election seems to require lots of money. Is there any realistic way for a non-rich person to become US President? By rich , I do not mean born to wealthy parents. What I mean is rich at the time of running. It seems to me that the only people who are actually likely to become president are people who are (very) well-off financially. | To the extent that one needs prior fame to become president, and since fame brings money in the modern world, be it through books or speaker fees, the answer is that it's unlikely a pauper could become president. The way Sanders became a millionaire is insightful in this respect. | {
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47,009 | People are up in arms about allegations that President Trump's pressured Ukraine to reopening an investigation into Joe Biden. My question is, why are the mainstream media and the people leading the impeachment inquiries ignoring the fact that Ukraine President Zelenskyy publicly stated that Trump didn't pressure him whatsoever? You can read more about this from Bloomberg News . If the person supposedly being pressured says they are not being pressured, isn't that the best possible evidence? How could any investigation be more effective than the source itself at determining whether or not the situation was pressured? Why is this not getting any attention from either the news or the impeachment process? I would appreciate if someone could offer a rational reason for this. | I wouldn't necessarily say that the mainstream media is ignoring Zelensky's statement. ( NY Times , Washington Post analysis , Fox News ). However, he made the statement at the end of September, and it's now almost the end of October, so it's "old news". Unless something new happens to re-reference it, it's unlikely to still be covered by anyone. That said, that still leaves the question of why the fact that he gave that statement is being discounted/ignored. This, however, would be pure speculation, and may be different for every person/organization. The two reasons that I can think of include: People just didn't believe him. If someone is pressured to do X, it's easy to also pressure them to say they weren't pressured to do X. People consider his opinion irrelevant. If someone is wrongly pressured but doesn't realize it, it's still wrong of the person doing the pressuring. Likewise, if a crime (abuse, fraud, rape, etc.) is committed, the government can prosecute it even if the victim says that nothing happened. But either one, both, or neither may actually reflect someone's opinions. | {
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47,027 | The House of Commons (image below from Wikipedia ) has two red lines on the floor. Wikipedia states that: In front of each set of benches a red line is drawn, which members are traditionally not allowed to cross during debates. These lines can clearly be seen in the picture. I have been following a couple of live parliamentary debates recently and I noticed that Ian Blackford, leader of the SNP in the House of Commons (the actual party leader is not an MP) regularly makes his statements while standing firmly across the line; see for example the image below (taken from the Press and Journal ; purely the first random image from Google Images on which the line and his feet could be seen) which shows both feet inside the line. This is not a coincidence; in fact, I want to recall Mr Blackford taking this position every time he speaks. Given that a great number of things in the UK parliament are based on tradition and seem weird or unnecessary nowadays, it strikes me as odd that Mr Blackford is allowed what I perceive as a breach of this tradition. Is there any reason be it written or traditional that would permit Mr Blackford to stand across the line or is it simply permitted because nobody objects? | Is there any reason be it written or traditional that would permit Mr Blackford to stand across the line or is it simply permitted because nobody objects? There is a rule is that members cannot speak from the Aisle , which is delimited by the two red lines, and so presumably it's allowed simply because nobody is objecting. However, Blackford's intent here is obviously benign. He hasn't just entered the chamber and made no effort to find a seat, and nor is he aggressively crossing with a view to physically confronting someone on the other side. Rather he has simply crossed the line to give himself room whilst he speaks, so I can't see a reason why someone would object. It would be too obviously petty. | {
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47,045 | Did the USA have a political agenda in Syria beyond simply the containment of ISIS? (Prior to the recent removal of troops by Trump.) If so what? I ask because I am hearing on CNN and MSNBC (and other liberal media) that Trump has empowered the Iranians, empowered Assad, and I also hear concerns about Israel. I am presenting texts as examples. How Trump’s sellout of the Kurds threw Iran a lifeline in Syria Donald Trump’s decision to pull US forces out of Syria, paved the way
for Turkey to push the Kurds away from its borders – but also
facilitated a comeback by Iran in one of the most strategic areas in
the Middle East. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) were pushed into a deal with
President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, Iran’s staunch ally, to
re-establish control over vast areas of northern Syria in a bid to
stave off any Turkish incursion. In Syria, Russia Is Pleased to Fill an American Void As the United States withdraws from Syria, Russia is stepping in,
running patrols to separate warring factions, striking deals and
helping President Bashar al-Assad advance. Russian and Syrian flags on
military vehicles near Manbij, Syria, on Tuesday. LA Times News Analysis: Trump’s rash exit from Syria emboldens Russia and
horrifies Israel The dates I am interested in are from the start of the civil war 2011 until just before Trump's withdrawal. | The other answer about the Trump presidency is not entirely correct . While Trump employed Tillerson, there was a plan, however unrealistic, to still oust Assad by diplomatic means: Obama’s old policy, such as it was, had suffered a catastrophic meltdown when confronted first with reality and then with Russia; and Trump had failed to string together even three coherent sentences on Syria during his presidential campaign. For the first few months of the new administration, policy drifted in no particular strategic direction. By late summer 2017, then-secretary of state Rex Tillerson had finally come up with a plan that promised to take the president’s varied interests into account while in fact recommitting to the anti-Assad line and rejecting a U.S. pullout. Trump signed off on it that autumn, momentarily swayed or simply distracted. The public rollout came in a January 2018 speech at Stanford University, in which Tillerson vowed to stay engaged in Syria and oust Assad by means of non-military pressure. The secretary explained that the United States would keep its troops embedded among the Kurds of northeastern Syria to prevent a jihadi resurgence, and would also ramp up economic pressure until Damascus accepted a “post-Assad future” that would neither attract jihadis nor permit “malicious Iranian influence.” [...] But it wasn’t the mismatched means and ends that felled the Tillerson plan. It was simmering conflict between the secretary and his boss (whom he had, famously and allegedly, called a “moron”), in addition to Trump’s instinctive dislike for mucking around in the Middle East. Almost immediately after Tillerson’s Stanford speech, Trump began to question why the United States still had troops in Syria, apparently feeling he’d been conned into accepting something he didn’t like and that he didn’t think U.S. taxpayers should be paying for. Tillerson was sacked in March 2018. Around the same time, the president reportedly read a Washington Post story about Tillerson’s promise of limited economic aid to Kurdish-ruled areas outside Assad’s control, which sent him into a fit of rage. Out of nowhere, he froze the U.S. stabilization budget for Syria, saying the Gulf oil kingdoms could pay for it if they wanted it so much, and demanded that U.S. troops should come home “as soon as possible.” And eventually that is going to happen, modulo a detour through Iraq . But back to the story line, Tillerson's departure was not a complete abandonment of any strategy in Syria, but rather it became mainly an anti-Iranian strategy. Over the summer of 2018, U.S. officialdom started to assemble the president’s latest preferences into a new plan to replace the one ejected alongside Tillerson. But like some indestructible squishy toy, Syria policy immediately began to reassume the open-ended and interventionist form that Trump had just denounced. One reason was that the president’s hard-ball tactics had worked—sort of. Arab and European leaders winced at the prospect of a quick withdrawal, and when U.S. diplomats came panhandling, allied nations agreed to fund the stabilization of former jihadi-held areas in order to let American taxpayers off the hook without derailing the Syria mission. The president was pleased. Another reason was the surging influence of citizens concerned by the Iranian land bridge. As he moved to exit the “decaying and rotten” Iranian nuclear deal in spring 2018, Trump started to stuff his government with Middle East hawks who saw Syria primarily through an anti-Iran lens. That April, Trump replaced his national security adviser H. R. McMaster with John Bolton, an advocate of bombing Iran and overthrowing its regime, while another top-tier Iran hawk, CIA chief Michael Pompeo, was sworn in to succeed Tillerson. In office, Bolton and Pompeo have renounced regime change in Tehran, instead settling for a policy of “maximum pressure” that is supposed to pave the way for direct talks with Iran’s leaders and a new, better nuclear deal. The concept seems patterned on Trump’s North Korea fliplomacy, and so may have originated in the Oval Office. However, Bolton’s real views are well known—he doesn’t want a better deal, he wants regime change—and Pompeo’s list of preconditions has been so expansive— Iranian withdrawal from Syria being just the appetizer—that they amount to asking the ayatollahs to come out with their hands over their heads. Rather than engaging with American demands, the Iranians have therefore spent summer and autumn showing how they can inflict asymmetric damage, threaten U.S. interests and allies, and disrupt oil markets. As for evacuating Syria, forget about it: “We stay there as long as Syria wants [it] so,” said a commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the paramilitary force that controls Iran’s Syria deployment. [...] By early September [2018], Trump had re-approved plans for an indefinite stay in Syria, with even more fanciful goals than those previously formulated by Tillerson. “We’re not going to leave as long as Iranian troops are outside Iranian borders, and that includes Iranian proxies and militias,” Bolton explained. Perhaps it shouldn't come as a big surprise that Trump's latest decision to withdraw from Syria, which is being implemented, came after Bolton was fired in September 2019. “It was in Bolton’s nature to run an imperial NSC [national security council] but he stepped on the toes of too many people,” said Mark Groombridge, who worked for Bolton for a decade. “He got into the crosshairs of Pompeo and Mulvaney, who saw Bolton as a liability for the 2020 election. War on every front was not what Trump ran on.” And I almost forgot about Mattis' resignation and that Bolton did dig the Kurds, angering Erdogan : President Trump first made waves on the issue in December 2018, when he abruptly announced the U.S. would completely pull its troops from Syria, tweeting that the mission to defeat ISIS was completed. The move prompted the resignation of then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and a coordinated campaign by then-National Security Adviser John Bolton to try to protect the Kurds, America's fighting partner in the region. Trump’s foreign policy decision on Syria, which he had promised back on the campaign trail in 2016, was reportedly the final straw for Mattis. His decision to resign was based on principle, sources told Fox News at the time. Bolton and other officials in the White House worked “behind the scenes” to slow the president’s order to pull all 2,000 troops from Syria, with Bolton pushing for the U.S. departure from Syria to include the condition that Turkey guaranteed it would not target Kurdish fighters . Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused Bolton of making a “serious mistake” in complicating Trump’s Syria withdrawal — and Bolton would ultimately also exit his post after being fired by Trump in September. | {
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47,073 | While generally risk of mass extinction is being considered as political subject and even served as source of a catchy name for one controversial political movements , the same can not be said about asteroid/comet impact. From purely scientific perspective the problem is low probability but real. That's exactly what caused extinction non-avian dinosaurs and suspect in case of other mass extinction. The subject, at least in theory, should be perfect for media. There had been in last decade a case of a meteroide exploding with blast yield of a sizeable nuclear warhead (400kt-500kt) , luckily on high altitude and over sparsely populated area. Moreover there were even block buster movies about averting such collision with nukes. Why such low probability but technically speaking real threat, with supposedly high level of media hype potential, is generally not source of major political movements or protests? [EDIT: The question is about why there is apparent lack of political movements related to this threat, and not what are coolheaded technocratic reaction to tackle this potential problem. To make clear distinction: with mad cow disease the issue was already mostly contained by veterinary agencies with zero public interest, when suddenly in media and politic discourse it become key breaking news. The question only covers the second part, concerning lack of political movements centred around this threat] | The scenario of an asteroid impact destroying life on Earth as we know it was actually a topic which got quite a lot of media attention in the late 90s. Disaster movies like Armageddon or Deep Impact reflect that sentiment. The reason why this hysteria died down in the past years is because politics did actually take actions to assess the threat of potential of asteroid impacts. Multiple projects were funded to detect, catalog and track any small objects in the solar system which could get close to Earth. For example: The Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research project of MIT, NASA and the US Air Force. The Catalina Sky Survey funded and executed by NASA and the University of Arizona The Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System by the Haleakala Observatory in Hawaii, funded by the US Air Force. Plus various smaller initiatives to detect near-earth objects . Together, these projects detected almost 20,000 near-Earth objects. Under 2000 of those are classified as "Potentially Hazardous", which means they have a non-zero chance to impact on the surface of Earth. But none was identified as a serious threat to life on Earth. Because the research has shown that near earth asteroids are a much smaller threat than feared in the 90s, political movements which advocate for asteroid protection have lost traction. If you have further questions on asteroid research and its results you might want to ask on Space Exploration Stack Exchange . | {
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47,187 | SNP MP Peter Grant accuses Boris Johnson of walking out of the chamber while his party's Westminster leader Ian Blackford was still speaking. In a tweet, he claims it is the "third or fourth time in a row" that Mr Johnson has left in such a way, adding: "This is deliberate. This is 2 fingers to Scotland." (This was on the BBC's live feed .) Two fingers as one sign is a sign of victory (as far as I know), so I guess that rather means "middle finger" shown twice. But why two then, when the statement says there were three or four incidents? I'm confused... Can someone clarify what the [finger] cultural reference is in that speech of Grant? | In the UK, two fingers is an insult much like the middle finger in the USA. Done in a palm-out orientation it is the victory sign, as done by Winston Churchill. The other way around, palm inwards (knuckles out) it is just like the middle finger. | {
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47,225 | The BBC writes As the testimony was due to begin, Mr Trump suggested Col Vindman was a "Never Trumper witness" in a tweet. But there's no evidence mentioned in support of that statement in that BBC article. So, is that Trump tweet a figurative statement or did Vindman sign one of those "Never Trump" letters/pledges? Or more generally, what other "never Trump" act has Vindman done besides disagreeing with the idea that Ukraine investigating the Bidens (first at Sondland's and later at Trump's request) was in the US national security interest (and then testifying to Congress about those occurrences)? (Aside: confusingly enough, Donald Trump Jr. implied Vindman was a "leftist" or at least "on their side".) | This comment is coming from the same President who called lifelong Republican Robert Mueller "a Democrat" for investigating him. He doesn't use these words to mean what they mean. He consistently uses them as epithets to dehumanize anyone who doesn't support him. It is a cue for his in-group to consider these people 'outsiders' and 'nonbelievers'. 'Others' to be immediately distrusted. "The Never Trumper Republicans, though on respirators with not many left, are in certain ways worse and more dangerous for our Country than the Do Nothing Democrats," Trump tweeted Thursday. "Watch out for them, they are human scum!" 'Human scum:' Donald Trump has harsh comments for 'Never Trumper' Republicans - USA Today In the same way that "Fake News!" leads to his followers wearing shirts that promote the lynching of journalists. Trump has provided no evidence for this specific claim. As of the writing of this answer, there does not appear to be any publicly available evidence of any sort of disqualifying personal bias on behalf of Vindman or other witnesses. Attacking a source of information that has already been verified from multiple other sources, including his own administration, is entirely baseless anyway. It's a purely ad hominem attack that plays to the emotions of his most fervent followers. | {
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47,264 | Per title. E.g. right now the US has a mutual defense treaty with the Philippines and also with South Korea . If the Philippines and Korea go to war with each other, who is the US obligated to help? I imagine this must have happened in history (making this perhaps better asked on the History SE), but I can't find any examples, and in that case this is likely the better place to ask. The closest example I found was US involvement in the Falklands war , but that never led anywhere because the US wasn't legally bound to assist either side: At first glance, it appeared that the US had military treaty obligations to both parties in the war, bound to the UK as a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and to Argentina by the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (the "Rio Pact"). However, the North Atlantic Treaty only obliges the signatories to give support if the attack occurs in Europe or North America north of the Tropic of Cancer, and the Rio Pact only obliges the US to intervene if one of the adherents to the treaty is attacked—the UK never attacked Argentina. | Very smart people are still trying to figure this out. Perhaps surprisingly, this is far from resolved, and is currently an ongoing topic of rigourous legal and political discussion. A good starting point might be Valentin Jeutner's book Irresolvable Norm Conflicts in International Law , based on his doctoral thesis defended at Cambridge University in 2015, which is the latest in a recent series of monographs that address norm conflicts in international law. A fairly-involved review of the book discusses this specific topic and its current unresolvedness: Egypt is party to both the regional 1950 Joint Defence Treaty and the
bilateral 1979 Peace Treaty with Israel. Under the Joint Defence
Treaty, a multilateral military alliance treaty with members of the
Arab League, Egypt is under an obligation to aid any state party to
the treaty in the case of aggression against that state, whereas the
1979 Peace Treaty with Israel puts Egypt under an obligation to
refrain from any direct or indirect use of force against Israel.
