True diplomacy

Vance truly is one of the Vice Presidents of all time

@Jay: Are you actually capable of making a concrete point or is vapid sarcasm all you can manage? Hey man, no worries if you're just that limited. The handi-capable are people too. 😉

But in the off chance that this is just an educational deficiency on your part, see below for a real example. The first lesson is free, but each one after will be charged...

It's bloody long past time that SOMEONE said something to these European leaders. The speech suppression tactics they are employing and their heavy handed regulatory approach to AI are fundamentally anathema to the notion of free and open democratic societies.

Heck it's so bad in the UK now that if a woman complains in an online forum about a dude walking around in a female locker room with his cock hanging out, she might actually get a visit from the police for posting "harmful content." Meanwhile, other European countries, along with Australia, are looking for ways to punish U.S.-based social media platforms for not censoring speech.

Enough is enough. We need to make it crystal clear that we will not countenance the targeting of our tech companies because certain European leaders cannot stand free speech. The only alternatives are to wall off each country from receiving content from posters in other countries or to censor globally using the most stringent global standards, neither of which is a remotely desirable outcome.

Have the bar for American politicians been set this low?

@rickdugan
"Are you actually capable of making a concrete point or is vapid sarcasm all you can manage?"

Sarcasm is a defense mechanism for the emotionally incontinent.

Police are turning a blind eye to grooming gangs in the UK, and arresting people assaulted by Muslims in Germany, for the fear of stoking "Islamophobia." But we can't get too cocky, the Nashville trans shooter's manifesto was hidden out of far of stoking violence against trans people.

Perhaps fear of an obvious threat is not a "phobia" but highly rational after all?

Vance is speaking truth to a continent that fears it.

Imagine having to live in this fucking world as a young man.

Telling NATO to fund bidens proxy bwar isnt good diplomacy

^ No, I can't imagine that.

@rick

You and I both know I was crystal clear in what my point happens to be. It's just in opposition to your position. Again, I hope they both get "rookie of the year" accolades at the end of this.

@Puddy

Oh, I see you are a purveyor of incontinence! You smell me!

@ski

As long as that young man gets married.....and then divorced, what do you care? You think my position(s) ruin shit, and I think your position(s) fuck shit up....so in the end, we even out and you still make a living off divorce, and I make a living, oh let me cater to your conservative senses: I'm a federal worker that will never get laid off, thus funding my club activities into perpetuity.

===> "You and I both know I was crystal clear in what my point happens to be."

If you were clear enough, I wouldn't have called you an ambiguous sarcastic twat, now would I? Feel free to be specific about what you found so objectionable about what Vance said or how he delivered it.

When Keystone and The Wall were instantly shuttered, not one Dem gave a rat's fart of the 50,000 union workers and associated downstream contractors that lost work. When Cisco or GE or META or shutting down coal miners in WV (they can learn to code was the answer), whomever lays off lots, Dems never say anything. Layoff a gov't worker and it Armageddon.

No one ever talks about how many taxpayers it takes to cover a $60K gov't job.

Jaybud thinking he was being clear and not understanding that he was the only one who thought so, is actually the epitome of stupidity. Many Federal workers are useless leaches gaming the system. They are the "outer party" referred to by Eric Arthur Blair many years ago. Winston Smith was the sole exception to Government Workers being a blight on humanity.

Ski, unfortunately the issue with Jaybud and others with his twisted world view is the belief that Europe is somehow morally and culturally superior to the U.S. They want the U.S. to be more like Europe, not the other way around.

I know what saner people might think. How in the world could anyone possibly want that when Europe has:
- Experienced decades of economic malaise due to stifling regulatory policies, employment laws and high taxes;
- Trashed its fiscal budgets with unsustainable spending, even with Daddy U.S. subsidizing Europe's massive welfare experiments through defense coverage and bearing the brunt of R&D costs for new medicines, among other things;
- Made its energy and gasoline absurdly expensive through unattainable ESG mandates, significantly harming both consumers and industrial production in the process while making themselves increasingly vulnerable to bad actors;
- Made many of its companies uncompetitive in the global markets due to the aforementioned issues, even with protective tariffs (which of course also hurts U.S. exporters and their own citizens);
- Shown themselves quite incapable of controlling violence and social disruptions perpetrated by certain groups, due in no small part to allowing too many radical Muslims into their borders and of course their voting booths;
- Swung so far to the extreme on DEI and gender ideology issues that they are actually trying to suppress free speech;...?

I could go on. I know that it boggles the mind for those of us who don't have our heads up our own asses, but these beliefs of European moral and cultural superiority are deeply if irrationally ingrained in certain elements of our population. So when they see Vance lecture these European leaders on these issues, they can feel nothing but shock and confusion that he would do something so (in their minds) audaciously off putting.

