• @eatthecake@lemmy.world
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    1309 months ago

    From the transcript of the speech:

    REPRESENTATIVE GREENE: What about Laken Riley?

    (Cross-talk.)

    AUDIENCE: Booo —

    REPRESENTATIVE GREENE: Say her name!

    THE PRESIDENT: (The President holds up a pin reading “Say Her Name, Laken Riley.”) Lanken — Lanken (Laken) Riley, an innocent young woman who was killed.

    REPRESENTATIVE GREENE: By an illegal!

    THE PRESIDENT: By an illegal. That’s right. But how many of thousands of people are being killed by legals?

    I don’t see the problem. His response rightly points out that murders happen regardless of the perpetrators legal status.

    • mozz
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      9 months ago

      It’s just how propaganda works.

      At any given time, there are a few different anecdotal-type “talking points” that are the new thing everyone’s talking about. You’re going to be hearing about Biden saying “an illegal” for a little while, even though as your transcript notes, it wasn’t even him that chose the wording. People form their picture of the world through these little gestalt-facts, and if you can pick one that will shape the narrative you want to present, and arrange for people to hear it over and over from a variety of sources, and do that in a constant stream that all points to the same types of conclusions, it actually does a pretty good job at controlling how they’ll perceive the totality of the situation.

      It’s almost exactly the same as how you will hear over and over that:

      • We broke a record for fossil fuel extraction in 2023
      • Biden’s climate bill includes giving money to oil and gas companies

      … and then all this weight of emotion behind how bad Biden is for the climate, how he’s just the same, how it’s such a shame that I as a good climate-change person can’t support him… etc etc. Because the little factoids are in fact accurate, and properly sized and shaped to stick in your brain, they count as “supporting evidence” for Biden being bad on the climate.

      The reality is, the way to analyze Biden’s performance on the climate is to ask what’s the total content of the climate bill he got passed, and what impact it’s expected to have. That’s it. Just like the reality is that how he performs on immigration has nothing at all to do with whether he said “an illegal” in this specific context.

      If you hear someone repeating one of these specific little factoids, or if you start to see one specific one that is commonly repeated, my advice is to become suspicious of the message on top of which it is being placed, like a little evidence-cherry.

      • @LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
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        159 months ago

        I mean the effects of the climate bill in comparison to the scale of the problem are fairly modest. And the US continues to slow-walk real change at the international stage as well. It’s a fair criticism.

        • mozz
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          39 months ago

          That, what you said, is a completely fair statement. Let me expand on it. Here’s a pretty solid summary of what was in the original bill. Here’s what actually passed. They are both, sadly, fucking tragically, too little, and absolutely unforgivably late. But, blaming that aspect of it on Biden specifically, when he just got here and started immediately fighting to get something unprecedented in American climate action to start happening the instant he got in, seems unfair. As does shifting the conversation away from “how much is this gonna do” and towards “does this involve giving money to oil companies” or similar focus-grouped talking points, blaming him for not doing more, and saying he’s just the same as the people who stopped him from doing it.

      • @Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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        -79 months ago

        You have made it crystal clear that you regard anything less than worship of Biden as being russian psyops.

        • mozz
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          9 months ago

          Here’s me saying that Biden should stop sending the Israelis aid, because that’s accessory to mass murder.

          Here’s me posting an article that says “It lets … duplicitous President Joe Biden be less servile when Netanyahu dismisses the low death toll.”

          Valid criticism, I’m fine with, and there is some to give (specifically on Gaza, absolutely). Propaganda and talking points that don’t correspond to reality, I object to. Surely that’s not confusing?

          (I mean, I know you’re not actually confused – you’re assigning me views I don’t hold because that’s way easier than addressing what I’m actually saying, and you’re fully aware that you’re being dishonest. I eagerly await your pivot to some other accusation which is just as untethered from the reality, or maybe just repeating this one and insisting on it. Or maybe a little drive-by quippy insult followed by radio silence. IDK. Let’s see what the future holds.)