Should Israel now use force against an Arab League state and should
that state invoke the Joint Defence Treaty, Egypt might find itself
facing two potentially conflicting treaty obligations: to aid the Arab
League state through the use of force against Israel and to refrain
from the use of force against Israel. [...] The court will need to exercise an interpretatory function, and the
interpretation will probably hinge upon the concrete question
submitted to it. Therefore, it might not actually come to interpret
obligations that are in conflict with each other. In order for a court
to issue a dilemmatic declaration in the sense that Jeutner proposes,
it would need to be the state facing the conflicting obligations to
submit the conflict to the court. This seems rather unlikely in
contentious proceedings. | {
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47,273 | PREFACE Over the past 30 years, the economic transformation of China has greatly improved the lives of the Chinese people. However, under the reign of Xi Jinping, China has begun to assert its power on the international stage. The Xi administration has also instituted many reforms such as the Social Credit system, asserted China's claim over nearby territories and the South China Sea, built up the military, encouraged the technological advancement of industry, purged his rivals(aka "anti-corruption campaign"), and has taken on a lot of national debt. The Xi regime has also begun to limit expat visas and encouraged greater nationalist sentiment within China. I understand that this has been done to strengthen the Chinese nation, protect the economic gains of the past few decades and, in theory, ensure future growth. Looking at the comparison of Communism vs Fascim a few obvious things jump out at me: Ideas: within Communism, "The government should own all means of production and land and also everything else. People should work for the government and the collective output should be redistributed equally." This is only partially true in modern China. Yes, the Chinese government owns all the land, but they have relinquished total-control over the means of production and do not redistribute collective output equally. The fact that China now has billionaires says it all. Fascism, on the other hand, is a "Union between businesses and the State, with the state telling the business what to do". This seems to more accurately describe China. Economic Coordination: While neither description accurately describes modern-day China, I'd say the Fascist system better describes their current system. Social Structure: I have no doubt that the Chinese government downplays the idea of Class and differences between people's station in life. However, there's no doubt that being a member of the Communist Party comes with many privileges. Bureaucrats and Communist Party officials take bribes and use their position for personal gain. While this is not uniquely Communist by any means, in practice, it does constitute a class of people positioned above the rest of society -- a Bourgeoisie of sorts. My own observations indicate an increase in nationalism within China. While, it is currently not "Extreme Nationalism", if it suits their goals and is encouraged by the Chinese Communist Party, it seems like this could change. One might argue that they've become more Capitalist, which in some respects is true. Except, under the surface the reality is very different.
For more specifics about what I mean by this point, check out the following video https://youtu.be/4cwXifDaCjE . It should provide some context. Definition capitalism n. An economic system in which the means of production and distribution are privately or corporately owned and development occurs through the accumulation and reinvestment of profits gained in a free market.
n. The state of having capital or property; possession of capital. Source: The American Heritage Dictionary NOTE: For all you nitpickers reading this, the aforementioned points are intended to paint a general picture based on my personal observations. I'm sure we could argue until we're blue in the face about specifics. So please don't. Also, there's more to Fascism than racism and it would be appreciated if we could focus on all aspects, including: social, economic and governmental. QUESTION Given the prefaced points above, is communist China headed down a path towards Fascism? Especially, if they become more nationalist and militaristic. | This is obviously a controversial topic so opinions on it will certainly be divided if we consider Chinese self-labeling (they strongly reject being called "fascist"). But on the matter of economics, there's little doubt that they moved to a mixed economy, which they have trouble justifying on a pure Marxist basis. So if you assume authoritarianism + mixed economy (with a large state-controlled sector) = fascism, then yes. Actuall, if you add oppression of minorities, in this case Uighurs or Tibetans (which again China denies it is doing), you have another dimension. The Chinese, of course, strongly object to this conclusion, e.g. A recent commentary from The Sydney Morning Herald’s international editor, Peter Hartcher, described China (along with Islamic State and Russia) as “fascist,” sparking an angry response from China’s Foreign Ministry. Yet the piece likely sparked cheers among people with similar views. [...] But the logic behind this piece does not stand firm. [...] Criticizing China for its political reality, developmental model, and “non-cooperative” behavior is easy, but seeing and truly understanding the differences and divergences between civilizations is far more difficult — so much so that quite often people choose not to even try. Instead, they import a Western concept (in this case, fascism) to try and conceptualize a non-Western system. Now, is China centralized? In general, yes — but how centralized? Actually, China is far less centralized than many outside observers assume. To cite one example: for years, fiscal decentralization between the central government and local provinces has played a critical role in the unbalanced flow of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into the Chinese market. This decentralization has had several readily observable consequences, including different levels of economic growth and green development among the various regions. In his 2012 book , Pierre F. Landry described China’s political system as “decentralized authoritarianism.” As for the final point, the nation (and the family) has a uniquely important role in China’s contemporary political philosophy. But this is not new, much less an invention of the current regime. Reverence for authority, emphasis on leaders’ moral quality, and collectivism have all been rooted in China’s political culture for thousands of years and these concepts have had natural and inevitable impacts on contemporary Chinese politics. Yet somehow this has made China unpopular in the eyes of the West and some Western media. And the degree of authoritarianism is also a matter of some dispute. With all the suppression from the state and censorship, worker protests have been fairly numerous e.g. China Labour Bulletin, an advocacy group in Hong Kong that tracks protests, recorded at least 1,700 labor disputes last year, up from about 1,200 the year before. Those figures represent only a fraction of disputes across China, since many conflicts go unreported and Mr. Xi has intensified censorship. [...] As protests have multiplied, Mr. Xi, China’s most powerful leader since Mao, has sought to reassure workers that he understands their plight. [...] Labor protests in China are common, and to avoid protracted conflicts, local officials often put pressure on businesses to settle disputes. But companies may be more unwilling — or unable — to do so now as they struggle to find money. [...] Mr. Xi has expanded the party’s oversight of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions, the party-controlled organ that is supposed to mediate disputes for its more than 300 million members but often sides with management. He has also dismantled nonprofit labor advocacy groups, which in the past provided advice to workers and helped with collective bargaining. In a crackdown in Shenzhen in late January, the authorities detained five veteran labor rights advocates and accused them of “disturbing public order,” a vague charge the party often uses against its critics. [...] Despite the restrictions, activists have had some success in organizing protests across provincial lines, often with the help of social media. Crane operators across China coordinated a Labor Day strike last year that involved tens of thousands of workers from at least 10 provinces. [...] Mr. Xi has particularly sought to suppress a resurgence of labor activism on college campuses, including a high-profile campaign for workers’ rights led by young communists at elite universities. The activists have used the teachings of Mao and Marx to argue that China’s embrace of capitalism has exploited workers. Last summer, they tried to help workers in southern China organize an independent labor union, saying that corrupt local officials were colluding with managers to abuse workers. The authorities have repeatedly tried to quash the protests, leading to the disappearances and detentions of more than 50 people associated with the campaign. The authorities have responded so forcefully to the young communists in part because their demands are ideological, not material, said Professor Fu, who has studied unrest in China. “To the government, calling out the party for not being Marxist is like children openly denouncing their birth parents,” she said. “It is seen as outright defiance and rejection of the state-led socialism.” The degree of dissent de facto allowed in China, especially on economic issues, is somewhere in between a strongly authoritarian system (be it either North Korea or Nazi Germany) and democracies. On militaristic adventures, insofar China has been fairly restrained compared even to Fascist Italy. Their building of islands etc. is a form of cold war, but they haven't invaded/colonized anyone yet. So there are some reasonable analogies to draw with fascist states of the past, but there are also some difference, often of degree. | {
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47,281 | Today (Oct 31) the house passed a resolution formalizing the impeachment inquiry. I assume this was not a necessary step as the inquiry was underway before the resolution. Does this resolution actually change how these proceedings will work? | It actually changes quite a few things. None would be make or break, but they address talking points and bring formality. According to electoral-vote.com/'s summation : It will give the investigation a bit more formality, and thus a stronger legal footing It will allow many future hearings to be public, rather than behind closed doors It authorizes the release of full deposition transcripts It potentially opens the door for Donald Trump to send lawyers to the Hill to represent his interests It potentially gives Republicans more opportunity to cross-examine witnesses It allows GOP committee members to subpoena witnesses (but only with agreement from the Democratic committee chair, which is not likely to be forthcoming) You may notice that the items are somewhat qualified with "potentially", "but", "many", etc. Thus I believe it's possible to argue that it changes little to nothing, but if it does change things, these are the ways in which it will. | {
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47,294 | According to a BBC ariticle, Trump has made comments like: Jeremy Corbyn would be "so bad" as prime minister Of Boris Johnson: "[He's] the exact right guy for the times" Is it usual for a US President to specifically endorse a UK Prime Minister during a General Election campaign? BBC Source | According to VOA , it hasn't been this blatant before, at least as actual elections go: During his time in office, Trump's predecessor, Barack Obama, weighed in on Brexit in 2016, provoking fury from the referendum's supporters for saying London would be at the "back of the queue" for a trade deal if it left the European Union, noted Ben Riley-Smith, U.S. editor of the Daily Telegraph. "And the consensus of that was it backfired," said Joe Lockhart, who was White House press secretary under U.S. President Bill Clinton. [...] The virtual endorsement of a candidate in a democratic election in a foreign country by a sitting U.S. president appears unprecedented in modern history. "As far as straight-up elections, it's normally more subtle. But with Trump, nothing is subtle," Lockhart told VOA. Riley-Smith agreed. "There has been a long-established norm in British politics that the prime minister does not weigh in on foreign elections, and vice versa, that world leaders should not intervene in United Kingdom votes," Riley-Smith told VOA. I'm pretty sure that compared to actual [covert] US interventions in Latin America etc., particularly during the Cold War, this pales in comparison though. Also of note: after having left office, some US presidents have endorsed candidates in foreign elections. Obama endorsed Macron in 2017 and Trudeau this year. | {
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47,328 | Donald Trump is moving to Florida. Doesn't he live in the White House in Washington DC? What does it mean that he is moving? Also, do we know why? | What does it mean that he is moving? He changed his permanent residence from Trump Tower in NYC to Mar-a-Lago in Florida, not actually moving. The change was made September 27th. Also, do we know why? For financial, political and legal reasons . The politics behind Trump's move to Florida are crystal clear , November 2, 2019. Trump has extremely good financial, political and legal reasons to get out of New York: his move is a logical, long-term answer to an immediate set of problems. The transaction itself is straightforward. Trump will almost certainly continue to own his suite atop Trump Tower, and will continue to move between New York and his Mar-a-Lago resort. But by designating Mar-a-Lago as his domicile -- in legal terms, "his true, fixed, permanent home"-- Trump is announcing he will spend most of each year in Florida (when not in D.C.), making him a resident of the Sunshine State for purposes of voting and paying state taxes. By doing so, Trump joins a large exodus of New Yorkers who regularly relocate to Florida for the sunny weather and lower taxes. Florida is considered a swing state . Being a resident may give him more votes. In 2016, Trump carried Florida's 29 electoral votes over Hillary Clinton by a slim 1.2% margin, only about 113,000 votes out of 9.4 million cast. ... The third incentive for Trump to get out of New York is legal. The state Attorney General and the Manhattan District Attorney have launched multiple probes of Trump's businesses, charities, political committees and personal conduct. ... Those inquiries won't vanish for Trump, simply with his moving away, but he knows that New York's overwhelmingly Democratic officials -- including the state attorney general and Manhattan district attorney -- have no incentive to take it easy on him. Trump lives in the White House. So, why is he moving to Florida? , Updated 8:55 a.m. ET Nov. 2, 2019. Trump criticized his political opponents in his “Farewell, New York” tweet Thursday suggesting his decision may have had to do with his treatment by political leaders in the city and state. “Despite the fact that I pay millions of dollars in city, state and local taxes each year,” he tweeted. “I have been treated very badly by the political leaders of both the city and state. Few have been treated worse.” See also Manhattan district attorney subpoena . | {
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47,349 | I am a learner of the Russian language and saw the following statement by a vice-president of the Russian Academy of Geopolitical Problems: Скажу лишь то, что в условиях обычной войны, если на нас нападут без применения ядерного оружия, мы свою "ядерную дубинку" не применим. Как не применила во время Второй мировой войны другой вид оружия массового поражения, химическое, ни одна из воюющих стран. Все его имели в количестве, достаточном для того, чтобы просто залить им друг друга. Но никто этого не сделал, даже гибнущая нацистская Германия. Также и в случае с ядерным оружием. Ведь все отдают себе отчет в том, что его применение будет самоубийством. И о том, что мы его не применим в случае войны с обычными средствами, прекрасно знают и в НАТО, и в Китае. ( Source ) My translation: I will only say that we will not use our "nuclear stick" under conditions of conventional war, if we are attacked by conventional means, just as in WWII neither of the fighting countries used another kind of weapons of mass destruction, chemical weapons. Everyone had chemical weapons in amounts sufficient to flood each other, but no one did so, even the dying Nazi Germany. The same will happen with nuclear weapons, as everyone realizes that using them will be a suicide. Both the NATO and China are perfectly aware that we won't use nuclear weapons in case of conventional war. My question: Do political scientists and experts agree with the view that if a conventional war breaks out between two major nuclear countries or alliances, which possess strategic nuclear weapons and a second-strike capability, the fighting sides will refrain from using nuclear weapons of mass destruction no matter what, just as Nazi Germany refrained from using chemical weapons in WWII? My doubts come from the following consideration. Let's suppose two major nuclear countries are in conventional war against each other and that one of them is losing the war. What if the losing side starts using its nuclear weapons of mass destruction in a limited way (i.e., tactical use against the enemy's military forces and/or limited strikes to the enemy's territory and civil population)? The other side will then face a choice between (i) responding with a full-scale nuclear strike (leading to a mutual destruction), (ii) trading limited nuclear blows, and (iii) agreeing to stop the war. I guess that Option (i) will be unacceptable for the winning country. If the winning country chooses Option (ii), I guess the losing country can increase the magnitude of limited nuclear strikes to the extent sufficient to force the winning country to agree to stop the war. So it appears that nuclear weapons are a factor even in a conventional war, as the losing side is apparently able to stop the war at any moment by using nuclear weapons of mass destruction in a limited way or perhaps even by threatening to do so. I am curious as to what is the dominating view by experts on this. | Except China nobody has currently pledged this, and even the Chinese pledge is not considered credible (by some Western experts, at least) : Most states with nuclear weapons maintain policies that would permit their first use in a conflict. Pledges to only use these weapons in retaliation for a nuclear attack—or a no-first-use (NFU) policy—are rare. Where these pledges have been made by nuclear states, their adversaries generally consider them not credible. A so-called NFU pledge, first publicly made by China in 1964, refers to any authoritative statement by a nuclear weapon state to never be the first to use these weapons in a conflict, reserving them strictly to retaliate in the aftermath of a nuclear attack against its territory or military personnel. These pledges are a component of nuclear declaratory policies. As such, there can be no diplomatic arrangement to verify or enforce a declaratory NFU pledge, and such pledges alone do not affect capabilities. States with such pledges would be technically able to still use nuclear weapons first in a conflict, and their adversaries have generally not trusted NFU assurances. Today, China is the only nuclear weapon state to maintain an unconditional NFU pledge. Even post-cold-war US doctrine didn't rule out a preemptive strike or tactical use The last nuclear operations doctrine , published during the George W Bush administration in 2005, also caused alarm. It envisaged pre-emptive nuclear strikes and the use of the US nuclear arsenal against all weapons of mass destruction, not just nuclear. It was apparently formally cancelled in Feb 2006 . The revised draft included for the first time descriptions of preemptive use of US nuclear weapons, and caused the Senate Armed Services Committee to ask for a briefing, and 16 lawmakers to protest to President Bush. The decision to cancel the doctrine document, and four other related documents, was confirmed today [2 Feb 2006] by the Pentagon. And more recently (under Trump), the Pentagon has published and then retracted from public view a somewhat similar document. The document, entitled Nuclear Operations, was published on 11 June [2019], and was the first such doctrine paper for 14 years. Arms control experts say it marks a shift in US military thinking towards the idea of fighting and winning a nuclear war – which they believe is a highly dangerous mindset. “Using nuclear weapons could create conditions for decisive results and the restoration of strategic stability,” the joint chiefs’ document says. [...] The Nuclear Operations document was taken down from the Pentagon online site after a week, and is now only available through a restricted access electronic library. [...] A spokesman for the joint chiefs of staff said the document was removed from the publicly accessible defence department website “because it was determined that this publication, as is with other joint staff publications, should be for official use only”. And most notably during the Cold War : In most cases, these [tactical nuclear] weapons were deployed to defend U.S. allies against aggression by the
Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies, but the United States did not rule out their possible use
in contingencies with other adversaries. In Europe, these weapons were a part of NATO’s strategy
of “flexible response.” Under this strategy, NATO did not insist that it would respond to any type
of attack with nuclear weapons, but it maintained the capability to do so and to control escalation
if nuclear weapons were used. This approach was intended to convince the Soviet Union and
Warsaw Pact that any conflict, even one that began with conventional weapons, could result in
nuclear retaliation. As the Cold War drew to a close, NATO acknowledged that it would no longer maintain nuclear weapons to deter or defeat a conventional attack from the Soviet Union
and Warsaw Pact because “the threat of a simultaneous, full-scale attack on all of NATO’s European fronts has effectively been removed.” But NATO documents indicated that these
