PRESIDENT TRUMP

author=pianotm

Solitayre
Two major foreign policy fuck-ups in two days and he's not even sworn in yet.

You do realize that this is the guy who swore to end our peace treaty with Iran.

Yet selling huge amounts of military equipment to Taiwan is okay.

I'm curious, what specifically do you think Trump intends to do about Iran? And are you of the mindset that they are peaceful now, not sponsoring terrorism, and not pursuing nuclear weapons?

author=harmonic

author=pianotm

Solitayre
Two major foreign policy fuck-ups in two days and he's not even sworn in yet.

You do realize that this is the guy who swore to end our peace treaty with Iran.

Yet selling huge amounts of military equipment to Taiwan is okay.

I'm curious, what specifically do you think Trump intends to do about Iran? And are you of the mindset that they are peaceful now, not sponsoring terrorism, and not pursuing nuclear weapons?

I have no idea what he's going to do, and neither do you, and neither does Donald Trump.

harmonic
Okay, assumption made, paranoia. Another assumption made, interventionist desires.

Since you claim I'm paranoid, are you going to assert that Iran does not in fact sponsor terrorism, does not have imperialistic tendencies in the region, nor desires nuclear weapons?

It doesn't fucking matter. The country made peace with them, and they're honoring it. When Trump gets into office, he's said he's not going to. This country, we, us; we are the imperialists. What Iran is doing halfway across the world is none isn't this country's business. They're the ones making the effort for peace with our country. I don't care if they're sponsoring terrorism. We sponsor terrorism, too. I don't care if they have imperialistic tendencies. We are the biggest imperialists in the world right now. I don't care if they want nuclear weapons. We are the biggest threat of nuclear apocalypse in the world. Stop assuming we're the good guys. We're not.

Solitayre
Iran getting nuclear weapons would probably be very bad. But while Iran's current government is corrupt and sponsors terrorism, a lot of their young people are very pro-West and are sick of living under a theocratic nightmare state. Their government is not to be trusted but I see the Iranian people are as a potential future ally and think going to war with them would be a tragic and catastrophic mistake.

Peace is always preferable to what our congress and president seem to want. Peace is the first step to solving the issues we have with Iran. This country has spent most of it's existence at war. Our economy is based on war. There's a reason that at the moment, we're the most hated country in the world.

author=pianotm
There's a reason that at the moment, we're the most hated country in the world.

I don't think this is true? I guess it depends on who you ask.

harmonic
The US is definitely not the greatest threat of nuclear apocalypse. That's silly. There are no "good guys" as far as governments go.

http://www.ploughshares.org/world-nuclear-stockpile-report
Nine countries in the world possess a total of 15,375 nuclear weapons. The United States and Russia account for 93 percent of them.

I don't think Trump wants to direct the war machine anywhere. The problem is that he's a self-titled counter-puncher, so any small aggression against him or the U.S. will result in him escalating things, which could spiral out of control but probably just hurt our standing with a lot of states.

I think that what scares me about Trump is that nukes feel like a possibility for the first time in my life, and it's not because he's bloodthirsty--it's because he's stupid, narcissistic, and petulant. I don't think it would ever get to that, though. My guess is that Trump's legacy will be a series of gaffs and a bunch of transparent conflicts of interest that will net him and his family lots of bank, likely at the expense of Americans. Cutting the estate tax down is something to look for.

The worst things that will come from his presidency will be the result of policies pushed by his cabinet. Education in particular looks grim.

Yeah, it's embarrassing. My family are British immigrants in America. I'd like to say that the place where we came from is doing so much better but it's really not. I envy you Scandinavians, personally. Your countries seem so livable.

I almost was terrified to open this topic up, but I did... and then I remembered, RPG Maker is an international community. It's probably more or less safe in there.

author=Solitayre
Iran getting nuclear weapons would probably be very bad. But while Iran's current government is corrupt and sponsors terrorism...

Iran's not trying to get nuclear weapons. They're trying to build nuclear power plants. They're two very different paths, but to the average schmoe reading fearmongering in the newspaper, nuclear is nuclear.
The only reason we, The West, antagonize Iran is because they aspire to being an independent 1st world nation via nuclear power, and our modus operandi for the last quarter century has been Middle East Destabilization on behalf of the Saudi royal family and related UAE filth. Your dark ages absolute monarchy won't last very long if your neighbor is a prosperous free nation offering lots of social mobility to it's people.


Anyway, I haven't been in it for awhile, but if I recall correctly, what Trump is talking about with Iran isn't as clear cut as "peace has ended, prepare for war." There's some kind of international treaty in place that's been on the books for awhile and has a lot of sanctions and whatnot in it. If I could remember the name, that would tell us everything we need to know. Anyhoo, Trump was talking about withdrawing from it, not picking a fight with them.
I listened to a good political analysis on it awhile back, sometime during the early campaign trail, and it basically said that if Trump went ahead and broke up this agreement, all it would do is unilaterally screw the US. With all the trade restrictions removed, everybody in the world would be free to trade with Iran however and whenever they want. But if the US wanted to be a sourpuss and continue villifying them, then they would be alone and US companies would be excluded from Iranian business opportunities.
So basically, and as usual, Trump is talking about shooting himself in both feet.
I don't know why harm defends this guy so fervently.

author=Dyhalto

author=Solitayre
Iran getting nuclear weapons would probably be very bad. But while Iran's current government is corrupt and sponsors terrorism...

Iran's not trying to get nuclear weapons. They're trying to build nuclear power plants. They're two very different paths, but to the average schmoe reading fearmongering in the newspaper, nuclear is nuclear.

The Bush administration swore up, down, and sideways that iraq had WMDs, but hey when we went in there weren't any, so yes I'll be appropriately skeptical if anyone comes along saying the country Republicans have been eyeing lustfully for over a decade is really close to nukes, guys, we gotta take them out right now.