          • @Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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            -79 months ago

            Here’s me saying that Biden should stop sending the Israelis aid, because that’s accessory to mass murder.

            Have you ever called it the genocide it is?

            The very first sentence in your link is a standard “Biden is the most [thing Biden emphatically isn’t] ever!” statement, and you want to talk about propaganda and talking points.

            • mozz
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              9 months ago

              Have you ever called it the genocide it is?

              Moving of goalposts! Okay, I didn’t have that one on the card, that’s new.

              The answer is yes:

              Here’s me saying “yes, I think Biden’s complicit to a certain extent in the genocide going on in Gaza.”

              Here’s me saying “if you don’t like Biden enabling genocide by not reversing US foreign policy (which, again, I don’t either)”

              What’s the new goal posts? My guess is that you’ll read the context for those statements, and say that because I also wrote loads of stuff in them that doesn’t fit your narrative (e.g. the fact, that you objected to, that Biden’s done more anti-Israel stuff than the criminally low bar that is every other US president), they don’t count.

              • @Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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                -69 months ago

                Biden’s done more anti-Israel stuff than the criminally low bar that is every other US president

                Yes, that’s the bullshit line. Even Reagan was willing to cut Israel off. I hope Biden moves to the left of Reagan and stops supporting genocide.

                • mozz
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                  9 months ago

                  Ah, picking one little element and ignoring the rest of the message completely! I need one more for a bad-faith bingo.

                  However I will tell you that the one piece you picked out also doesn’t hold up. Citation:

                  The two countries signed strategic military agreements and Washington began stockpiling weapons in Israel officially assigned to US forces but which could quickly be handed to the Israelis.

                  There were tensions. Israel’s attack on Iraq’s nuclear reactor in 1981 was done without US approval and prompted Reagan to suspend some weapons shipments. The US administration also soured on Israeli’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon.

                  But Washington continued to protect Israel at the UN, including vetoing a Soviet move in the security council to impose an arms embargo. Still, the Reagan administration shocked Israel by talking to Yasser Arafat’s Palestine Liberation Organisation, a terrorist group in Israeli eyes.

                  Pausing weapons shipments had nothing to do with murder in Palestine; it was because they attacked Iraq and we liked Iraq back then. Reagan, of all people, was just as supportive of the slaughter of brown people in Palestine as he was of it in many other places. And even besides the reasons why he might have been briefly upset with Israel for non-Palestine reasons, he didn’t place sanctions on any Israelis, he didn’t meet pointedly with Begin’s political opponents, and he sure as shit didn’t land the US military in Palestine.

                  I’m not trying to say that Biden doing those things somehow undoes $10 billion worth of weapons and money to support Israel’s ongoing slaughter. I’m simply saying that it’s factually true that the tiny steps Biden is taking are more than any other US leader in the long line of neoliberals has decided to do.

      • HACKthePRISONS
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        -249 months ago

        >You’re going to be hearing about Biden saying “an illegal” for a little while, even though as your transcript notes, it wasn’t even him that chose the wording.

        why isn’t he accountable for the words that come out of his mouth?

    • FuglyDuck
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      209 months ago

      The only real problem is he gave them a sound bite.

      Which, I mean, even if he didn’t, they’d try and manufacture something anyhow.

  • Juergen
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    409 months ago

    I dislike Biden immeasurably less than Trump, and I plan to vote for him in November, yet:

    “It is a red line," Biden said, adding, “but I’m never gonna leave Israel. The defense of Israel is still critical.”

    That sounds to me like there is, in fact, not a red line.

    Drawing a line without any consequences for crossing it is worse than not drawing a line at all (source: my pedagogy prof, many, many moons ago).

    I realize that Biden did not, in fact, say that there were not going to be any consequences at all - but the other thing with lines is that the consequences need to be known in advance, and they need to be adhered to. From all I’m hearing in interviews, the US government seems very hesitant to commit to any consequences, and if the slaughter keeps going, it may save Netanyahu’s political career, but seriously bite Biden in the tush come election day.

      • Juergen
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        119 months ago

        Yes, he has been saying this. What is lacking is a plan to get there. Against the opposition of the current Israeli government.