weapons would still play an important political role in NATO’s strategy by ensuring “uncertainty
in the mind of any potential aggressor about the nature of the Allies’ response to military aggression. The above para is a pretty simplistic presentation of the US Cold War position (and mostly reflects the McNamara years). For a much more nuanced historical presentation that follows all the changes in doctrine see Nichols et al. "Tactical Nuclear Weapons and NATO" . And Russia did not shy from this view either: In 1999, at a time when renewed war in Chechnya seemed imminent, Moscow watched with great concern as NATO waged a high-precision military campaign in Yugoslavia. The conventional capabilities that the United States and its allies demonstrated seemed far beyond Russia’s own capacities. And because the issues underlying the Kosovo conflict seemed almost identical to those underlying the Chechen conflict, Moscow became deeply worried that the United States would interfere within its borders. By the next year, Russia had issued a new military doctrine whose main innovation was the concept of “de-escalation”—the idea that, if Russia were faced with a large-scale conventional attack that exceeded its capacity for defense, it might respond with a limited nuclear strike. To date, Russia has never publically invoked the possibility of de-escalation in relation to any specific conflict. But Russia’s policy probably limited the West’s options for responding to the 2008 war in Georgia. And it is probably in the back of Western leaders’ minds today, dictating restraint as they formulate their responses to events in Ukraine. The exact text was (in translation) The Russian Federation reserves the right to use nuclear weapons in response to the use of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction against it and (or) its allies, as well as in response to large-scale aggression utilizing conventional weapons in situations critical to the national security of the Russian Federation. The Russian Federation will not use nuclear weapons against states party to the Nonproliferation Treaty that do not possess nuclear weapons except in the event of an attack on the Russian Federation, the Russian Federation Armed Forces or other troops, its allies, or a state to which it has security commitments that is carried out or supported by a state without nuclear weapons jointly or in the context of allied commitments with a state with nuclear weapons. Formally this represented a departure from the Soviet declarations ... Although the Soviet Union had pledged that it would not be the first to use nuclear weapons, most Western observers doubted that it would actually observe this pledge in a conflict. Instead, analysts argue that the Soviet Union had integrated nuclear weapons into its
warfighting plans to a much greater degree than the United States. [...] The Soviet Union reportedly began to reduce its emphasis on nuclear warfighting strategies in the
mid-1980s, under Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev. He reportedly believed that the use of
nuclear weapons would be catastrophic. | {
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47,355 | Despite rhetoric to the contrary, did the Inspector General (Michael Atkinson- IGIC) determine that the whistle-blower's complaint appeared credible? This question can be answered factually. The question relates to a government process that resulted in a finding. | Yes, from the August 26 letter from the Inspector General to the Acting Director of National Intelligence as published by the NY Times : Having determined that the complaint relating to the urgent concern appears credible, I am transmitting to you this notice of my determination, along with the Complainant's Letter and Classified Appendix. | {
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47,360 | In the UK, parliamentary votes are usually public, so that MPs remain accountable for their actions. Since 2009, votes to choose the Speaker of the House of Commons have been taken by secret ballot. I am curious as to why this vote is done in secret. | The rule was introduced in 2001 , following the 2000 election of Michael Martin. That election took place "by means of a conventional parliamentary motion with recorded votes on an amendment for each candidate". Due to the large number of candidates, the repeated ballots took 6 hours. The process was also politically charged, with party whips lobbying MPs to vote for specific candidates, and Martin's election was controversial, since it broke with the tradition of alternating the role between the two main parties. The new rules, introducing an exhaustive secret ballot, were intended to speed up the process and make it less political. "In a significant departure, MPs will vote in a secret ballot, away from the eyes of the whips. A secret ballot also ensures that MPs will not be forced into voting for the most popular candidate out of a fear that their lack of support might be punished by the new Speaker in future debates." — Daily Telegraph, 20 May 2009 | {
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47,364 | I keep seeing articles in the US media recently, claiming that Iran is in violation of a 'nuclear deal'. For example: The head of Iran's nuclear program said on Monday that Tehran was now operating double the amount of advanced centrifuges than was previously known in violation of its atomic deal with world powers. NBC News - Iran spins more centrifuges on U.S. Embassy crisis anniversary Iran announced new violations of its collapsing nuclear deal with world powers as it also marked Monday the 40th anniversary of the 1979 student takeover of the U.S. Embassy ... The head of Iran's nuclear program, Ali Akbar Salehi, said the Middle Eastern nation is now operating 60 IR-6 advanced centrifuges in violation of its 2015 landmark atomic deal with world powers USA Today - Iran announces nuke deal violations 40 years after U.S. Embassy takeover, hostage crisis However, didn't Donald Trump withdraw the US nuclear deal with Iran ? In that case, in what sense can they be viewed as violating a deal that the US chose to cancel? | The deal was not only between the USA and Iran, as other countries and the EU were signatories : China France Germany European Union Russia United Kingdom The situation with those signatories is complicated, as neither they nor Iran have withdrawn from the treaty. Those signatories are not trading with Iran due to USA sanction regimes; the pact is formally in place even if the U.S. has withdrawn. Even if we ignore the above point and consider the nuclear deal extinct, the provisions of the deal could be considered a "measuring unit" to give some context to the public. For example, saying that "Iran has 1000 centrifuges" can be factual but not very informative; saying that "Iran has 1000 centrifuges while by the pact they agreed to have 500" gives more information and would definitely be different from "Iran has 1000 centrifuges while by the pact they agreed to have 999". | {
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47,372 | Right now, American politics is dominated by an impeachment inquiry into President Trump. The thing that caused this inquiry was a whistleblower's report about a phone call Trump made with the leader of Ukraine. Who did the whistleblower give his report to? And, how did it become public information? | The whistleblower made his report to the Inspector General of the Intelligence Community on August 12, 2019. 14 days later (August 26), the Inspector General determined that it was a credible report of an "urgent concern" (the statutory standard for this sort of report) and forwarded it to the Director of National Intelligence to forward to the Congressional intelligence committees within 7 days as provided by law. The DNI decided that the complaint did not need to be forwarded and refused to send it to the committees. 7 days after the deadline (September 9), the IG sent a letter to the intelligence committees informing them of the complaint's existence, the IG's determination that it was credible, and the DNI's refusal to forward it. The next day, the House intelligence committee sent a letter to the DNI demanding the complaint; 3 days later (September 13), they issued a subpoena and a press release , announcing the complaint's existence. | {
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47,385 | In November 2019, many polls (such as this ABC/Washington Post poll from November 5th) claimed that the Democratic candidates had double-digit leads over Trump. In the 2016 elections, however, polls suggested that Clinton would beat Trump, which turned out not to be the case. Based on this history, were these polls trustworthy? Or could they have been biased or inaccurate? | Fully-specified polls are perfectly trustworthy in terms of what polls actually indicate . Their topline results are not very reliable. Most people think of polls in various incorrect ways. The most common (and least meaningful) way is as a straight prediction of how people will vote on election day. Polls almost never try to indicate this. Even when hacks present them in a way that suggests that's what they show, they're usually not so honest about that. Consider a poll indicating a 85% chance of result A (and this is already a vague prediction), and a 15% chance of result B. That result certainly suggests that we're more likely to see A, but also indicates a nonzero chance of B. If the outcome turns out to be B, that doesn't mean that the poll was wrong . It was the assumption that an 85% prediction of A meant that A definitely would happen that is wrong, and that's not something that the poll claimed. And that "85% chance of A" is already an odd way to think about a polling result, though it's possible that a poll could be designed to indicate something like that. The correct way to interpret a poll is pretty involved-- you have to understand their sampling strategy, what assumptions get "baked in" to the information that comes out of the polls as a result, the margin of error, the response rate, the effect size the poll can detect based on its statistical power, and other factors. Different groups definitely release polls in more of a public relations context than a mathematical or scientific one. Understanding how those polls were conducted can reveal any shenanigans undertaken during the polling process, but a bigger issue is that groups with a strong advocacy will only publicize polls that illustrate the result they want on people's minds. Statistical information is generally internally consistent, and the fully specified protocol tells you exactly what the statistic means, and the context in which that meaning exists. If you are not permitted to review a poll's methodology, it is wise to be very skeptical of that poll. If you can review the methodology, then the poll indicates exactly what it was specified to indicate, with mathematical bounds on how precise that information can be. So polls about expected 2020 federal election results can be very trustworthy for what they actually measure (which is usually something like "if the election were held tomorrow..."), and that information is not quite meaningless regarding the actual 2020 election results. But they are not very strongly predictive. Anyone telling you that the correct interpretation of their poll means a specific result will happen in November of 2020 is either lying, expressing themselves poorly, or is an incompetent pollster/interpreter of polls. As a side-note, the national polls around the 2016 election were fairly accurate in terms of vote totals-- they were wrong about the distribution of votes with respect to electoral college votes, which happens to be more relevant to securing the Presidency. In-state poll results varied, but weren't off by that much that the polls should be considered worthless. Polls deal with likelihoods based off of current, incomplete information. It is very, very rare that a poll is meant to provide (let alone capable of providing) a reliable point estimate or a prediction of a clear, specific binary outcome. | {
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47,407 | Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are currently the two most prominent candidates campaigning for universal healthcare, as an expansion of Obama's original Affordable Care Act. However their plans are mostly focused on increased government funding and rarely mention any measures for decreasing the costs of healthcare such as: increasing the number of doctors, decreasing the costs of drugs, reducing the amount of red tape, restricting liability lawsuits, etc. However this seems to be of crucial importance as healthcare costs in the US are undeniably the highest in the whole world. Why is this the case? | This is a bit of a phony question on several levels. To answer, they absolutely HAVE emphasized the healthcare cost savings. First of all, you claim that they focus on "increased healthcare spending," in the title, but then you talk about increased GOVERNMENT spending in the body of the question. In a system that is based on PRIVATE, FOR-PROFIT healthcare financing, proposing that the increased government spending entirely eliminate the private sector spending does not equate to "increased healthcare spending." Indeed, the greater services and savings have been the central selling point for any candidates proposing a single-payer solution - Let’s just say, hypothetically, you are self-employed, and you have — you’ve got a husband and two kids, okay? Family of four. You know how much that family is paying today for health care? $28,000 a year. Are people going to pay more in taxes? Yes. But at the end of the day, the overwhelming majority of people are going to end up paying less for health care because they aren’t paying premiums, co-payments or deductibles. Bernie Sanders on the April 15, 2019 Fox News town hall Option 1: Maintain our current system, which will cost the country $52 trillion over ten years. And under that current system – 24 million people won’t have coverage, and millions can’t get long-term care. 63 million have coverage gaps or substandard coverage that could break down if they actually get sick. And millions who have health insurance will end up going broke at least in part from medical costs anyway. Together, the American people will pay $11 trillion of that bill themselves in the form of premiums, deductibles, copays, out-of-network, and other expensive medical equipment and care they pay for out-of-pocket - all while America’s wealthiest individuals and biggest companies pay far less in taxes than in other major countries. Option 2: Switch to my approach to Medicare for All, which would cost the country just under $52 trillion over ten years. Under this new system – Every person in America – all 331 million people – will have full health coverage, and coverage for long-term care. Everybody gets the doctors and the treatments they need, when they need them. No more restrictive provider networks, no more insurance companies denying coverage for prescribed treatments, and no more going broke over medical bills. The $11 trillion in household insurance and out-of-pocket expenses projected under our current system goes right back into the pockets of America’s working people. And we make up the difference with targeted spending cuts, new taxes on giant corporations and the richest 1% of Americans, and by cracking down on tax evasion and fraud. Not one penny in middle-class tax increases. That’s it. That’s the choice. Warren campaign website - Plans: Paying for Medicare For All The premise that the candidates are just talking about increasing spending and are not talking about the savings is a phony one. Edit/Addendum: When the Mercatus Institute's anti-social program "researcher," Charles Blahous published what was supposed to be a hit piece that highlighted the massive increase in tax revenues necessary for Medicare for all, it accidentally showed overall healthcare savings. In response, Sanders posted a Twitter video thanking the Koch Brothers (sponsors of that "think tank") and went on to emphasize the savings of "hundreds of billions every year" for Medicare for All. Sander's Tweet: Thank you Koch Brothers! | {
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47,520 | There are several rich "Muslim" states in Middle East: Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, Bahrain and so on. It seems that none of them want to receive Syrian, Iraqi, North African and other Muslim refugees. Besides sectarian reasons, if any, why do Muslim refugees seem to prefer Europe over those rich Middle Eastern countries? Do those rich Middle Eastern states not want to take refugees? | The premise in your question, about Muslims preferring Europe over rich Middle-Eastern countries, is false. In fact, Syrian refugees prefer neighbouring Middle-Eastern countries over rich ones. More than 6 million Syrians are internally displaced within their own country, accounting for about half (49%) of all displaced Syrians
worldwide. More than 5 million displaced Syrians live in neighboring countries in the Middle East and North Africa. Turkey (3.4 million) Lebanon (1 million) Jordan (660,000) Iraq (250,000) Egypt (130,000) About 1 million displaced Syrians have moved to Europe as asylum seekers or refugees since the conflict began Germany (500,000) Sweden (110,000) Austria (50,000) About 100,000 displaced Syrians live outside Europe, Africa and the Middle East, primarily in North America Canada (52,000) USA (21,000) Source: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/01/29/where-displaced-syrians-have-resettled/ | {
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47,583 | Setting aside usually polarised US politics, the situation (at least for an outsider like me) looks quite bizarre. The identity of the whistle blower has been common knowledge among anyone who bothered to care for quite some time: Realclearinvestigation posted article pointing towards him on 30th of October Politico run an article, Apparently Fox News aired the name Reportedly, the impeachment committee accidentally published the name in their proceedings, though it has been disputed whether that was, in fact, the real whistleblower. However, despite their identity no longer being even a public secret, there appear to have been many efforts to stop the spread of this information: When the link to Politico was enthusiastically retweeted by Trump jr it caused outrage, with many suggesting that by spreading their identity he may have committed a crime . Tim Pool claimed in a videocast that he got suspended from Facebook for using that name. What are logical reasons for such efforts to hide the identity of a person who is already well known? Are there any genuine reasons at this moment? Or is it just partisanship or an issue that some high ranking people in the media do not understand how information is spread on Internet, so they do something that could have worked maybe two decades ago? [EDIT: I received here a quite many answers, explaining why outing whistleblowers is generally a wrong idea and should not be condoned. While reasonable and well thought, they nevertheless somewhat miss the second part of the question. As on non-mainstream websites the name already fights with Epstein for popularity among memes inspiration, I simply don't see how trying not to utter this name on more mainstream sources changes the situation] | Mistaken identity It's not clear that the person named by RealClearInvestigations is the actual whistleblower. According to mediabiasfactcheck.com , that website has mixed factual reporting and has frequently run "emotionally loaded headlines" of which they give a few examples. Given the uncertainty as to whether this is the actual whistleblower, it's not surprising that other news outlets are hesitant to pick it up. If it turns out this isn't the whistleblower then they will be called out to have spread fake news. The same can be said about social media, they will be careful not to be promoting or providing a platform for fake news, especially in such a high profile case. If this person isn't the whistleblower and something does happen to him, then those who provided a platform may well be called out. Facebook is already under pressure from congress for not doing enough against fake news . It's not looking for more bad news when there's little to be gained. Legal reasons CNN has an article on whether it's illegal to out the whistle blower. They have two experts weigh in and the conclusion is that it's not illegal per se unless revealing their identity is retaliatory. To quote their experts: Revealing the whistleblower's name does not clearly fall under one of these categories. However, Robert Litt, former general counsel for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence under Obama, argues it could be considered retaliatory if the individual disclosing the name is also a member of the intelligence community. Noting that "there is liability for intelligence community employees who retaliate against an intelligence whistleblower," Litt said, "revealing the name could lead to the claim that you've created a hostile work environment and that's a form of retaliation." Given the formal whistleblower protections enshrined in law, Michael German, a former FBI agent and a fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice's Liberty and National Security Program, said Paul's statement is "not quite accurate." "If the purpose of revealing this alleged whistleblower's name is retaliatory, then obviously it's prohibited by law," German said. However, even if a whistleblower feels they could make the case they're facing retaliation, German told CNN "the protections are very weak." "If a whistleblower makes a complaint about retaliation, that goes through an internal process," German said. However, because those viewing the case are part of the same organization as those accused of the retaliatory actions, German said, "it's hard for whistleblowers to get a fair hearing. It's a completely closed process." The CNN article goes on to name the specific law (which is not specific to whistleblower protections) that German alludes to: According to statute 18 USC § 1513(e), "whoever knowingly, with the intent to retaliate, takes any action harmful to any person, including interference with the lawful employment or livelihood of any person, for providing to a law enforcement officer any truthful information relating to the commission or possible commission of any Federal offense, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both." | {
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47,589 | A recent CNN article says: Germany's President Frank-Walter Steinmeier has asked for Poland's forgiveness 80 years after the start of World War II.
