Both are common. Fox will put nearly anyone on TV these days. 

It would take a serious investment, both by NATO countries and the EU, to set up a “defensible” border against potential Russian expansionism in the Baltic. But that risk remains low, if concerning, with political influence and proxy threats far more likely.

The minute his far-right allies and his camp started pushing conspiracy theories and turning this partisan was the minute I believed he did know. That sort of damaging honorless behavior is rarely used except when the alternative is worse. The fact that he’s spending political capital to get his allies to rally around…

Exactly. It’s not worth instability to push smaller countries towards that goal and ignore all other issues. The 2% is one of those arbitrary numbers and it’s generally not good to set policy based on that. Especially given there’s no major military threat aligned against NATO. It’s exceedingly unlikely the size of…

Even beyond that, there’s not really a conventional military threat equal to NATO. If most NATO states up their defense spending it will be useful, but I think we’re at diminishing returns levels there. No outside threat, including Russia, is equal in military terms. Trump always seems to think NATO countries would…

Yeah, it’s complicated by that and I think the most likely outcome is it happens. Russia getting that lifeline isn’t good, but it may be unavoidable. But what Trump did isn’t going to help the US and other EU states not keen on the idea make their arguments. 

4% is an utter waste of money for NATO. The 2% target should be pushed, but it’s not a massive concern either. The largest threats are presently assymetrical; we’re no longer worrying about the Soviet army marching to Berlin, and the Russian military is largely short term conscripts and outside of some of the more…

It’s about asserting their authority. They allege he crossed without their approval. The informal rule of bureaucracy is if you don’t assert your authority any time it’s challenged you may end up losing it. That said, this is a fairly stupid hill to die on even by that standard. 

This is amazingly stupid. I’ve said it a dozen times and I’m sure I’ll say it a hundred more, but the institutional culture at CBP is toxic, just like ICE. Petty authoritarians high on their own authority and without good institutional checks and a bureaucratic culture that has little emotional intelligence or common…

There’s a ton of data contradicting most of that take, including the idea that most Americans are centrists (most are solidly one party or the other, and most independents lean one way and vote one way).

You’re not very well informed, because so-called “triple talaq” divorce is not legal in a number of Muslim countries. While it’s technically part of a number of Sunni schools, it’s not widely accepted as common practice. Pakistan, for example, has banned it, and Pakistan is hardly the most secular state. 

Your authoritarian bigotry has no place in a liberal and democratic society. Take your prejudice and cowardice and choke on them.

Red meat to the far-right. Pardon powers being abused morally. 

Ugh, Schumer is giving a speech right now. The writing isn’t actually terrible, there’s some good stuff there, but he has the charisma of a wood post. He doesn’t know how to speak publicly. He’s hitting emphasis on the wrong places, he’s constantly looking down at his script (more than would pass on a high school…

Whoever he picks will be bad, they all come with endorsements from far-right culture war groups.

I’d just say don’t use a New Atheist argument, Dawkins or otherwise, unless you’ve personally researched the topic. Most of the time they assume their prejudices and thought patterns are normative, and nothing else. They don’t bother to grapple with the question on an intellectual level.

His promotion of evopsych, which is a field where the majority of “scholars” promoting it work from bigoted first assumptions (particularly against women). You can google criticism of evopsych and find it put more thoroughly than I can explain it at the moment. There’s also him engaging in the usual rabid bigotry…

To be replaced with a coal lobbyist. The damage done to the EPA goes much deeper.

I doubt there would be much support, and with respect to public school teachers I’m not sure all of them are really qualified. Teacher quality varies so widely, from ones who know their field well to ones who know the methodology of teaching but are 40 years out of date in their field and don’t know JSTOR from Jamba…

FYI, since there’s at least 5 or 6 trolls in the greys, for all of you asshats trying to rile me up, I’m just dismissing you. I don’t care that you’re a bigot and love Maajid Nawaz or CIS or Jordan Peterson. Go whine about being persecuted on Twitter with the rest of the shitheels who hold your toxic ideological…