        • @S_204@lemm.ee
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          39 months ago

          How does the American president develop a plan when one side is refusing to even say if the hostages are alive and acknowledge the existence of the other party?

          It’s so weird that people act like Hamas/Palestinians aren’t required to be a part of the process… when they’re the ones who have turned down the deals Egypt and Qatar have brokered.

            • @S_204@lemm.ee
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              39 months ago

              Israel won’t negotiate until they get a list of names of living hostages. That’s what’s being negotiated, Hamas won’t provide it. Blaming Israel because Hamas won’t come to the table in any reasonable way is ridiculous.

              The Qatar’s have threatened to boot Hamas if they don’t start negotiating in good faith is the news coming out lately. Blaming Israel for not negotiating over nothing is just stupid.

              • @OppaGundamStyle@discuss.tchncs.de
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                9 months ago

                Israel cannot get a list of names until they stop bombing the place and shooting everyone.

                How is Hamas meant to go out and find out who’s even survived Israeli bombings if they get killed? Even ambulances with Israeli permission to rescue young children aren’t even safe to travel the streets.

              • norbert
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                -29 months ago

                Israel won’t negotiate

                You could’ve stopped there.

                • @S_204@lemm.ee
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                  29 months ago

                  Meanwhile Qatar is threatening to boot Hamas because they’re not negotiating in good faith.

                  Your narrative doesn’t match reality.

          • Juergen
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            -29 months ago

            Right. The principal parties of such negotiations are the Israeli- and the Palestinian Government, with Hamas in the mix, because they control the Gaza Strip.

            Anyone outside those groups can make suggestions, demands, etc., but there are limited means for them to influence such negotiations. The US government can threaten to withhold support (at the risk of being labeled antisemitic or at least anti Israel), but I wouldn’t bet my bottom dollar that it would make a difference in this climate.

            I did not mean imply that Biden and his government can make a plan, and expect it to be followed. However, I feel that for his own benefit, Biden has to make a public display of making stronger demands for a resolution of this problem. It may not fix things in the Middle East in the short term, but it will demonstrate that he cares, and that the USA cares.

            • @S_204@lemm.ee
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              -29 months ago

              That’s fair, I would probably agree with most of how you have reframed that. I think the qataris have an outside influence and obviously Iran’s input would mean something.

              I think Biden bringing Gantz over for a chat is about as big of a threat to Bibi as you’re going to see though. That’s notable on many levels.

      • @Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world
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        89 months ago

        He says a lot of things. He’s supporting Netanyahu’s genocide by selling him weapons and backing him up at the UN.

        His support for a 2 state solution consists of words.

      • ddh
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        39 months ago

        The two state solution here seems to be a border with Israel on one side and Egypt on the other.

        • @Bernie_Sandals@lemmy.world
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          59 months ago

          This is just willful ignorance at this point, the administration has been saying consistently since at least a month after October 7th, that a two state solution was the only answer to permanently solve the crisis.

          • ddh
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            129 months ago

            Contrast what is being said with what is happening. Gazans are being pushed hard against that Egypt border. They are being starved and killed. Where does this end if US watches it continue?

          • @Sunforged@lemmy.ml
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            109 months ago

            And yet they will do nothing to make it happen, just like every administration before them. At what point will you care that it’s just lip service?

  • @Furbag@lemmy.world
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    219 months ago

    For as good as the SOTU address was, I agree that that one line where he used the term “illegal” came off very wrong when I heard it. I thought it was very out of character for him to use the same language that Republicans use to dehumanize people. I’m glad he at least recognizes that it was wrong.

  • @CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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    189 months ago

    Ugh, the liberal handwringing over this term is how we make more Republicans. Is that term all that significant in contrast with what the policies will be? No.

    • @scottywh@lemmy.world
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      99 months ago

      This article and, from the sounds of it, Biden’s interview from yesterday both sound like a great refute to trump’s putting down / making fun of Biden for “apologizing” for referring to the man as “an illegal”.