"I stand before you, those who have survived, before the descendants of the victims, the old and the young residents of Wielun, I am humbled and grateful," Steinmeier said during a ceremony in the Polish city of Wielun, the site of one of the first Nazi bombings in the country on September 1, 1939. "I bow to the victims of the attack in Wielun, I pay tribute to the Polish victims of German tyranny and I ask for forgiveness," he said. 1st Sep, 2019, in Wieluń (Poland): Polish President Andrzej Duda and German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier commemorated the first victims of World War II But if you travel to Germany, you will find monuments portraying German soldiers of WWII as heroes. Here is an example . The inscription on the monument says, "1939-1945. Sie gaben ihr alles ihr Leben ihr Blut sie gaben es hin mit heiligem Mut für uns." My translation: "1939-1945. They gave everything, their lives, their blood, they gave it for us with their divine courage." (To answer a question raised in the comments below, this particular monument is in Damp, Kreis Rendsburg-Eckenförde, and you can find this monument on this website .) Here are some German monuments that contain a list of soldier names and dates of death: link1 , link2 , link3 , link4 , link5 , link6 , link7 . If you pay attention to the dates of death in these pictures, you will easily find 1941, 1940, and even 1939. We all know that practically all German soldiers who died those years died as aggressors outside their home country. The last two links, namely link6 and link7 , show monuments whose inscriptions explicitly refer to German soldiers of WWII as Helden (heroes): the inscription on the first of these two monuments says, "Unseren gefallenen Helden" (which translates as "to our fallen heroes"), and the inscription on the other monument is, "Dem Andenken Ihrer toten Helden aus Dankbarkeit" (which translates as "to the memory of your dead heroes out of gratitude). My question: Should the apology statements like Steinmeier's be taken as truly representative of the views and feelings actually dominating in the population of Germany? | Outside a small fringe group, there is a broad consensus in Germany that starting WW2 was wrong. That is not incompatible with the idolization of German soldiers who fought in the war, though. For a long time (I would say roughly after the war until the 80s), many Germans blamed the political leadership (i.e. Hitler and the other Nazi leaders) essentially for both starting and for losing the war. War crimes and the holocaust were blamed almost exclusively on the SS. The Wehrmacht was assumed to have followed orders and "fought honorably". Once they started to be seen as heroes, the 20th July plotters were coopted into this picture, as they were Wehrmacht members. That this happened in 1944, and that many of those plotters actively contributed to the wars of aggression in 1939–1942, is pushed aside. This is the context of those monuments. The movement of 1968 in Germany was not just anti-capitalist, but also directed against what was perceived by the youth as an insufficient discontinuity to Nazi Germany. In the 90s, there was a somewhat controversial exhibition on war crimes committed by the Wehrmacht (the so-called Wehrmachtsausstellung ). The understanding of "duty" changed. Some conservatives would still agree with plaques as the ones you mentioned, but it is almost unimaginable for sentiments like those to be uttered by a mainstream politician these days. | {
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47,602 | I have recently visited Rome for about a week and the city looks as if the municipality has serious issues maintaining the city. Many monuments are well maintained, the public transportation is quite reliable, but everything else seem to be rather poorly maintained: there is garbage almost everywhere. While this might be explained by the large number of tourists during the season (large crowds typically leave a lot of garbage behind), this is strange in November when the number visitors heavily decreases (off-season, more rain) several subway stations seem to be full of structural dampness which might affect people's health condition air pollution seem to be very high graffiti can be seen virtually everywhere (this is especially true after the stores close) This RT article mentions a large public debt of about €12 billion, which might explain the difficulties. The city’s debt essentially consists of financial and commercial debt,
with other types affecting the figure to a lesser extent. Basically,
and perhaps unsurprisingly, more than half of the debt is in the hands
of banks, whereas private debt makes up just over a quarter of the €12
billion. However, this is rather strange if we look at the figures from tourism: Rome is the 3rd most visited city in the EU, after London and Paris,
and receives an average of 7–10 million tourists a year, which
sometimes doubles on holy years. (..) Rome charges a tourism tax which contributes towards the maintenance of public transportation and
infrastructure. It ranges from €3 to €7 per person, per night, based
on the hotel or other type of accommodation used. Rome, already Italy's biggest destination, was the chief beneficiary
of the boom: the capital's tourist takings rose by 20.3 percent last
year, to €6.74 billion Question: Why does Rome municipality seem to have a hard time maintaining the city? I am interested in answers that provide a local politics perspective, focusing on causes that are related to town hall or city council. | This article has a lengthy backstory. In short, it's been corruption scandal after corruption scandal for the past half decade or so, on a backdrop of mobsters running rampant. Also, Rome only has one waste processing plant, which is buckling under the strain. Crime families in Italy have long held control over large parts of the country's waste management systems. In 2014 the capital was shaken by revelations that the city administration had, for years, been infiltrated by a mafia-style network which syphoned off millions of euros destined for public services. [...] Italy's anti-corruption body in 2015 warned Rome lacked the "antibodies" necessary to fight the infiltration of gangsters. | {
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47,705 | One of the big deals right now is the question of whether there was quid-pro-quo in the July 25 phone call between president Trump and Zelinsky. Isn't every conversation with the US president a form of quid-pro-quo? The US president is one of the most powerful people in the world. If the president is asking a favor from another head of state, won't they automatically understand that? In fact, other head of states want the US persident to like them and treat them well, right? In another words, they are exchanging what the US president wants for a favorable disposition towards them, which can result in aid or policies that could help them, or bring some other benefits to them. So, isn't it always quid-pro-quo? | Isn't every conversation with the US president a form of quid-pro-quo? Possibly, though it depends on what's in the quid pro quo if it matters. In the case of withholding congressional approved security assistance until the Ukrainians investigate a domestic political opponent, there are two things wrong: It's not up to the president to withhold the assistance. 1 The president isn't supposed to use his office to go after his political opponents. Furthermore, it's exactly contrary to the foreign policy the US is trying to promote in Ukraine (one without political investigations). Or, as we heard on the first day of the public impeachment hearings (as transcribed by rev.com ): Daniel Goldman: (04:16) Mr. Ken, is pressuring Ukraine to conduct what I believe you’ve called political investigations, a part of US foreign policy to promote the rule of law in Ukraine and around the world? Mr. Kent: (04:29) It is not. Daniel Goldman: (04:31) Is it in the national interest of the United States? Mr. Kent: (04:34) In my opinion, it is not. Daniel Goldman: (04:36) Why not? Mr. Kent: (04:37) Because our policies, particularly in promoting the rule of law, are designed to help countries, and in Eastern Europe and central Europe, that is overcoming the legacy of communism. In the communist system in particular, the prosecutor general office was used to suppress and persecute citizens, not promote the rule of law. So in helping these countries reach their own aspirations to join the Western community of nations and live lives of dignity, helping them have the rule of law with strong institutions is the purpose of our policy. Daniel Goldman: (05:13) So in other words, it is a purpose of our foreign policy to encourage foreign nations to refrain from conducting political investigations. Is that right? Mr. Kent: (05:24) Correct. And in fact, as a matter of policy not of programming, we oftentimes raise our concerns usually in private with countries that we feel are engaged in selective political prosecution and persecution of their opponents. In conclusion, it's not so much that foreign policy doesn't or shouldn't rely on quid pro quo, because it does. The problem is the type of quid pro quo, it should not be used to benefit (elected) official personally, it should be in the interest of their country. 1 In reply to Sjoerd's comments, it is considered unusual for OMB, the Office of Management and Budget, to block the funds in the way that this has been done. To quote from Laura Cooper's testimony before congress, "the top Pentagon official overseeing U.S. policy regarding Ukraine" , testified as reported by NBC News : "Well, I'm not an expert on the law, but in that meeting immediately deputies began to raise concerns about how this could be done in a legal fashion because there was broad understanding in the meeting that the funding — the State Department funding related to an earmark for Ukraine and that the DOD funding was specific to Ukraine security assistance. So the comments in the room at the deputies' level reflected a sense that there was not an understanding of how this could legally play out. And at that meeting the deputies agreed to look into the legalities and to look at what was possible," she said, according to the transcript. At the next meeting with national security personnel, she said she told attendees "there were two legally available mechanisms should the President want to stop assistance" — a presidential rescission notice to Congress or for the Defense Department to do "a reprogramming action." "But I mentioned that either way, there would need to be a notification to Congress," she said, according to the transcript. Asked if that happened, Cooper said, "That did not occur." | {
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47,806 | I am coming from a UK perspective; we lost our AAA credit rating in 2013, and dropped again in 2017 after the referendum on European Union membership. It was reported last week that we are set to be downgraded yet again. How does credit rating of a country affect the common man in the street? Should they be worried about their countries credit rating? What can they do about it? | First of all, what does the credit rating of a country actually mean ? The credit rating of a sovereign country is calculated by privately owned rating agencies using algorithms and formulas they invented themselves. Different rating agencies don't always agree on the rating of every country. These ratings are supposed to serve as a guideline for investors how likely a government is to default on its debt (refuses to pay back loan installments in a timely manner). This in turn tells investors what interest rate they should expect when they lend money to a government (usually in form of buying government bonds ). That means the better the credit rating, the lower the interest rate a government has to pay when it takes on debt. The rating agencies calculate that rating by estimating various factors, for example: Credit history (has the government defaulted on its debt in recent history?) Political stability (is it likely that there will be a change in government and the new government refuses to pay back the debt of the old one?) Currency stability (a good way to cheat creditors out of their money is to devalue ones currency until the debt isn't worth anything anymore. So a high rate of inflation reduces the credit rating) Total government debt compared to gross domestic product (is the state able to pay back the debt it already has?) Economic stability (Is it likely that the GDP stay the way it is?) When a government has a large amount of debt and a bad credit rating, then a large part of its tax revenue has to be paid to pay interest on that debt. That money is now no longer available to pay for public expenses. How does that affect the average woman on the street? The better the credit rating of her government, the more of her taxes go back into government programs like education, police, infrastructure or social security. With a worse credit rating, taxes are instead used to pay off investors who lent money to her government. It doesn't affect her own credit rating in case she wants to take a personal loan (at least not directly). But note that most of the factors which affect the credit rating of a country also have direct effects on the quality of life of the population of the country. That means a bad credit rating is a secondary indicator that there is a lot of stuff going wrong in a country. What can the common woman on the street do to improve the credit rating of her country? Not much, except putting politicians in power who care about improving the metrics outlined above, working hard to keep the economy stable and productive and paying her taxes. For more information on sovereign credit ratings, check out this article . | {
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47,832 | I live in Germany, and it seems completely strange to see a stable separation between Republicans and Democrats, and even somewhat near half of the votes for each. I see that the number of two parties is based on the method of voting . But is that the complete reason? Here, there are separate parties that potentially need to build a coalition to reach 50% or more of the votes. The parties can have a small number of votes, down to 5%, but there are two large parties that are somewhat similar in terms of the separation between Republicans and Democrats. If none of them get 50% of votes, they need to accept to include one or more other parties into the government, and sometimes it's even the two largest parties. The last case would be similar to Republicans and Democrats building a government together. Currently, both parties are relevant as some component of the government - but in a different way. Basically, the hard separation - so hard I would even call it a front, feels somewhat strange. Why does it exist? | The answer is First Past The Post . The nature of the voting system is such that many people who would rather support a 3rd Party feel compelled to vote against the party that they like the least, rather than for the party they support the most, because their preferred candidate is unlikely to win the race anyway and thus they are simply removing support from whichever of the two main party's candidates that they hate the least. This means support gravitates towards the two parties that are seen as being most likely to win the election overall. In Germany you use MMR which, in addition to a FPTP element, also introduces a proportional representation element that means smaller parties are also often elected (since there's no reason not to vote for your actual preference under proportional representation). There are other factors. As @RayButterworth handily points out, nationalist sentiment can create strong blocs such as the Scottish National Party in the United Kingdom or Bloc Québécois in Canada - parties which are strongly focused on regional autonomy or even secessionism. The US lacks such sentiment in any great amount these days (probably an artifact of the nation's history so far) which means there's not that party drawing off support. As @CoedRhyfelwr points out there's also the US constitutional arrangements to consider. Unlike in a parliamentary democracy, where election of a legislature is also the election of a government in proxy, the US system of directly electing the executive branch means that parties do not need to enter into coalitions to govern ; there is after all only one President. That being the case, they possibly feel less inclined to compromise with one another. Tl;dr yes, it's mostly because of the voting methods, but there's some history and constitutional structural reasons too. | {
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47,856 | As far as I can tell, the anonymous whistleblower report filed by an intelligence officer about President Trump’s interactions with the leader of Ukraine is what got the whole Trump impeachment investigation started. At this point, however, others have openly testified about the the same things described in the report. Still, the question of the whistleblower's identity seems to be attracting a lot of attention. President Trump claims to knows who the whistleblower was and Nancy Pelosi has said that she'll: "make sure [Trump] does not intimidate the whistleblower." At this point though, why is it so important who the whistleblower is? Even if they never spoke to them again, haven't other witnesses said the exact same things? | In terms of what new information of substance can the whistle-blower bring to the fore that is not already confirmed or refuted by more closely engaged sources, there is no purpose and nothing for the whistle-blower to offer. Since the allegations have been corroborated, and more, it seems, the purpose of the whistle-blower is more key for the defense of Trump - as a distraction from the facts and evidence in the case. Consider, that when the report was initially made, the defense you'd hear from the GOP and conservatives was that this person had nothing of value to offer, as their perspective was not "first hand." Now, the counter-argument was that the report and examination of the claims led to more direct corroboration, so bringing the issues to light was important, but the whistle-blower, himself/herself and what they had to say (already in the report), was less important than offering a map of where to look and who to talk to. So, the same people, who previously, before any witnesses were heard, were discounting the value of anything this person had to say, now think it is very important to talk to them, even though they don't have anything more to offer than what was in the report, and certainly less than other sources who have spoken to the same issues. But as a distraction, the defense is to hope to throw ancillary issues that have no probative value into the mix, and make a muddled mess of things. Supposedly, it is important to find out if this person had a partisan agenda, if they hated Trump, if they ever lied about anything in their lives, if they had ever "leaked" information. None of that matters. If I hate a person, and see them shoot someone dead in the street, and I report it, maybe if my claim is the only piece of evidence, it might be looked at with skepticism. If my reporting it leads to the police talking to other witnesses who saw the events, pulling camera footage that objectively documents the events..... how does my own feelings about the person impact the veracity of the claims and facts? It does not. This person followed the documented procedure for raising an issue, by the book. To eliminate bias and false claims, the process has a review by an independent, objective party - the Inspector General. If the Inspector General finds that the claims are "credible and urgent," THEN it is supposed to be forwarded. The IG did find this, so, again, whatever their motivations, whatever their goals, an independent party without the same agenda, bias and feelings assessed the claims to be credible. Whether the person ever "leaked" information is irrelevant, because this was not a leak - the proper procedure was followed by the whistle-blower. Whether the person ever lied about anything is irrelevant, as these claims have been independently vetted and corroborated. So, if you are searching for the truth about what happened, and are seeking useful information, the whistle-blower has nothing of value to offer to the process, at this point. Their valuable input started and ended with the filing of the report, and with the contents of the report. If you want to create an imaginary conspiracy of some sort as a lifeline to those desperate to deny the facts in evidence, then the whistle-blower has value as an imaginary boogey-man. | {