@rickdugan - There's an epidemic of westerners trashing their homelands to look more enlightened, worldly, and intelligent than those who haven't been outside their country. Jaybud doesn't sound like that; the sarcastic whining doesn't exactly scream "Harvard" or "summers in Monaco," it's decidedly more "howler monkey." We see similar levels of mental retardation here in individuals who make internet threats to kick my ass because he played basketball and lifts weights or something. Or semi-literate "pimps" who unironically use phrases like "end-stage capitalism."

Back when I was in college, I talked to a European friend who was enthusiastic about the coming European Union, the coming down of trade barriers. When I asked him if he thought a united Europe could be a world power on the scale of America, he said "no, Puddy Tat, it's just too old."

Europe acts like a place that has lost its identity and now wants to amuse itself down into comfortable decline and nothingness. Hence why when Muslims drive cars into German crowds, the headlines read "car drives into crowds" and it's a greater sin to insult the Religion of Peace(TM) (ROFL), admitting more people who want to turn your country into a caliphate is the "humane" thing to do, and free speech comes subordinate to protecting everyone's widdle biddy feewings.
Though somehow I doubt "FUCK CATHOLICISM" would earn the same sentence as "FUCK ISLAM."

Maybe I'm just an ornery Yank, but I'm not copacetic with the idea of slow American suicide. That's why, despite believe that Trump is a fucking jerkoff prick, I contributed to his campaign and sleep like a baby at night having done so. I'm not cool with the barbarians at the gates, whether they're yelling "Allahu Akbar!" or "Communist Revolution!" You want to worship Allah or vote far left, fine, that's your prerogative, just stay in your mosque or on your commune and not try and shove your values up my ass.

In this country, we have freedom of speech; you can call Christianity or Islam or Hinduism or Atheism a pile of lies and not risk going to jail. We have the second amendment in case the rest of the Bill of Rights gets infringed. Federal workers are not our betters and not guaranteed employment for life.

And if you don't like it, I hear Northern Greenland is nice this time of year. For now ;)

Are you guys that fucking stupid? I take no issue with trimming federal waste. My OP is suggesting they’re using a blunt axe to do a sharpened machetes work (oops, these guys were lumped in and accidentally fired….hire them back). A little more thought to the actual cuts would/will have been advisable.

God damn you fucking tards have to go to full libtard mode on this? You can’t even own thatthey’ve made a few firing mistakes, and probably shouldn’t show our negotiation positions so freely? That’s a twisted world view Dugan? Whatever.. Europe culturally superior? The fuck are you talking about?

I don’t have an issue with cutting positions. I don’t have an issue with Europe shoring up their own security. I have an issue with the rookies calling those shots and the armchair diplomacy.

"Are you guys that fucking stupid?"
I don't speak Sarcastic Idiot very well and the Google Translate for it is busted.

"I take no issue with trimming federal waste."
Which is why for the last 4 years you've shown fuckall interest in doing it, and still object to every nickel cut from the budget. Stop screaming and throwing your poo, and start with some constructive ideas, and you might get listened to.

"A little more thought to the actual cuts would/will have been advisable."
Yep, I agree. Backtracking on firing people is a bad look. But they're uncovering waste, fraud, and abuse that a blind monkey could have picked out. Why have they been paying SS out to people who have been dead for decades? I really can't wait until they get into the DOD.

"You can’t even own that they’ve made a few firing mistakes, and probably shouldn’t show our negotiation positions so freely?"
Negotiation positions like stop arresting people for making social media posts you don't like, about groups you keep letting into the country and want to kill you? Oooh, God Forbid.
They don't like Trump because he asks things of them.

"Europe culturally superior? The fuck are you talking about?"
You should travel there someday and talk to the people. Before Trump, I always got a lecture about something. During Trump's first term, I got a lot of opinions from people who never set foot on US soil.

"I have an issue with the rookies calling those shots and the armchair diplomacy."
When the same people--like Biden--have been chronically wrong for half a century, perhaps it's time for a change? We've seen this problem with "expertise" throughout the government. The Harvard people have fucked up or been shown to be on the take. Perhaps fresh blood is what we need, especially when Trump 45's foreign policy has been shown correct again and again.

The only reason that Europe has a social welfare system and hasn't failed completely is they spend minimally on defense, because the suckers called the American taxpayer pay for it. Ukraine is their problem, not ours. Why should we pay for it? Be more like Europe? Yup, a failure. Has been.

Finally you manage to be specific Jaybud. Congratulations, I knew you could do it. 😉

I actually don't disagree on the chaotic was that these firings have occurred. I also would have liked to see a more targeted plan. But that's also not what I was criticizing in my comments.

You could have saved yourself the labels and confusion if you had just been clear in the first place. But what I said about way too many liberals, like the JamesSD's and others of his ilk (who incidentally came in here to high five you), is still right on the money.

But we'll agree to disagree about the intent and strategy behind the speech. I don't know if you watched the whole speech, but I did. Vance gave very specific examples of government abuses of freedoms. It was downright chilling. What he said needed to be said, loudly and publicly in a way that it could not be hushed up or suppressed.