Trump has already tried to use pressure to help Bolsonaro by announcing a 50% tariff on goods from Latin America’s No. 1 economy
Apparently this (fueled by family members lobbying) has backfired in Brazil as members of Bolsonaro's base are disaponted by what is perceived as his anti national behaviour.
International politics is revealing itself to operate on the principles of the mafia, where basically everything is leverage and where 'imposing costs' is the primary tool of discipline. Perhaps,'twas ever thus and Trump's main crime is being so crude about it that deniability is no longer plausible
Not really a revelation though. The ones with most of the power always leveraged any tool they had at their disposal to have their way and press everyone else into compliance. Sometimes it's carrot, sometimes it's stick. And they always applied rules selectively based not on what but on who. Just like the mafia, carving out special rules and dispensations for themselves.
Interference in other countries' affairs was the name of the game for at least a century. But for a long time now the US has no need to offer the carrot at all seeing how most times they can get anything they want with just the threat of the stick.
In this case not having a visa is probably a blessing in disguise. Better to know you're not wanted before you are detained at the border and "accidentally" extradited directly to a prison's gate.
States using courtrooms to punish people who have attempted a coup is hardly unethical, no?
I have to say, it is cute to read your faux outrage over this after Bolsonaro made sure the guy with the best chances to defeat him two elections back would be put into prison in a sham trial right before the election... not persecuting a figure as corrupt and power hungry as Bolsonaro would be 100% ethically wrong.
I think you got your timeline of events in the wrong order. Bolsonaro was just a low-level congressman when Lula was convicted.
Not saying that Bolsonaro has any moral high ground to stand on, though. He is as corrupt as it gets. But if anything, I'd say that his problems really started when he was already elected and colluded with the Supreme Court to get Lula out of prison in exchange of killing the investigation against his sons.
That is false. Lula was freed because a hacker leaked the messages between the judge and the prosecutor, showing the judge's active collaboration with the prosecution. The trial was annulled. The case restarted, and they found that the evidence against him was quite weak.
So did Bolsonaro have any basis for claiming the vote against him was rigged? If he did, fair enough. There should be an investigation into the rigging.
If the vote was fair, then there may be an excuse of bad advice. He should've known better, but it's possible someone lied to him.
And a third option, he lied knowing well that the vote was fair. I such case this is an attempt to undermine the state and it should be dealt with harshly. It's o E thing if some journalist makes BS claims. It's another if obe if candidates does so.
I genuinely have no idea which of these is true. I know for a fact the claim "we lost because of fraud" has been popularised by Trump and him basically not getting even a slap on the wrist for it. So it gets used everywhere now.
> The proponents of liberal democracy should have sold it better.
That sounds an awful lot like victim-blaming.
What's worse is that your blend of comments somehow omits the fact that fascism is not being openly pushed onto people. Instead, fascists frame their intentions as granting them the authority to impose populist policies within the framework of liberal democracies. The problem is that, as Nazi Germany proved, once these fascists are in power they pull a bait-and-switch onto their own supporters.
To be fair, German Nazi were openly against democracy. It was not bait and switch, it was you get what you was promised.
Contemporary fascists pay lit service to it and like to accuse opponents of not being democratic. Tho, to large extend, conservatives lead by Trump are also doing what was known they will do.
Things like freedom of speech or political organizations which are not subservient to the state?
Of course unrestricted freedom of speech can devolve into whatever has been happening in the US for quite a while but still... don't see how "enlightened totalitarianism" is an answer to that.
authoritarian state that restricts basic individual freedoms = bad
Not sure sure how could you have inferred anything else from my comment.
> Other countries have a far larger mistrust of corporations
Grass is always greener and such. Corporations in Europe have massive amounts of political influence. They are just not as good at making money as American corporations so have less resources to spend on stuff like that.
At least you admit you want a communist revolution rather than using euphemisms like "aligning governmental policy with science and reason" or "programs informed by a root-cause analysis".
By the way, I share the worry you express in your profile. Imo, eco-socialism is the only way out, there's no way capital interests will give up on burning our planet in their attempt to finally become fully independent of labor. Do you have any better ideas?