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47,869 | According to a leaked source , the Labour government plans to introduce VAT on private school fees to pay for free meals for all primary school pupils. But isn’t this clearly illegal under EU law? The EU council directive on VAT Article 132, section I and J says: Member States shall exempt the following transactions: [...] (i) the provision of children's or young people's education, school or university education, vocational training or retraining, including the supply of services and of goods closely related thereto, by bodies governed by public law having such as their aim or by other organisations recognised by the Member State concerned as having similar objects; (j) tuition given privately by teachers and covering school or university education; | In terms of what new information of substance can the whistle-blower bring to the fore that is not already confirmed or refuted by more closely engaged sources, there is no purpose and nothing for the whistle-blower to offer. Since the allegations have been corroborated, and more, it seems, the purpose of the whistle-blower is more key for the defense of Trump - as a distraction from the facts and evidence in the case. Consider, that when the report was initially made, the defense you'd hear from the GOP and conservatives was that this person had nothing of value to offer, as their perspective was not "first hand." Now, the counter-argument was that the report and examination of the claims led to more direct corroboration, so bringing the issues to light was important, but the whistle-blower, himself/herself and what they had to say (already in the report), was less important than offering a map of where to look and who to talk to. So, the same people, who previously, before any witnesses were heard, were discounting the value of anything this person had to say, now think it is very important to talk to them, even though they don't have anything more to offer than what was in the report, and certainly less than other sources who have spoken to the same issues. But as a distraction, the defense is to hope to throw ancillary issues that have no probative value into the mix, and make a muddled mess of things. Supposedly, it is important to find out if this person had a partisan agenda, if they hated Trump, if they ever lied about anything in their lives, if they had ever "leaked" information. None of that matters. If I hate a person, and see them shoot someone dead in the street, and I report it, maybe if my claim is the only piece of evidence, it might be looked at with skepticism. If my reporting it leads to the police talking to other witnesses who saw the events, pulling camera footage that objectively documents the events..... how does my own feelings about the person impact the veracity of the claims and facts? It does not. This person followed the documented procedure for raising an issue, by the book. To eliminate bias and false claims, the process has a review by an independent, objective party - the Inspector General. If the Inspector General finds that the claims are "credible and urgent," THEN it is supposed to be forwarded. The IG did find this, so, again, whatever their motivations, whatever their goals, an independent party without the same agenda, bias and feelings assessed the claims to be credible. Whether the person ever "leaked" information is irrelevant, because this was not a leak - the proper procedure was followed by the whistle-blower. Whether the person ever lied about anything is irrelevant, as these claims have been independently vetted and corroborated. So, if you are searching for the truth about what happened, and are seeking useful information, the whistle-blower has nothing of value to offer to the process, at this point. Their valuable input started and ended with the filing of the report, and with the contents of the report. If you want to create an imaginary conspiracy of some sort as a lifeline to those desperate to deny the facts in evidence, then the whistle-blower has value as an imaginary boogey-man. | {
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47,948 | Ambassador Sondland donated 1 million dollars to Trumps inauguration, and then was appointed to a high profile ambassadorship. He never worked in the government previously, has no credentials, no experience in international diplomacy, but somehow found himself in a high value role in the state department. Why has this not been investigated and treated as a Pay to Play appointment? This seems like the easiest of all charges that Democrats could be charging against Trump. | This has a long tradition in the US . Before World War II, most ambassadors were actually political appointees rather than career diplomats. Trump might be marginally worse than Obama and reverted back to a level of political appointment last seen under FDR but everybody is doing it. Consequently, using this as a charge would promptly backfire for Democrats. | {
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47,954 | As I understand, the current vice president Mike Pence is next in line for the presidency should president Trump be removed from office. However, there's some links between Mike Pence and the Ukrainian "quid pro quo" issue, i.e., the underlying issue which has led to consideration of impeachment of president Trump ( CNN ). Putting aside whether Pence has done things considered impeachable, I'm wondering if it's theoretically possible to pre-impeach him. (As opposed to first impeaching Trump, then instating Pence as president, then impeaching Pence.) Question : Is it possible to impeach (pre-impeach?) US Vice President Pence first? | I don't think "pre-impeach" is the right word because Congress has the power to impeach the VP or any other "civil officer" , not just the president. According to article 2 of the constitution, as stated by Wikipedia : The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors. Since the Vice President can be impeached separately from the President, Congress could simply impeach him now directly instead of waiting for him to become President. | {
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47,963 | Are there any arguments for Trump not getting impeached, besides the argument that Ukraine actually did not do anything so the quid pro quo never happened? EDIT: To be clear, I'm not asking for an argument that can be supported/justified with reasons, I'm just looking for ALL the arguments that have been made. | Assuming you're asking for the Republicans' arguments, there are some more including: that aid being withheld was not linked to the investigation into the Bidens, e.g. that
aid was being withheld for general corruption concerts regarding Ukraine. (The Rep. from Ohio on intelligence committee [Jim Jordan] often takes this line in his questions.) that Hunter Biden's participation in Burisma at least had the appearance of impropriety, so that asking for an investigation in his involvement was not unseemly. Several witnesses in the hearing were asked (by Republicans) about their opinion on Hunter Biden's qualifications in relation to Burisma for example, as a way to suggest that Hunter Biden was receiving undeserved money. (Can't recall exactly who asked this, but at least Kent and Sondland were asked this same question, days apart.) that Democrats manufactured the whole concern with a phony whistleblower, who had political motives... and that those career federal employees who back him up are "Never Trumpers". This is probably the line that Trump himself likes best. | {
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47,973 | The news articles appear to focus strongly on those notes that say "I WANT NO QUID PRO QUO" and the like. I appear to be missing the relevance of this, since the news seems to be focusing on the fact that these notes exist. They appear to be fairly obvious - talking points for speaking with the media with the same message that's been said from the beginning. Is there more to those notes that I'm missing, or is it perhaps a need to fill stories with what is most publicly interesting at the moment? | What the note says, how it is written, and specifically, that the Ukrainian president's name is misspelled in the note tell us a lot about the thought processes of Donald Trump in making his statement. The note itself shows us what Trump thought most important in what he said. The notes say so much, less about what Trump said or Sondland
testified — the ambassador stated explicitly before Congress that
Ukraine had been subject to a quid pro quo — than how he views himself
in this moment. “THE FINAL WORD FROM THE PRES OF THE U.S.” sounds more
like a dictum from the great and powerful Oz than from a
democratically elected leader. The misspelling of Ukraine president
Volodymyr Zelensky's name betrays a casual disregard for even the most
basic facts of the matter. And the giant lettering supports the
operating theory that Trump refuses to wear glasses that he sorely
needs. The public would have none of that additional insight without Wilson’s
photograph. https://www.wired.com/story/trump-notes-photographer/ | {
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47,985 | If I understand correctly, in the United States, charges are currently being brought against President Trump on the suspicion of enlisting the assistance of foreign governments with re-election, in a procedure called impeachment . Why does this trial involve politicians? Firstly, that would seem to violate separation of powers. Secondly, those deciding on guilt are not neutral. In a regular trial, a suspect is considered guilty if the jury decides so unanimously. Following a US impeachment, the suspect is considered guilty if 2/3rds of the members of the Senate consider so. It seems reasonable to suspect that Senators may be biased based on their political alignment. In Israel, Prime Minister Nethanyahu is indicted on the suspicion of corruption , but this trial is run by independent¹ courts, not by fellow politicians. I am aware Israel has a parliamentary system and the USA a presidential system, but I don't see why that makes any difference. Why are politicians involved in deciding on the guilt of other politicians? ¹Independent at least in theory. In practice, it always depends on the people. | If I understand correctly, in the United States, charges are currently being brought against President Trump You understand incorrectly. It has been asserted that President Trump may have done those things that you mentioned, but he has not yet been charged with anything. There is no criminal proceeding currently taking place in Congress that will result in the President being formally accused of a crime. Impeachment is not a criminal trial, but a political process. Impeachment can be done for any reason Congress can agree upon. What is taking place in the House of Representatives is an investigative hearing to determine whether or not the President did anything worthy of removing him from office. If the House decides to vote to impeach the President at the conclusion of those hearings, then the Senate has the task of determining whether or not he should be removed from office. This is occasionally referred to as a "trial" but it is not a criminal trial. If the President were to be removed from office, he would simply no longer be the President or be eligible to be President in the future. Whether he would then be subject to criminal prosecution is a separate question. Why does this trial involve politicians? Because it's a political process to determine whether the President should be removed from office, not a trial to determine if he is guilty of a crime and what punishment he should receive under the law. Firstly, that would seem to violate separation of powers. No, actually, it does not. Congress is explicitly given this power to check the President. Criminal indictments originate from the Executive Branch, so it would violate separation of powers to immediately treat these sorts of things as routine criminal matters, because the President would have to decide to accuse himself of a crime. The issues with this are the basis of a longstanding opinion in the Justice Department that sitting Presidents cannot be indicted in criminal proceedings while they are President. Secondly, those deciding on guilt are not neutral. Guilt is not being decided, merely whether the President should be removed. It is a political question, and is thus best left to people who represent the interests of the people in political questions, e.g. Congress. In a US impeachment, the suspect is considered guilty if 2/3rds of the members of the Senate consider so. It seems reasonable to suspect that Senators may be biased based on their political alignment. The political alignment of the Senate is determined by how people voted. Given that this is a political process and not a criminal proceeding, the biased nature of how the proceeding will proceed is a feature and not a bug, because said biased nature is reflective of how people from different parts of the country think about politics. Unlike a jury trial, the Senate's role is not to be the finders of fact in a criminal proceeding. In Israel, Prime Minister Nethanyahu is indicted on the suspicion of corruption, but this trial is run by independent courts, not by fellow politicians. I am aware Israel has a parliamentary system and the USA a presidential system, but I don't see why that makes any difference If Benjamin Nethanyahu were President of the United States instead of Prime Minister of Israel, he would need to be impeached before being indicted, because it is understood that the sitting President cannot be indicted, as I stated earlier. I do not know why the opposite situation is the operative one in Israel. Why are politicians involved in deciding on the guilt of other politicians? They aren't. | {
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48,016 | Recently, the US Senate passed a bill about the situation in Hong Kong. Some core points from the bill: impose sanctions on Chinese officials review the special autonomous status it grants Hong Kong in trade considerations. For now US treats China and HK differently while trading. many words about commiting a freedom by the US The third point is less concrete and in fact, common in US foreign claims - so it is harmless. But first two are definitely not.
First two points look like an attempt to spread US laws to foreign countries. Can it formally be treated as foreign interference into China's inner dealings? | Yes the Senate bill can be framed as an attempt by the U.S. to influence China. Whether that is a bad thing or not depends on your own beliefs. The U.S. commonly uses trade restrictions and sanctions to attempt to bring about change in other nations that it believes are acting against the interests of the U.S.. Iran continually faces sanctions for their support of terror abroad and attempt to develop nuclear weapons. Russia also faced sanctions for annexing the Crimean peninsula. Countries try to influence each other all the time and through all different sorts of methods. Most countries accept it to a reasonable degree, China has become particularly more aggressive in spreading pro-China sentiment. There have been many people claim China is overplaying their hand, and backlash has been long overdue. China can claim this is an attempt to influence their inner dealings, but that doesn't really change anything for them unless they want to escalate tensions with the U.S. The U.S. interferes with pretty much every other country and has as they see fit since the end of WWII. | {
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48,017 | In the comments of this question , I came across this quote from Nixon: but when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal My common sense is telling me that logically, there must be some situations where what the president does is the law but it shouldn't be all the time. Was this quote "correct" in the day it was said and to what degree? Is there any ground to this claim and if there is, what is the situation required for this to be true? Is it still true? Any example situations are welcome that can serve to explain this to someone who's not really proficient in US Law. Let's take extreme and not so extreme examples, the president shot someone or he trafficked illegal drugs (directly committing the crime), the president pardoned a mob boss (aiding and abetting a criminal?), the president approved some operation which involved crimes and anything else you can think of. | The fuller context of the quote (emphasis on the part the question quoted): Frost: The wave of dissent, occasionally violent, which followed in the wake of the Cambodian incursion, prompted President Nixon to demand better intelligence about the people who were opposing him. To this end, the Deputy White House Counsel, Tom Huston, arranged a series of meetings with representatives of the CIA, the FBI, and other police and intelligence agencies. These meetings produced a plan, the Huston Plan, which advocated the systematic use of wiretappings, burglaries, or so-called black bag jobs, mail openings and infiltration against antiwar groups and others. Some of these activities, as Huston emphasized to Nixon, were clearly illegal. Nevertheless, the president approved the plan. Five days later, after opposition from J. Edgar Hoover, the plan was withdrawn, but the president's approval was later to be listed in the Articles of Impeachment as an alleged abuse of presidential power. So what in a sense, you're saying is that there are certain situations, and the Huston Plan or that part of it was one of them, where the president can decide that it's in the best interests of the nation or something, and do something illegal. Nixon: Well, when the president does it that means that it is not illegal. Frost: By definition. Nixon: Exactly. Exactly. If the president, for example, approves something because of the national security, or in this case because of a threat to internal peace and order of significant magnitude, then the president's decision in that instance is one that enables those who carry it out, to carry it out without violating a law. Otherwise they're in an impossible position. Frost: So, that in other words, really you were saying in that answer, really, between the burglary and murder, again, there's no subtle way to say that there was murder of a dissenter in this country because I don't know any evidence to that effect at all. But, the point is: just the dividing line, is that in fact, the dividing line is the president's judgment? Nixon: Yes, and the dividing line and, just so that one does not get the impression, that a president can run amok in this country and get away with it, we have to have in mind that a president has to come up before the electorate. We also have to have in mind, that a president has to get appropriations from the Congress. We have to have in mind, for example, that as far as the CIA's covert operations are concerned, as far as the FBI's covert operations are concerned, through the years, they have been disclosed on a very, very limited basis to trusted members of Congress. I don't know whether it can be done today or not. Frost: Pulling some of our discussions together, as it were; speaking of the Presidency and in an interrogatory filed with the Church Committee, you stated, quote, "It's quite obvious that there are certain inherently government activities, which, if undertaken by the sovereign in protection of the interests of the nation's security are lawful, but which if undertaken by private persons, are not." What, at root, did you have in mind there? Nixon: Well, what I, at root I had in mind I think was perhaps much better stated by Lincoln during the War between the States. Lincoln said, and I think I can remember the quote almost exactly, he said, "Actions which otherwise would be unconstitutional, could become lawful if undertaken for the purpose of preserving the Constitution and the Nation." Now that's the kind of action I'm referring to. Of course in Lincoln's case it was the survival of the Union in wartime, it's the defense of the nation and, who knows, perhaps the survival of the nation. Frost: But there was no comparison was there, between the situation you faced and the situation Lincoln faced, for instance? Nixon:This nation was torn apart in an ideological way by the war in Vietnam, as much as the Civil War tore apart the nation when Lincoln was president. Now it's true that we didn't have the North and the South— Frost: But when you said, as you said when we were talking about the Huston Plan, you know, "If the president orders it, that makes it legal", as it were: Is the president in that sense—is there anything in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights that suggests the president is that far of a sovereign, that far above the law? Nixon: No, there isn't. There's nothing specific that the Constitution contemplates in that respect. I haven't read every word, every jot and every title, but I do know this: That it has been, however, argued that as far as a president is concerned, that in war time, a president does have certain extraordinary powers which would make acts that would otherwise be unlawful, lawful if undertaken for the purpose of preserving the nation and the Constitution, which is essential for the rights we're all talking about. Clearly there are things which when authorized by the president become legal. E.g. the declassification of materials (as Peter's comment exemplified), the strike on a foreign terrorist abroad (well, at least as far US law is concerned) and so forth, i.e. almost anything that falls under the remit of an executive order. But Nixon's concrete example, the wiretappings he ordered, ultimately were probably not legal for him to order, although he didn't have to stand up in a criminal court to defend them because Ford pardoned him . But Nixon did resign essentially over those, so the part where he says he was responsible in front of the electorate turned out true in a sense. And some of the operatives that carried out some of Nixon's Houston Plan as well as some of his advisers were actually convicted and imprisoned so at least their actions were clearly deemed illegal, despite what Nixon claimed. There was actually a grand jury criminal indictment against Nixon, the full text of which was released to the public only in 2018; as summarized : The documents released today also include the criminal indictment, approved by a grand jury, against President Nixon on four criminal counts: bribery, conspiracy, obstruction of justice and obstruction of a criminal investigation. (In general, grand jury information is protected by Federal rules on criminal procedure.) These documents had been made available to the House Judiciary Committee when it was deliberating whether to impeach Nixon, but had not been [fully] entered into the public domain. | {
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48,076 | I’ve heard mixed reports as to his involvement; some reports describe him as a broker of peace whose efforts brought an early end to the Troubles, while others describe him as a terrorist sympathizer who repeatedly met with and supported militants from the IRA. Is it possible to put aside opinion as much as is sensible and give an objective account of his involvement? | There's no evidence that Corbyn advocates terrorism or other kinds of violence and he has consistently stated his opposition to violence. If "sympathise" means agree, approve, favourable to, support, Corbyn did openly "sympathise" with the IRA's ultimate goal of a united republican Ireland, but he does not appear to "sympathise" with violence. Corbyn's position is that he wanted to aid the peace process (we can only speculate about his contribution). But a public relations challenge for Corbyn is that he has historically behaved so as to provide many opportunities to be portrayed as a "terrorist sympathiser" - and not just in relation to the IRA but with Hamas and Hezbollah too. He has also appeared to deny or refuse to acknowledge their terrorist acts. There are patterns of behaviour since his public life began. It is unclear whether he understands that or is bothered by it but it is clear that many won't forgive him for it. Corbyn has repeatedly avoided unequivocally condemning IRA violence when asked, choosing instead to condemn the violence on both sides or all bombing, and attended meetings with and vigils for people associated with terrorism. He has referred to these people as "friends", "honoured citizens" and such, rather than neutral terms. Corbyn met with Sinn Féin's leader Gerry Adams several times during The Troubles in the 1980s. Sinn Féin (rightly or wrongly) considered the political wing of the IRA with interchangable membership and Gerry Adams was alleged (he denies it) to be part of the IRA's leadership - at the very least having some influence. Such meetings were very controversial in that period. Two weeks after the IRA's Brighton hotel bombing intended to assassinate the Conservative party's leadership, including then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and which killed five people and injured over 30, Corbyn invited Gerry Adams and convicted terrorists Linda Quigley and Gerry MacLochlainn to the House of Commons. Labour's then Chief Whip Michael Corks commented , in the present climate of opinion this action must be regarded as
thoughtlessness of the highest order. Labour's leader Neil Kinnock was said to be appalled and furious. The meeting was also shortly before the first anniversary of the 1983 Harrods bombing, which killed six people and injured 90. Corks told the BBC, I think that, unless you are very very careful, any contact with
people of this sort gives credence to their cause, and unless you are
very careful that can lead to people thinking you are actually
indifferent to the outrage, the suffering, the killing and the maiming
which is the direct consequence of the actions of people who are
terrorists. Corbyn was unrepentant and said he'd do it again. Gerry MacLochlainn claimed to have visited Parliament several times, as a constituent of Corbyn's, and he was reportedly a regular at Corbyn's constituency office. Corbyn denies meeting anyone in the IRA. Two months later, the Guardian wrote of Corbyn : Mr Corbyn and a sizeable number of other left Labour MPs ... will
continue their sordid romantic infatuation with the Provisional IRA. Mr Corbyn's invitation to two convicted terrorists to meet him in the Commons in
October can be attacked on several grounds. It was a very stupid
political gesture from someone who is an elected member of a party
opposed to terrorism. It was appallingly timed, so soon after the
Brighton hotel bombing. ... We agree with Mr Ivor Stanbrook, the very
right-wing Conservative MP for Orpington, when he says that to stop
the public from meeting their MPs is to play into the hands of
democracy's enemies. But there is a time and a place for everything
and Mr Corbyn has little reason to feel proud of his judgment. | {
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48,100 | In following the ongoing story about a Chinese spy who defected to Australia , I see this paragraph about the breaking point for why the defection happened: He said that in Taiwan he was part of an infiltration operation that involved him – working under an assumed identity and with a South Korean passport – running local operatives tasked with meddling in last year's municipal elections and the presidential polls due to take place in January. The claim is that China issued this spy with a South Korean passport. I'm wondering how this is possible. Surely allowing another country to issue passports in one's country's name is very dangerous - they can now do great harm to one's country. The whole idea of declaring someone persona non grata would never work, because they can just be issued another passport and identity. Besides, sneaking one's spy into another country becomes a simple matter of giving them a passport of that country. So there must be barriers against this. What are those barriers? Why were they apparently ineffective in this situation? | China didn't issue anyone a genuine South Korean passport; only South Korea can do that - China allegedly issued a forged or counterfeit passport . But China is not alone in doing this, and this is nothing like a new thing. Criminals and intelligence agencies across the globe have done it since passports were invented - which is why passports have become ever more complicated to produce over the years (anti-forgery techniques, electronic tags, machine readable parts, etc). What are those barriers? As mentioned above, governments build many anti-forgery techniques into their identity documents these days - they may even issue general guidance on how to spot fake documents or validate real ones, which is important top third party countries when they are examining documents they did not issue themselves. Why were they apparently ineffective in this situation? Because intelligence agencies are very good at their jobs. | {
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48,138 | As far as I understand it, the pledge of allegiance is an oath or expression of allegiance to the United States, and is made by students in many (most?) schools throughout the USA, as well as at the start of Congressional sessions. Do any other countries have such an exercise? If not a pledge to their flag and republic, to something else, like a monarch or their parliament? | Indeed, there are other countries with ritualized pledges to flag and country: Pledge of Allegiance to the Phillipine Flag Pledge of Allegiance to the (South) Korean Flag Some other countries also have ritualized pledges expressing love of country and ideals, without specific reference to flags or symbolism: Rukun Negara, the Pledge to Malaysia National Pledge of India Singapore National Pledge Student Oath in Turkey | {
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48,223 | As a consequence of the recent developments in China, I’ve heard a lot of commentary which characterises authoritarianism as an inevitable consequence of a Communist state. How true is this statement? Is Communism by definition, inherently authoritarian? If not, are Communist states doomed to fall into authoritarianism in practice? Are there examples of Communist states either today or that have existed in the past which escape this definition? | It depends on what you mean by communism. If you mean what the Soviet-bloc states ended up like, then, yes, all historical examples of this communism were pretty authoritarian. If you want to indulge the [far] leftist theoreticians, no country achieved communism. Even the former Soviet bloc countries only declared themselves socialist and on the path to communism, but not entirely having completed it. So it's hard to say what something that never existed might be like. Of course, the theoreticians who praised this ideal communism probably would not accept that it has to be authoritarian, despite the "dictatorship of the proletariat" as a critical transitional phase . As the joke/saying goes, temporary things have a way of becoming permanent. Now regarding China nowadays, it's even further away from Soviet (or Maoist) style socialism, let alone ideal communism. Some have compared China to fascism or at least state capitalism , the justification for either being rather tricky on a pure Marxist basis. | {
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48,247 | Currently in Israel, a big political question that stands is whether grocery stores or other businesses should be open on Saturday (Shabbat, holy day for a large portion of business owners). Currently, the law stands that businesses that are open on Saturday will receive a fine and the responsibility of enforcing that law has been given to the smaller municipalities (from what I understood, some do not bother enforcing the law). From what I understand (I have not been living in Israel for a while) that argument of both sides is as follows: For closing businesses on Shabbat: A practicing jewish business-owner may lose in competition to secular businesses that are open on Saturdays (applies largely to grocery stores, such that the law is often referred to as "the grocery-stores law"). As Israel identifies as a Jewish country, it will be immoral to have a practicing jew unable to conduct business because of his belief in Judaism. Against closing businesses on Shabbat: secular life-style should not be undermined and the government should not enforce laws that are religious, as the country identifies as pluralistic and democratic (freedom of belief and practice). I am not sure about the enforcement of the law on the Christian and Muslim businesses in Israel (I believe that this is the reason why the law is enforced mainly by municipalities) As a north-american secular myself, I tend to favor the second argument and it was my very self-sufficient and naive belief that all progressive countries should not enforce laws to conform with a single religion. However, I have lived in Germany for a while and it just clicked to me that many businesses are not open on Sundays (to the point that it was very difficult to find a place to do groceries on a Sunday since I did not plan well my shopping throughout the week before). I did a small research and figured that there is actually a law enforcing this close-down on Sundays. I wanted to ask, did the law have any backlash with the secular population of Germany? and if such arose, how was it settled? Edit: I re-read my second paragraph and realized it may be passive-aggressive. I actually meant: since I became aware of the arguments for/against this law , I realized that is not necessarily an issue that determines a country to be progressive and pluralist, but an issue about relationship of the private with the public. | Many Germans who have friends and family really enjoy the fact that there is one "common day off" in the week which is the same for all family members. Going to church together has become rather uncommon, but the benefit for the family remains. Of course one cannot go shopping together on this "common day off," but that's where the golden rule comes in -- treat others as you would want them to treat you. Doctors and nurses work on Sundays. So do bakers and train conductors, television staff and gas station attendants. But as many people as possible get Sunday off. The Soviets tried to tinker with staggered days off to run factories every day, but this caused a rather unhappy population. There are occasional complaints of free market advocates who say that shops should be free to open any time they want, provided they can find customers and hire sales clerks. The usual answer is that the Ladenschlussgesetz is an important part of worker protection legislation and shouldn't be given up, because supermarkets and individual sales clerks are not negotiating on a level playing field. Another form of pushback are trade unions who negotiated a bonus for Sunday work. (Trade unions in Germany are stronger than in the US. I don't know about Israel in this regard.) | {
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48,306 | I'm an American so I don't have a total grasp of UK politics but my understanding is that when the Queen of the UK dies, the country shuts down for a few days. It's also my understanding that prior to a general election, parliament is dissolved. Now there were rumours earlier today that the Queen died (she didn't) but it made me think: what would happen to the UK if the Queen (or another monarch) died immediately prior to the election where the shutdown/mourning period overlapped with the election? Would the election happen? If so, would it have to be delayed? Would that happen automatically or would parliament need to be undissolved in order for it to happen? Do the laws surrounding the deaths of monarchs and general elections already have contingencies for this sort of thing in place? Is there a scenario where the UK is left permanently without a parliament? | Upon the Demise of the crown (which covers both the death of the current monarch or their abdication, or any other event ending the reign of the monarch), the next in succession immediately becomes the new monarch without any act of government or state required. The throne is never empty. If this happens during the time Parliament has been dissolved for a general election, then the legislation of the Representation of the People Act 1985 comes in to play, which among other things, was enacted to amend the law relating to the effect of the demise of the Crown on the summoning and duration of a new Parliament and to repeal section 21(3) of the Representation of the People Act 1918 The relevant passage from the act says: (3) In relation to the current election, for the purposes of the timetable in rule 1 in Schedule 1 to the principal Act— a. the polling day shall be— (i) the 14th day after the day which would otherwise have been the polling day, or (ii) if the 14th day is not a working day, the next working day after the 14th day; b. any working day within the period of 13 days beginning with the day after the demise— (i) shall be disregarded in computing any period of time, and (ii) shall not be treated as a day for the purpose of any proceedings before the polling day. So usually the election would be postponed by 14 days. In the specific case of the 2019 general election to be held on the Thursday 12th December, this would move it to the 26th, which in the UK is a bank holiday - a non-working day. So it would, per 3.a.ii move to the next working day, which is Friday 27th December | {
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48,316 | In the last few years, there have been a few attempts made by such territories to achieve independence. Particularly in Europe, we had the cases of Scotland and Catalonia . In the case of Scotland, the power to hold a referendum was granted by the government in Westminster by the Scottish Independence Referendum Act 2013 . This is an exception to what I am looking for in that the path to independence was dependent on the UK parliament as a whole granting independence, and not just the unilateral decision of, say, the Scottish parliament in Holyrood. In the case of Catalonia, the Spanish government declared the referendum unconstitutional, so clearly the ability to unilaterally declare independence was stymied. I am also not interested in attempts to declare independence through force, or de-facto independence achieved through wide-spread international acceptance. Do any countries provide a legal pathway for independence that can be taken by a territory unilaterally , which cannot be halted or vetoed by central government? | According to the The Ashgate Research Companion to Secession only 7 countries out of 89 surveyed had any explicit provisions for secession in their constitution: Austria, Ethiopia, France (overseas territories only), Saint Christopher and Nevis, Singapore, the USSR, Czechoslovakia, and [the Union of] Serbia and Montenegro (of 2003). Some scholars argue that Canada's constitution permits it too. Of these, Serbia and Montenegro acted on them successfully, dissolving in 2006. The USSR and Czechoslovakia also did so farther in the past. The lack of provisions doesn't mean secession is impossible by non-violent means. The book notes that non-violent secession succeeded some 60% of the time, despite there not being explicit provisions in the original country's constitution in most cases. | {
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48,326 | I had a discussion with a friend because I would argue that Denmark is not a socialist country. We have a welfare state and therefore pay high taxes, however we have a free market and privately owned companies. Even things that are "free" like school and medical care that is owned and operated by the state has competition through private schools and private hospitals which you pay to attend. Now the problem arose because the railroad system in Denmark is owned by the state and so it is only the state owned company that can use these railroads (called DSB). So there is a monopoly on train transportation, which favor the state. The government has decided that DSB (the transportation company) has a time period where they have the right to use the rail roads alone and when the time is up, others can appear on the market, however this period is always extended 30 years from time to time. This sounds a lot to me like a socialistic trait. Does that mean that we have a mix of capitalism and socialism? | Yes. You have set up a false dichotomy: that either a country is "socialist" or "capitalist". Nearly all countries have aspects of both. In socialism, the ownership of property and the "means of production" are held in common (typically ownership is assigned to a government). In capitalism, ownership is held by private individuals and companies. Denmark has aspects of both systems. In this it is entirely unremarkable, and the same is true of nearly every other country. Few "socialists" actually believe that all property should be held in common. Few capitalists think that the state should have no property and produce nothing. Instead a "socialist party" believes that the balance should be different to a capitalist party: for example a socialist party may think that the government should own rail, health, and utility industries (perhaps alongside privately owned companies). A capitalist party might believe that these industries should be entirely privately owned (but think that education should still be provided by the state). There is nothing surprising about that. | {
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48,334 | Over President Trump’s term in office, he has been very vocal about the spending commitments made by many NATO countries, and their frequent failure to live up to them. He now seems to be taking credit for reversing this trend. In particular, I’m talking about the claims made in the tweet below. How true are Trump’s claims that the US is unfairly paying for Europe’s defense, and are his claims that his presidency has been responsible for persuading other member states to meet their spending commitments valid? Text of tweet:
In the 3 decades before my election, NATO spending declined by two-thirds, and only 3 other NATO members were meeting their financial obligations. Since I took office, the number of NATO allies fulfilling their obligations more than DOUBLED, and NATO spending increased by $130B! | Mostly true First claim: exaggerated In the three decades before Trump's election, NATO spending declined by two-thirds. On page 4 of this 1987 report (pdf) on NATO military spending, we learn that in 1987 they were globally spending 5.0% of their GDP on defense. More precisely: USA: 6.6% Canada: 2.1% (Western) Europe: 3.4% In 2016, i.e. year 1 before Trump, this level was down to 2.49% of GDP. The military spending has thus decreased by a half, and not by two-thirds, in share of GDP. In nominal terms, of course, it had not decreased at all, since GDP more than doubled from 1987 to 2016. Please note that these comparisons are not on a consistent number of countries, since NATO expanded to new countries after the end of the Cold War. I suspect than Warsaw Pact countries, e.g. Poland, were spending a huge share of their GDP on defense, but it would be complicated, and certainly meaningless, to refine the figures to include them. Second claim: true [Before Trump came to office] only 3 other NATO countries were meeting their financial obligations. From WorldPopulationReview : At the 2014 summit in Wales, all of the NATO members agreed to spend 2 percent of their GDP on the defense by the year 2025. NATO published the report Defence Expenditure of NATO Countries (2013-2019) (pdf) According to table 3, Back in 2016, only 3 NATO countries beside the USA were fulfilling this 2% commitment: Greece, UK, Estonia were at least at 2.07%, and Poland stood just under the threshold with 1.99%. So, 3 out of 27 non-US NATO countries, the claim is correct. Third claim: true The number of NATO allies fulfilling their obligations more than doubled (all-caps changed to lowercase). In 2019, spending is just an estimation, but beside the US, 8 countries pass the 2.0% threshold: Country / Total Spending as Share of GDP Poland 2.00% Latvia 2.01% Lithuania 2.03% Romania 2.04% United Kingdom 2.13% Estonia 2.14% Greece 2.28% Bulgaria 3.25% Bulgaria announced a spectacular increase in military spending, it was standing at 1.48% in 2018. This is due to a huge one-time command in 2019 (cf notes below), so it is hard to imagine how much they will spend on defense in 2020. If we include Bulgaria and the USA, the number of countries above 2.0% of military spending passed from 4 to 9, so this is indeed more than doubling. However, this is maybe not as significant as the capital letters might make the readers of Trump's tweeter account think: for instance, Poland's military spending has increased from 1.99% to 2.00% of GDP. The figures are more impressive for Romania's (from 1.40% to 2.04%) Latvia's (from 1.45% to 2.01%), and of course Bulgaria. Fourth claim: rather false NATO spending increased by $130B Defence Expenditure of NATO Countries (2013-2019) (pdf) estimates that NATO total Defence expenditure (table 2), in constant dollar, raises from $913B in 2016 to $987B in 2019. This is a $74B increase , slightly more than half of what Trump claims. Using current prices and exchange rates, however, the increase is +$128B, from $911B in 2016 to $1039B in 2019. This might be the figure Trump refers to, but it is misleading. The extra $54B are due to inflation and to the exchange rate of US dollar($) versus other NATO countries currencies, mainly Euro(€). In any case, about half of the raise is due to the US own growing military budget. Canada and Europe NATO countries have raised their military spending by $40B in this 3 years period. (Which I would describe as significant, but also significantly lower than the figure given by Trump's tweet). If we were Since we are on Politics.SE and not Skeptics.SE, we might discuss how much of this raise is due to Trump's diplomatic effort, and how much was already planned (the 2% commitment was taken in 2014, countries needed time to converge there), or a reaction by East-European countries to the perceived threat of Russia after the Ukraine crisis, or a consequence of NATO members putting less trust in their American ally for their own protection. Notes Montenegro joined NATO in 2017, mechanically raising the total military budget of the alliance. This amount of circa $70M, however, doesn't affect the general picture. Bulgaria announced a doubling of its military expenditure in 2019, which would make it pass the 2% threshold. @T.E.D gave the explanation in a comment: Bulgaria's blip up this year is due to a one-time purchase of 8 expensive F-16's (at about 15mil a pop). Writing this answer feels weird, because this is the first time I fact-checked a Trump tweet that happens to deserve the 'rather true' mention. | {