Although I don't think communism is a good idea, we find ourselves facing a danger and a menace much more potent than communism IMHO, so I would warmly welcome a communist takeover of my country (the US) if it would reliably stop AI research in my country and keep it stopped. (I'm OK with people's continuing to use models that have already seen widespread usage: it's the training of large new models I want to stop -- that and any attempts to improve human understanding of the fundamentals of machine learning.)
But I tend to think that most communists are neutral or positive in their attitude toward AI research. For example, according to a credible China expert, Xi Jinping has directed China to pursue AI research very aggressively.
In my ideal world, the main priority post-revolution would be to freeze development and prioritize saving our climate so we keep having a livable planet - green energy, public transport, etc etc.
Once that monumental task is done (and this is where we might disagree, but I'd be curious to hear your thoughts - my position there is not very firm!) I feel like looking at AI again - while keeping environmental constraints in mind, might be worth a try. The end goal would be utopian star trek post-resource-constraint society, a classless, socialist society in the humanistic sense - where everyone's needs are met and conflicts around resource allocation are a thing of the past.
Re your last edit - ask three socialists and you will get five conflicting takes, I definitely disagree with Xi on most things, though I do think he's doing a good job in things like building the Chinese high speed rail network.
If some bright young person (or more realistically some sequence of bright young people building on each other's work) were to devise a plausible method to control an AI such that it stays under human control even if it become much more cognitively capable than the most capable people, then I would be OK with going ahead with AI research.
I don't think most readers here realize just how little control the AI labs have over their creations and how reliant they are on trial and error for implementing what control they do have. Of course, as soon as it becomes critical to keep an AI under control (namely, when its capabilities start to exceed human capabilities) is exactly when a lab will stop being able to rely on trial and error: specifically, the next time the lab loses control, the AI will tend to arrange things so the lab doesn't get any more tries.
As Rosa Luxemburg said, it's socialism or barbarism. It is unfortunate we seem to be going down the path of the latter. To me, it proves the non-viability of electoralism.
The biggest thing that makes communism just completely non-viable is the simultaneous demand for socialism/democracy and internationalism.
Different people just aren't going to agree on social norms and some groups are going to abuse certain things more than other groups. In the past between freedom of association and low levels of migration people could kind of work that out but when you force people to use public services for everything that's completely impossible.
You get one or the other at most. Both at the same time is an immediate non-starter for pretty much everyone.
It’s just the same old same old. The U.S. is the country that bought Suharto and saddam hussein to power, that cosied up with the Khmer Rouge and pinochet, that trained and supported bin laden, enabled the contras and Mubarak, etc. - and these are just a handful of recent examples.
The only difference is that these guys are perhaps more brazen about it, as they’ve realised it makes no difference to their electability.
You assume that there is a long-term strategy: why do you think there is one?
What evidence do you have that Trump cares about anything more than the current day's headlines and whatever whims take his fancy in a particular moment?
Trump has already tried to use pressure to help Bolsonaro by announcing a 50% tariff on goods from Latin America’s No. 1 economy
Apparently this (fueled by family members lobbying) has backfired in Brazil as members of Bolsonaro's base are disaponted by what is perceived as his anti national behaviour.
International politics is revealing itself to operate on the principles of the mafia, where basically everything is leverage and where 'imposing costs' is the primary tool of discipline. Perhaps,'twas ever thus and Trump's main crime is being so crude about it that deniability is no longer plausible
> is revealing itself
Not really a revelation though. The ones with most of the power always leveraged any tool they had at their disposal to have their way and press everyone else into compliance. Sometimes it's carrot, sometimes it's stick. And they always applied rules selectively based not on what but on who. Just like the mafia, carving out special rules and dispensations for themselves.
Interference in other countries' affairs was the name of the game for at least a century. But for a long time now the US has no need to offer the carrot at all seeing how most times they can get anything they want with just the threat of the stick.
In this case not having a visa is probably a blessing in disguise. Better to know you're not wanted before you are detained at the border and "accidentally" extradited directly to a prison's gate.
Yep, it always was.
cooperation show greater benefits in general.
Especially when one stand to lose much more than they can afford, to switch them from opposition to cooperation..
Nah. Trumps main crime is his bad faith malignant harm seeking politics. It is what he does and did again and again.
Wait, so you're saying the crackdown on Bolsonaro is fine and ethically 100 percent ok?
Sounds like you know more about it than me.
Can you explain?
States using courtrooms to punish people who have attempted a coup is hardly unethical, no?
I have to say, it is cute to read your faux outrage over this after Bolsonaro made sure the guy with the best chances to defeat him two elections back would be put into prison in a sham trial right before the election... not persecuting a figure as corrupt and power hungry as Bolsonaro would be 100% ethically wrong.
I think you got your timeline of events in the wrong order. Bolsonaro was just a low-level congressman when Lula was convicted.
Not saying that Bolsonaro has any moral high ground to stand on, though. He is as corrupt as it gets. But if anything, I'd say that his problems really started when he was already elected and colluded with the Supreme Court to get Lula out of prison in exchange of killing the investigation against his sons.
That is false. Lula was freed because a hacker leaked the messages between the judge and the prosecutor, showing the judge's active collaboration with the prosecution. The trial was annulled. The case restarted, and they found that the evidence against him was quite weak.
Yeah, right. And the fact that investigations on Bolsonaro were shelved by Toffoli are a mere coincidence.
If anything it’s way too mild.
I meant the guy had a concrete plan to topple democracy, assassinate other leaders and bring back dictatorship.
People like this should be thrown into prison for the rest of their lives.
So did Bolsonaro have any basis for claiming the vote against him was rigged? If he did, fair enough. There should be an investigation into the rigging.
If the vote was fair, then there may be an excuse of bad advice. He should've known better, but it's possible someone lied to him.
And a third option, he lied knowing well that the vote was fair. I such case this is an attempt to undermine the state and it should be dealt with harshly. It's o E thing if some journalist makes BS claims. It's another if obe if candidates does so.
I genuinely have no idea which of these is true. I know for a fact the claim "we lost because of fraud" has been popularised by Trump and him basically not getting even a slap on the wrist for it. So it gets used everywhere now.
Brazilian politics are a shitshow and neither Lula nor Bolsonaro are saints.
But Trump exerting pressure like this is another level.
This “both sides” shit has to stop! They are not equivalent in their badness.
What's the alternative?
"We're right and you're wrong!"
That's sure to lead to more nuance and critical thought.
That is intellectually very dishonest. That's not what I said and not even close.
People constantly "both side" genocides when they happen, don't be surprised when they both side less significant things.
It's challenging to comprehend this administration's "Strong with the weak, weak with the strong" approach to geopolitics.
What's the end game here?
The end game is a club of authoritarians and an end to liberal democracy worldwide.
The proponents of liberal democracy should have sold it better.
> The proponents of liberal democracy should have sold it better.
That sounds an awful lot like victim-blaming.
What's worse is that your blend of comments somehow omits the fact that fascism is not being openly pushed onto people. Instead, fascists frame their intentions as granting them the authority to impose populist policies within the framework of liberal democracies. The problem is that, as Nazi Germany proved, once these fascists are in power they pull a bait-and-switch onto their own supporters.
It is fascist rhetoric taking delight that their authoritarian project has succeeded.
Russia has been the main sponsor of fascism. They have full networks pushing content promoting and platforming it, and nothing is done about this.
To be fair, German Nazi were openly against democracy. It was not bait and switch, it was you get what you was promised.
Contemporary fascists pay lit service to it and like to accuse opponents of not being democratic. Tho, to large extend, conservatives lead by Trump are also doing what was known they will do.
I don't disagree.
Liberal Democracy inevitably leads to corporate capture and then Fascism, as the US is demonstrating beautifully right now.
The ideal form of government is Titoism, with strong repression of regressive forces.
> with strong repression of regressive forces.
Things like freedom of speech or political organizations which are not subservient to the state?
Of course unrestricted freedom of speech can devolve into whatever has been happening in the US for quite a while but still... don't see how "enlightened totalitarianism" is an answer to that.
The problem the US has is it's unwavering belief that state = bad, not state = good
This tends to allow corporations to do all the bad things that states can do, with no checks or balances.
Other countries have a far larger mistrust of corporations and use their voice in the state to attempt to moderate that.