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48,371 | According to this article Germany requires the authorities to prove that some funds are illegal instead of asking the company or individual for that proof: In Germany, the burden of proving that money comes from illegal sources rests on authorities, rather than on firms or individuals needing to document they are clean , as is the case in Italy. Another key feature making Germany a magnet for Mafia investment is that only individuals, not companies, can be tried for criminal activities there. I am wondering about the rationale of apparently making the life of authorities harder by having the law like this. Question: In Germany, why does the burden of proof fall on authorities rather than the company or individual when it comes to possible illegal funds? | In 2014, the European Union adopted Directive 2014/42/EU on the freezing and confiscation of instrumentalities and proceeds of crime , and this directive was implemented in Germany on 2017-07-01. As a consequence, likely proceeds of crime can now be confiscated even in cases where it is unclear what exactly the crime was or who committed it. According to § 437 StPO (in German), the court may base its decision to confiscate, among other things, on “a serious mismatch” between the value of the object and the legal earnings of whoever it is to be taken from. So the quoted article, which is from 2014, is no longer current. | {
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48,378 | As far as I can tell, green political parties worldwide are almost all opposed to nuclear power. Considering nuclear power is a low-carbon source of electricity (in fact, in terms of the total-lifecycle, emissions are better than hydro or solar power reference 1 , reference 2 ), and it had a proven track record as a power source (France sources more than 70% of its electricity from nuclear), why are green parties generally so opposed to its use or development? To clarify, I guess it would be most interesting to hear explanations from party officials/leaders/representatives about why this is the case. Maybe some have given interviews in the past where this subject has come up? | Burning fossil fuels has a negative impact on the environment. This impact is relatively well understood and predictable . Nuclear power may have a negative impact on the environment, both when the fuel rods and reactors reach their end of life and when accidents happen. The problems of radioactive waste disposal are not solved and accidents are unpredictable, uncommon, but severe . So one might well make the case that nuclear power is the lesser evil, but many environmentalist parties want to stop both . Here is what the German Greens have to say: 1) Leave the climate-detrimental coal. [...] 5) [...] Nuclear power is an unpredicably risky technology. [...] | {
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48,387 | I'm unclear why Democrats are trying to impeach Trump at this particular point in time. The U.S. 2020 elections are less than a year (about 11 months) away, so why risk an impeachment move now when the public will vote on the next president in a few months anyway? If they really wanted to impeach Trump, why didn't they try to do this in 2018 or even early 2019? | Democrats didn't impeach in 2018, because they were a minority in both House and Senate until January 3, 2019 . Afterwards, they didn't have the necessary evidence until the Mueller Report that would have resulted in multiple felony charges for any American other than the president , was released on April 18, 2019. Democrats were divided on whether to impeach based on the Mueller Report and instead ended up running more investigations , until the smoking gun of the Ukraine transcript dropped September 25, 2019 . In the Ukraine episode, the President is credibly accused (given the amount of evidence, that's an understatement) of having solicited a bribe, and of having attempted to unlawfully interfere with the presidential election . Tolerating unlawful interference into the presidential election sets an absolutely horrible precedent going into the presidential election, and invites a lot more of that unlawful interference, which didn't leave the Democrats much of a choice . Additionally, refusing to impeach the president for obvious crimes will be seen by many left-leaning voters as a violation of their Representatives' oaths and duties, which will put their seats at risk during primaries. Not impeaching is at least as risky as impeaching. | {
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48,429 | In an answer to this question, @Peter said that: ...the Mueller Report ... would have resulted in multiple felony charges for any American other than the president. Is this a true statement? If so, why are the referenced felonies not a problem for the president? | While the question of whether Trump's actions would have resulted in felony charges is a matter of opinion (though the 1027 prosecutors who signed the letter you mentioned is strong evidence in the positive), it is a fact that Mueller specifically avoided making a judgement about indictable offenses and chose to stick to investigating and reporting the bare facts of the case. Robert Mueller was operating under a memo issued by the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Council in 2000 which stated that, under their understanding of the law, a sitting President cannot be indicted or prosecuted while in office. In 1973, the Department concluded that the indictment or criminal prosecution of a sitting President would impermissibly undermine the capacity of the executive branch to perform its constitutionally assigned functions. ... We believe that the conclusion reached by the Department in 1973 still represents the best interpretation of the Constitution A SITTING PRESIDENT’S AMENABILITY TO INDICTMENT AND CRIMINAL PROSECUTION For more discussion of this memo, see the question How is justice supposed to work for the president of the United States? . Based on this memo, Mueller stated that he did not consider it his job to determine whether the president did or did not commit a crime: “The special counsel’s office is part of the Department of Justice, and, by regulation, it was bound by that Department policy,” Mueller said. “Charging the president with a crime was therefore not an option we could consider.” Mueller did not say explicitly that he would have accused Trump of a crime had it not been for the standing policy, but he reiterated that his investigation did not exonerate Trump. “If we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said that,” Mueller said. Mueller quoted by The Hill The statement by former prosecutors that you mentioned also mentions this: Each of us believes that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President , result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice. The Mueller report describes several acts that satisfy all of the elements for an obstruction charge: conduct that obstructed or attempted to obstruct the truth-finding process, as to which the evidence of corrupt intent and connection to pending proceedings is overwhelming STATEMENT BY FORMER FEDERAL PROSECUTORS So, while I can't say for sure that Trump would have been charged had he not been president, I think the odds (of being charged, not necessarily convicted) are quite good. However under current legal guidance, as a sitting president he is currently immune to prosecution by the DOJ and impeachment is the only remedy for his (alleged) crimes. When asked by AG Barr whether he would have indicted Trump if not for the OLC policy, Mueller did not say that he would have. Some have pointed to this as evidence that he specifically found Trump to not have met the bar for indictment. However, as uMdRupert pointed out, Mueller's office specifically addressed this point to shoot down this theory: “The Special Counsel’s report and his statement today made clear that the office concluded it would not reach a determination – one way or the other – about whether the President committed a crime. There is no conflict between these statements,” they said. DOJ, special counsel say there is 'no conflict' on Mueller, Barr statements about obstruction inquiry - The Hill | {
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48,454 | In a general sense, it seems that proponents of marijuana legalization tend to come from left-wing political parties, or at least, from the left-leaning factions within right-wing parties. I am thinking mostly about the Conservative party in the UK, as well as the Republican party in the US - although I acknowledge that there do exist proponents of legalization within these parties, it seems a lot rarer than in, say, the Labour party or Democrats respectively - and certainly nowhere near being official party policy. Is this generalization accurate? If so, why? Doesn’t legalization and regulation of the drug tally with support for a laissez-faire approach to governance, as well as a capitalist opportunity? I am not asking for opinions, but an objective explanation of why right-wing policy tends to lean away from supporting legalization despite the policy exhibiting features that would seem to appeal to the right-wing values of capitalism and the abstention of governments from interference in the free market, etc. | Much of politics doesn't fit into the traditional left-right one-dimensional political spectrum. Politics is multi-dimensional. Marijuana legalisation (and the legalisation/regulation of other drugs) is a socially liberal as well as economically liberal idea. While being economically liberal, many people on the Right wing are not socially liberal. Rightly or wrongly they concern themselves with what people do to themselves and with each other. They are socially conservative, socially illiberal, authoritarian or religious. They might see it as their duty to prevent people from doing harm to themselves, their families and society through the use of currently illicit drugs. It is moral, in their view, to prevent the use of such drugs, regardless of the purported economic benefits of liberalisation. The UK's Conservative Party membership comprises a variety of political outlooks that include social liberalism and social conservatism. | {
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48,508 | The pensions systems that I'm familiar with usually work as following: Workers pay a tax on their salaries The government uses that money to fund the pensions of current retirees When the current workers retire they'll rely on future generations to fund their pensions This works out just fine as long as the population remains stable or increases, but otherwise will require ever increasing contributions from younger workers to prevent inevitable collapse. But what if it could be funded in a different way? Workers pay a tax on their salaries The government puts that money into a pensions fund When these workers retire they'll get a share of what they've contributed, with no reliance on future taxpayers Did any countries implement such a scheme? I am aware that some countries support voluntary individual pension funds (e.g. 401k in the US), but they still have a traditional tax-based pensions system in place too (Social Security). | The question is based on a faulty premise that is all too common in lay discussions of the issue and the broader political debate. A generation “being responsible just for themselves” is an illusion, the percentage of retirees in a society is not only relevant to pension funds, it's always the main factor in the stability of retirement systems, whatever their mechanics. The reason why is that whatever is being consumed by retirees has to be produced by younger, still-active workers. There is no way around this simple fact. You can store gold, banknotes or shares in some investment fund, you will not be able to transfer value and purchasing power over time. To see why, imagine an economy collapsing: none of these will buy you much in retirement. If the economy as a whole is more productive (as Western economies have become over the decades following WW2), it's no problem for one active worker to sustain many more non-active people all the while seeing his or her real income increase. Or, equivalently, to see working times over the course of their life decrease (be it through reduced weekly working times, additional paid holiday or longer retirement) while becoming richer. If there are no productivity gains, retirement pensions are a drain on the income of currently active workers, even if they are paid through a pension fund. Concretely, in the pension fund case, the transfer would not be only through tax-like mandatory contributions but also through the dividends paid to retirees or through the sale of shares and other financial instruments to new workers currently seeking to build their pension fund. But in both cases, it still means a larger share of current income going to pensions, either through increased pressure to lower the wage share or through higher prices to buy into pension funds. Besides allowing several players to wet their beaks or providing captive capital to protect against outside investors, pension funds do have two marginal advantages over direct transfers: Contributing to the productivity of the economy itself, say because there is more capital to invest. There is however many reasons to believe that we are suffering from a saving glut and a dearth of productive investment. Forcing workers to put part of their income in the hands of the financial system won't necessarily result in a more productive economy. Distributing investment and risks geographically. If you live in a rich, demographically challenged country like Italy or Germany, depending on a pension fund for your retirement would mean that your money could be invested in other countries and you would profit from the contributions of younger, say, Asian workers, rather than the dwindling local population. But none of these fundamentally change the macro-economical dynamics behind retirement systems. | {
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48,511 | As an example, changing the US Constitution is extremely difficult as it requires the consent of 3/4 of all States according to the text of the existing Constitution. But in practice any law including the constitution is just a piece of paper and has no enforcement power of its own. Therefore it's theoretically possible for the US to just ignore its former constitution and drastically change how the country is run without following the previous rules. Are there examples of such a change happening in a democratic state at a time of peace? | In some ways all French constitutions are a bit like that. Just think of Napoleon… The Fourth French Republic had a 1946 constitution that in article 90f regulated how to change it. They found that that didn't work out as thought. But during the crisis of 1958 the national assembly just passed a law on June,3 1958 – that de Gaulle requested as condition for taking power – in a venerable coup on radically changing that procedure. Emergency powers to the rescue? Thus, the Fifth Republic would have had a severe problem of legitimacy but it was then subjected to a plebiscite to rectify that. With some, but not total success: Although most politicians supported de Gaulle, Mitterrand , who opposed the new Constitution, famously denounced "a permanent coup d'état" in 1964. ( fr.wp ) The only problem from how the question is framed: How much the crisis solved peacefully or whether it "was a time of peace". Technically the internal turmoil in France would disqualify it outright. But even more so the Algerian war from 1954–1962 or the Ifni-war from 1957–58 . Or France being part of NATO fighting the Cold War? In our apparent understanding, the West was largely at peace after 1945. But like Revolutionary France, it is really better described as constant war . Regardless of these considerations, at least within France not that many people were shot dead over adopting this newer constitution. Like any important institutional change, the new French constitution owes its parentage to an established doctrinal tradition, the particular ideas and experiences of its authors, and the combination of immediate political circumstances. The complexity of this process in the summer of 1958 and the failure of the French government to publish the records of the drafting, make it difficult even a year later to describe the birth of the document. Yet the fact that the drafting closely followed a short though dangerous 'crise du rigime', and that it was primarily the work of the new Ministry rather than a constituent assembly, presents a meager advantage to the student of the new constitution. For the haste with which General de Gaulle's government prepared the initial draft—while at the same time preoccupied with many other pressing matters – strongly suggests that the drafters simply cast into legal text the program of the familiar opposition movement, formed by the General over a decade before, specifically to accomplish constitutional reform. –– Nicholas Wahl: "The French Constitution Of 1958: II. The Initial Draft And Its Origins" , The American Political Science Review, Vol. 53, No. 2, 1959. (pp358–382) And the French weren't finished in doctoring the constitution in a 'we can do it' way, like just 4 years later 1962 French presidential election referendum , nor do they seem to stop anytime soon. | {
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48,565 | Currently four states: Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon and Washington run all their elections exclusively by mail . This seems to have the significant advantage of allowing people to vote at any time they please, thus increasing turnout. In addition, counties don't have to staff polling stations and controversial issues such as Voter ID are not a concern with postal ballots. So why not switch to all postal voting throughout the US? Are there any significant upsides to the traditional voting system? Update. I've asked a follow up question: Is there a higher incidence of electoral fraud in states that use all-mail voting? | This answer is tainted by my German experience and views, but I expect many instances of it to apply to the US, too. With the traditional concept of an election day, all people have the opportunity to make up their mind up to that very day. With postal voting, the vote needs to be posted some time before to make it to the counting station in time. Now imagine a huge scandal surfacing on the day before election day with the leader of one party caught on video saying they’ll lock up half the population. Obviously, that is going to seriously hurt that party on election day, but if voters already cast their ballots they cannot change them. Whether you consider this more or less important depends on how much weight you want to give the ‘opinion of the people at a certain point in time’ philosophy when it comes to voting. Arguably, this can be mitigated by requiring ballots to be posted no earlier than other measures. Counties don’t have to staff polling stations While that may seem true on paper, they still have to staff vote counting. In Germany, most of what the polling station volunteers (not actually staff) do is counting the votes after the polling station closes. For most polling stations, this is an annoying, but not too hard task as throughout the day they will have already confirmed that all votes cast were legitimate and in the correct box. However, the volunteers manning the absentee/postal ballot station will have to confirm that for every single ballot while retaining integrity of secrecy of vote. Thus, they have a much higher workload than all other polling stations. This is essentially a tie-in to the previous argument, but it is harder to maintain integrity of the vote for absentee ballots. It all begins with the question whether the person who said they cast the vote actually cast the vote. Then, did they cast it by themselves or were they influenced/coerced/somebody made the cross for them. Did each eligible voter receive exactly one ballot paper? All of this is essentially checked on-the-fly while voting is carried out in traditional polling stations but there needs to be a separate process in place for postal ballots. It’s worth mentioning that a person with sufficient criminal energy can intercept ballots either on their way from the county to the voter (to cast their own vote rather than the voter’s – although this may show up if the voter is concerned they didn’t receive their ballot) or on the return trip (where they could silently let votes they don’t like disappear). Coming from a country that has mandatory ID and mandatory residence registration (which means you are automatically registered to vote if your residence is registered properly and you are eligible), it is rather easy to confirm someone’s identity on the spot. Even where there are no mandatory ID cards (like in the US or UK), many (sadly not all, though) people will have a driving licence or some other form of photo ID that should be acceptable as identification. With postal voting this method of identification is not used; at least in my country. The only thing that identifies you as being eligible is your signature on a slip of paper that you post together with a sealed ballot envelope. Not even a copy of the official ID is required. There is a quick ID check of sorts when picking up the absentee ballot, but again, it’s never confirmed again afterwards. So arguably all-postal voting makes claims of illegal voting easier rather than harder as ID requirements are, by definition, weaker. Even assuming all the above works perfectly, there is still no guarantee that the posted ballots make it to the county in good condition – or good enough to be counted manually/by the machines if they have them. All it takes is a particularly bad rainy day and a big puddle in the wrong spot or a bad gust of wind and the mail bag can get drenched potentially spoiling hundreds of ballots to be unreadable. Not a problem if ballots were cast in a dry indoor setting. | {
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48,597 | I was only a child when the Romanian dictator, Ceaușescu announced that all of the country's foreign debt had been paid : Romanian leader Nicolae Ceausescu announced this week that his
country, despite an economy that a recent U.S. congressional report
called the second poorest in Europe, has paid off all of its foreign
debts ahead of schedule. As the same article mentions, achieving this came at a tremendous cost for the population, the most notorious step being food rationing (since almost everything was exported to get dollars): The costs of this accelerated repayment program have been massive. In
a recent report on Romanian human rights violations, congressional
Helsinki Commission chairmen Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) and Sen.
Dennis DeConcini (D-Ariz.) I have checked if there are any countries that are debt-free and I could find about five : Macao, The British Virgin Islands, Palau, Liechtenstein, Brunei So being a debt-free state is clearly an exception and they probably account for a very tiny fraction of the world economy (all these states have small economies). From the myopic perspective of an individual, being debt-free sounds something desirable, but I assume that states work differently. I am wondering about the downsides of being debt-free state, assuming this is achieved in a much more sustainable way than Romania's case. Question: What are the downsides of being a debt-free country (no foreign national debt )? | Eliminating national debt is not necessarily a good thing because a country's economics are a lot less like personal finance and far more like business finance. Businesses (and countries) take on debt because they believe they can use the debt to spark growth far in excess of the interest on the debt. That's why using a personal frame of reference is usually a bad way of looking at government finance. Personal Debt is usually a bad thing, because a person obtains their money through a salary that's generally independent of their personal expenditures. If I go out and buy a new TV or PS4, that's not going to typically increase my salary. But businesses (and countries) need capital investments - buying things like supplies/inputs, machinery, staffing, marketing, etc. And realistically, if it can spend X amount of money to turn around and generate X+10% revenue, it's worth taking on a smaller percentage of debt to get that X. | {
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48,627 | From the wikipedia page about the number of nuclear weapons we see that China only has 250 nukes, which puts it in the same league as France or the UK, and way under the 1000+ actives held by Russia and the US. That number has been unchanged for decades. Yet, China is putting some major effort in deploying better weapon systems, has a somewhat aggressive foreign policy in the South China sea area, along with a number of deep held priorities, like Taiwan, that might involve the US against it. Besides equipment that is still catching up to the West, Chinese troops lack experience, especially compared to US forces that have amassed considerable combat experience, albeit against technologically inferior foes, over the last 18 years. This part is especially important, as nuclear weapons don't rely on combat-seasoned troops. Last, but not least, the fledgling Anti Ballistic Missile defenses the US has deployed are not credible against a full-on Russian launch, but are more relevant against an opponent that has a limited number of nukes at hand. China is above that threshold, but not by much. Have there been indications from China why they have not much strengthened their nuclear forces? They have the technology, funding and are not averse to competing in other areas. They're not much bound by law or treaties, being a recognized nuclear power, having their UN veto, and not being party to the various nuclear disarmament treaties signed between the US and Russia. It seems like it would go a long way to equalize their position wrt the US. Note: while I don't rule out an official Chinese government explanation, nuclear armament is certainly a domain where countries use a lot of spin in describing what they are up to. Also, I am mostly interested in the reasons for this restraint from a realpolitik Chinese military planning point of view, rather than other perspectives which, correctly, find nuclear reduction a laudable goal. | "Only 250"? That's plenty for their purposes. Nukes are meant to be seen, not heard. Even if the US could intercept 99/100 missiles, having 250 means china can deliver a devastating enough attack that the US is encouraged to avoid the scenario at almost all costs. That's reasonable deterrence for their particular threat model, and for a fledgling superpower, it fits their needs. 250's also more than enough to fend off local challenges, like another Japanese invasion for example. There's little tactical advantage to being able to blow up the world ten times instead of just once. A shotgun might be more deadly than a pistol, but either one can easily kill you. Development is massively expensive, polluting, and physically risky, so why waste effort on over-kill? It makes no sense for them to "catch up" with Russia and the USA. | {
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48,629 | I am not asking for an opinion based answer, just factual. This time last week, there was talk of three articles of impeachment . Now, bribery has been dropped. Has any senior offical said why? | Schiff himself thought that this was bribery "I don't think there's any question that the uncontested facts show this president solicited a bribe," Schiff told NPR's Steve Inskeep in an interview in the congressman's office on Capitol Hill Tuesday. "Bribery ... most importantly in terms of what the founders had in mind, that is conditioning an official act for something of value," Schiff said, adding, "I think this certainly meets that definition." The best argument I've heard why the Judiciary Committee doesn't see it that way is this WaPo article which notes The Democrats’ worry appears to be that it would then put them in the position of satisfying the statutory requirements of bribery, which is a valid concern. Bribery is a very specific crime . Something of value is exchanged for some illegal act by an elected official. But what value did Trump get out of it (in a legal sense)? Another article fleshes that out a bit more Frank O. Bowman, the author of a recent book on impeachment (titled, as it happens, “High Crimes and Misdemeanors”), said proving there was a “thing of value” could be tough. The Justice Department opted not to pursue an investigation of the whistleblower complaint because it determined the value of a government investigation could not be quantified. (That decision is not without controversy, though.) “If we consider Trump as the recipient of a bribe, the ‘thing of value’ is presumably an investigation of Biden/CrowdStrike, or an announcement that such an investigation is being undertaken,” Bowman said. “Whether these are things of value is an interesting legal question. I can certainly make the argument that they are.” | {
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48,630 | YouGov's multilevel regression and post-stratification (MRP) model is seen as one of the most reliable pre-election predictors of what results will look like in the UK. Their turnout predictions by age are as follows: According to the academic analysis linked on their election centre , this is determined from historical figures, primarily in 2015 and 2017. "In contrast to traditional polling approaches, we do not rely on
respondents’ self-reported likelihood of voting when working out
probable voting patterns across different constituencies. Instead, we
build a model based on data from past elections to predict whether
different types of individual would be likely to vote in a new
election. The result of this process is that we assume that the
electorate for a new election would be demographically similar to the
electorates of 2015 and 2017 (which were themselves similar, despite
2017 claims about a “youthquake”). This is the same strategy we used
for the 2017 election model. It is not perfect, as it is possible that
there will be changes to the demographic make-up of the electorate,
but is also unlikely to yield large errors overall." It seems to me like these turnout figures exaggerate the differences that exist between age groups. Let's compare them to the historical figures from the parliament website: While youth voter turnout looks pretty much in line with what you'd expect (assuming that 2017 was largely an anomaly) their estimates for older voters seem significantly higher than the historical data would imply. Has anything been published which would explain this difference? | Schiff himself thought that this was bribery "I don't think there's any question that the uncontested facts show this president solicited a bribe," Schiff told NPR's Steve Inskeep in an interview in the congressman's office on Capitol Hill Tuesday. "Bribery ... most importantly in terms of what the founders had in mind, that is conditioning an official act for something of value," Schiff said, adding, "I think this certainly meets that definition." The best argument I've heard why the Judiciary Committee doesn't see it that way is this WaPo article which notes The Democrats’ worry appears to be that it would then put them in the position of satisfying the statutory requirements of bribery, which is a valid concern. Bribery is a very specific crime . Something of value is exchanged for some illegal act by an elected official. But what value did Trump get out of it (in a legal sense)? Another article fleshes that out a bit more Frank O. Bowman, the author of a recent book on impeachment (titled, as it happens, “High Crimes and Misdemeanors”), said proving there was a “thing of value” could be tough. The Justice Department opted not to pursue an investigation of the whistleblower complaint because it determined the value of a government investigation could not be quantified. (That decision is not without controversy, though.) “If we consider Trump as the recipient of a bribe, the ‘thing of value’ is presumably an investigation of Biden/CrowdStrike, or an announcement that such an investigation is being undertaken,” Bowman said. “Whether these are things of value is an interesting legal question. I can certainly make the argument that they are.” | {
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48,654 | If an impeached President (but not one removed from office) is elected for a second term, can they be impeached again during their second term if the House decides they committed new impeachable offenses? If not, is a previously impeached President more or less 'immune' to repercussions for further misconduct? Does the boundary between terms matter, or could a President theoretically be impeached twice in the same term? Is there any case of this happening for another office? | A president can be impeached as many times as the House would like. The House could impeach the president multiple times in the same term if they wanted to. They could impeach on the same charges each time if they wanted to. Impeachment isn't a criminal charge so things like double-jeopardy aren't a consideration. The only consideration is practical and political. If the House impeached on one set of grounds and the Senate declined to convict, it makes little sense to impeach again unless you have significantly different grounds, significantly more evidence, a significantly different Senate, or a significantly different popular sentiment that would make the old Senate reconsider their previous judgement. Politically, impeachment already carries a significant risk of blowback which would only increase for a second or third impeachment. I don't believe any officials have ever been impeached by the House, acquitted by the Senate, and then re-impeached by the House. | {
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48,658 | For how long will the UK government / parliament elected on December 12, 2019 remain (serve?), if we're not counting any possible new non-regular elections? Put in another way: When will the next regular general election for UK parliament be held? | The current law — the 2011 Fixed Term Parliaments Act — sets the next election as “the first Thursday in May of the fifth year after the last General Election”, which would make the next scheduled General Election the 2nd of May 2024 . | {
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48,660 | If we look at the population of the US at large, as of time of writing, 84.7% of Democrats, 43.0% of Independents, and 9.4% of Republicans support impeachment . Meanwhile, in Congress, literally 100% of Democrats support impeachment, and literally 0% of Republicans do . If we assume that the national values are representative, then the odds of all 133 Democrats who've expressed an opinion landing on the side of impeachment is extremely low, in the range of 0.000000003%, and yet here we are. Why are the Democrats & Republicans in the House so homogeneous? Statistically it's extremely unlikely to get this 100% support/oppose, yet that's what has happened. Things I can think of: The Democrats & Republicans in the House aren't representative of the population. If so, why? It seems weird too: it means the elected leaders don't actually represent the population, which seems to run contrary to the whole point of democracy. The Democrats who oppose impeachment and the Republicans who support it are in the "no response yet" column. However, it's unclear to me why this would make a big difference - presumably some of the US population polled don't respond either. They are under threat by their party to either vote along the party line or be expelled from the party. This is conceivable, but seems unlikely, because when Boris Johnson expelled rebels from his Conservative party a few months ago, 1) there were public warnings that he would do so and 2) it didn't stop the rebels from voting against his proposal. I haven't seen public warnings by either the Democrats or the Republicans, but it seems nobody wants to rebel anyway. They might not agree with/oppose impeachment on a personal level, but they are voting the other way because they believe that's what the people that voted for them want. It's conceivable, but there's no evidence for this in the New York Times list - the closest is Republican Michael Guest who said "I will not vote to silence the voices of over 700,000 Mississippians who voted for our president", but he didn't express a personal opinion. Update: there're now news items claiming that even vulnerable Democrats are supporting the impeachment, which seems to refute this as an explanation. | Primaries. In order to win re-election a politician must win both a party primary and a general election. In most Republican primaries 80-90% of the electorate approves of the president and thinks he should not be impeached. So if you are a Republican running for office it is virtually impossible to win if you support impeachment because the people voting in a Republican primary really like the president. The same goes for the Democrats for them it is just 80-90% that support impeachment and dislike the president. | {
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48,709 | How did they do it? And are there any people or companies today who could become a sovereign state if they wanted to? Could Jeff Bezos start his own country and become a sovereign state? How would he do it, and would anyone try to stop him? Who would try to stop him, and how would they do it? | A monarch by definition is the sovereign : A monarch is a sovereign head of state in a monarchy. A monarch may exercise the highest authority and power in the state […] an individual may become monarch by conquest, acclamation or a combination of means. As (possibly) said by France's Louis XIV : L’État, c’est moi. or, in English: I am the State. Such monarchs are literally above the law : Sovereign immunity, or crown immunity, is a legal doctrine by which the sovereign or state cannot commit a legal wrong… In its older sense, sovereign immunity is the original forebear of state immunity based on the classical concept of sovereignty in the sense that a sovereign could not be subjected without his or her approval to the jurisdiction of another. There are two forms of sovereign immunity: immunity from suit (also known as immunity from jurisdiction or adjudication) immunity from enforcement There are numerous such monarchs throughout history. It's debatable that the UK's Queen Elizabeth II is legally still one even to this day. In Shakespeare's Henry V , the King of France refers to King Henry V of England literally as "England" itself many times: King of France … For England his approaches makes as fierce … and King of France From our brother England? All Jeff Bezos would have to do is buy a lot of land, declare himself King/Caliph/Emperor/Khan/Shah/Pharaoh/… and then successfully defend his kingdom/caliphate/empire/… from anyone and everyone who disagreed. | {
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48,751 | If everyone on the voting list for a polling station had been to vote and have been marked off on the list the polling clerks have, would the polling station shut early? Or would it remain open until 10PM even though no one else could come in and vote? | There's a process that's meant to be followed if someone arrives at a polling station to find that someone has already voted in their name or they're recorded as having received a postal vote (a 'tendered vote' can be made, although it isn't counted). If the polling station closed early then this might be made impossible. For this reason it would not make sense to close early. | {
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48,771 | All conservatives members so far confirmed that it is an absolute No to second Scotland referendum.
As per that, assuming that no approval is given for a second referendum in the coming months, is there anything that Scotland can do legally/constitutionally to get it despite the disagreement of Westminster? | There is no formalised way for Scotland to leave the UK so for that to happen Parliament would have to agree because that is the supreme legislative body of the UK (Scotland has its own devolved parliament but that only has the powers granted to it by the UK parliament). So they can do nothing legally without the consent of Parliament. | {
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