> belief that state = bad, not state = good
authoritarian state that restricts basic individual freedoms = bad
Not sure sure how could you have inferred anything else from my comment.
> Other countries have a far larger mistrust of corporations
Grass is always greener and such. Corporations in Europe have massive amounts of political influence. They are just not as good at making money as American corporations so have less resources to spend on stuff like that.
Americans have this naive belief that they can withstand corruption.
> Liberal Democracy inevitably leads to corporate capture
Does it? Is this a major problem in say Sweden, or Switzerland, or New Zealand?
Yeah that's the problem with it. It wasn't communist and aggressive enough. Certainly everyone would have wanted it if it were.
That's the beautiful thing, if it had been communist and aggressive, it wouldn't have mattered if the fascists wanted it or not.
>Why is everyone suddenly tearing down all our shared institutions? All we wanted to do was force a communist revolution on them!
It is the other way around. The tear-down of the shared institutions proves that a communist revolution would've been the right move in hindsight.
At least you admit you want a communist revolution rather than using euphemisms like "aligning governmental policy with science and reason" or "programs informed by a root-cause analysis".
By the way, I share the worry you express in your profile. Imo, eco-socialism is the only way out, there's no way capital interests will give up on burning our planet in their attempt to finally become fully independent of labor. Do you have any better ideas?
Although I don't think communism is a good idea, we find ourselves facing a danger and a menace much more potent than communism IMHO, so I would warmly welcome a communist takeover of my country (the US) if it would reliably stop AI research in my country and keep it stopped. (I'm OK with people's continuing to use models that have already seen widespread usage: it's the training of large new models I want to stop -- that and any attempts to improve human understanding of the fundamentals of machine learning.)
But I tend to think that most communists are neutral or positive in their attitude toward AI research. For example, according to a credible China expert, Xi Jinping has directed China to pursue AI research very aggressively.
In my ideal world, the main priority post-revolution would be to freeze development and prioritize saving our climate so we keep having a livable planet - green energy, public transport, etc etc.
Once that monumental task is done (and this is where we might disagree, but I'd be curious to hear your thoughts - my position there is not very firm!) I feel like looking at AI again - while keeping environmental constraints in mind, might be worth a try. The end goal would be utopian star trek post-resource-constraint society, a classless, socialist society in the humanistic sense - where everyone's needs are met and conflicts around resource allocation are a thing of the past.
Re your last edit - ask three socialists and you will get five conflicting takes, I definitely disagree with Xi on most things, though I do think he's doing a good job in things like building the Chinese high speed rail network.
If some bright young person (or more realistically some sequence of bright young people building on each other's work) were to devise a plausible method to control an AI such that it stays under human control even if it become much more cognitively capable than the most capable people, then I would be OK with going ahead with AI research.
I don't think most readers here realize just how little control the AI labs have over their creations and how reliant they are on trial and error for implementing what control they do have. Of course, as soon as it becomes critical to keep an AI under control (namely, when its capabilities start to exceed human capabilities) is exactly when a lab will stop being able to rely on trial and error: specifically, the next time the lab loses control, the AI will tend to arrange things so the lab doesn't get any more tries.
As Rosa Luxemburg said, it's socialism or barbarism. It is unfortunate we seem to be going down the path of the latter. To me, it proves the non-viability of electoralism.
The biggest thing that makes communism just completely non-viable is the simultaneous demand for socialism/democracy and internationalism.
Different people just aren't going to agree on social norms and some groups are going to abuse certain things more than other groups. In the past between freedom of association and low levels of migration people could kind of work that out but when you force people to use public services for everything that's completely impossible.
You get one or the other at most. Both at the same time is an immediate non-starter for pretty much everyone.
It’s just the same old same old. The U.S. is the country that bought Suharto and saddam hussein to power, that cosied up with the Khmer Rouge and pinochet, that trained and supported bin laden, enabled the contras and Mubarak, etc. - and these are just a handful of recent examples.
The only difference is that these guys are perhaps more brazen about it, as they’ve realised it makes no difference to their electability.
> What's the end game here?
You assume that there is a long-term strategy: why do you think there is one?
What evidence do you have that Trump cares about anything more than the current day's headlines and whatever whims take his fancy in a particular moment?
Grifters gonna grift