You know what’s even more precise? A bullet from an AK-47 wielded by a Hamas fighter. These bombs are of similar precision to Hamas on October 7th. The Hamas militants charged across the border and started shooting every soldier they could find. A bullet is directly directed by an individual person, so they are intrinsically more precise than any guided bomb.

Did a lot of innocent Israeli civilians get caught in the crossfire? Sure. There were civilian casualties, and those increased by an order of magnitude once Israel started shooting into crowds of its own civilians. But I’m glad you recognize that Hamas does such a great job of protecting civilians. If you find the Israeli pager bombings a work of superior precision combat, you should similarly admire the work of Hamas on October 7. They are works of similar precision.

These were pagers handed out to Hezbollah operatives. How do you get more precise?

You were incorrect. They were handed to Hezbollah military and civilian officials. Hezbollah is effectively the government in that area; the civilian state is degraded due to decades of Israeli military strikes and incursions. There are tons of people who are “Hezbollah” but work the kinds of jobs the people down at your local city hall work. They’re the people operating the water systems, trash collection, etc. Realize also that this pager system WAS the local emergency response system. Think of the radios carried by police, EMS, and fire departments. There were doubtlessly police officers blown up by these bombs.

And worse still, these pagers have been in circulation FOR YEARS. They didn’t just send them out and immediately pop them. How many years do you keep a phone? How many of the people who had these devices later found their way to others hands?

You’re a member of Hezbollah, working in the civilian branch. One day you get a walkie talkie and carry it around with you. Another day you decide to be done with Hezbollah, so you get work somewhere else and you take the old walkie talkie to a pawn shop. The next day someone else, completely unaffiliated with Hezbollah, buys a set of those walkie talkies to talk with people around town.

So if Hezbollah launches a campaign to mail anthrax to leading Israeli military and civilian leaders, will you call that well-targeted as well?

Ultimately, the only hope of the Lebanese retaining any kind of country long-term is to violently resist Israeli expansion. All of Lebanon is part of Israel’s long-term territorial ambitions. So yes, honestly, violence is necessary to resist Israeli expansion. Israel’s plan is that 100 years from now, Lebanon and Jordan will not exist. See Greater Israel.

Remember, these terms are identical:

“God’s Chosen People” = Übermensch

“God’s Promised Land” = Lebensraum

The Germans in WW2 believed they were a special people chosen by God. This gave them the natural right to take over the lands of racially inferior peoples and to drive the existing inhabitants out through intimidation and violence. The modern Israeli right shares the same beliefs. They are indistinguishable; they just use different marketing.

One key note is that Israel is worse at protecting civilians than Hamas is. By their own numbers, the IDF kills more civilians for every enemy soldier they kill than Hamas does. Hamas is actually a far more ethical army, in terms of civilian casualty ratios, than the IDF is.

The harsh truth is that the only reason we call Hamas a “terrorist group” and the IDF “an army” is classism. The IDF kills 10 civilians to destroy one Hamas fighter with a laser-guided bomb? That’s just collateral damage. Hamas kills 10 civilians to kill one IDF soldier with a truck bomb? That’s terrorism.

The definition of terrorism should be amended:

terrorism (n): violence committed by a group representing one demographic group against a wealthier demographic group.

That is how YOU vote. A lot of people do not view it as a practical matter. They view their vote as an endorsement.

I don’t know where you are going with the utilitarianism and Hitler example. This is a massive stretch bordering on being rather insulting.

It really isn’t when we’re discussing fascists coming to power in the US. Godwin’s Law is dead. It is not a stretch when the reason Kamala lost is for literally supporting a genocide.

Kamala’s message was, “yes, I support a genocide overseas. But, my opponent supports it even more, and he will support crimes against humanity at home, while I will only support them overseas.”

Yup. And she let him play her like a fiddle. And there are like, 3 anti-Israel voters in the US. Harris lost because of anti-genocide voters, not because of anti-Israeli voters. You seem to be implying that anti-genocide = anti-Israeli.

If you believe that the only way a person can be an Israeli is if they support the massacre of innocent civilians, then you are racist anti-Semitic trash that doesn’t deserve to live. If that is the case, please chain yourself to a large rock, and throw the rock in the ocean.

You are ignoring how people actually think and live. You view voting as a utilitarian choice. Utilitarianism is not the only ethical system in existence. In fact, utilitarianism is exactly how histories worst autocrats justified their atrocities. Hitler himself ran on a platform of doing painful things that, he at least claimed, simply had to be done. The Holocaust itself was justified entirely from a “lesser of two evils” perspective. Hitler just had to convince the broader German populace that killing all the Jews was a necessary evil. Kill all the Jews or have the world taken over by godless Communists. That was Hitler’s central “lesser of two evils” message.

This is the fatal flaw of appeals to the lesser of two evils approaches. Yes, you “achieve more” by picking the lesser evil. But from many ethical perspectives, if both choices are objectively evil, and you can’t stop either, your only ethical choice is to not support either side. You’re still supporting evil, even if it’s the lesser evil.

I voted for Kamala, ya dingus. I just have enough self-reflection to note that her messaging was shit and that there was little difference between the two of them when it came to Palestine. I voted for her because of domestic policy, not foreign policy.

There are lessons to be learned here. And sticking our heads in the sand will not help us learn those lessons. And one of those lessons should absolutely be that, “vote for me. I support genocide, but my opponent supports it EVEN MORE!” is a shit campaign message. Whoever thought of that strategy should be shot.

Vague bullshit platitudes. That’s all she offered.

What you quoted is indistinguishable for saying, “I want all the good things for both Israelis and Palestinians! I like good things. I don’t like bad things.”

Zero acknowledgement about the hard choices involved.

She says she’ll do “everything in her power,” but we know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she is lying.

Will she make US offensive aid contingent on a cease fire?

Will she make US defensive aid contingent on a cease fire?

Will she support US military aid contingent on Israel ending its ethnic-cleansing-by-zoning code in the West Bank?

Will she support slapping sanctions on Israeli leaders who support genocide and ethnic cleansing?

Will she agree to not interfere with the attempts to prosecute Israeli officials at the International Criminal Court?

Will she make long-term support of Israel contingent on the establishment of a two-state solution?

She cares for the Palestinians, but only if she doesn’t have to life a finger for them.

Kamala is to the right of Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush when it comes to actually reigning in Israeli excesses.

Again, Kamala supports a SLOW GENOCIDE. She doesn’t mind genocide. She isn’t willing to lift a finger to restrict it. Her only concern at all for the matter is that it might hurt her at the polls, so she opposes the kind of overt ethnic cleansing that Trump supports. Trump supports putting a line of tanks on the east side of the Gaza Strip and just driving forward until the entire Gazan population is forced into the sea. That’s the kind of overt genocide Trump supports.

But in practice, Kamala is little different. I voted for Kamala, but I did so reluctantly. She says she opposes genocide, but those are meaningless words not backed by actual practice. Actions matter, words don’t. And by her actions, it is clear she and Biden support genocide. They just want it done quietly.

They’ve already BEEN doing it. And this was the critical failure of all those who argued that Trump would be better for Palestine than Harris. I voted for Harris, but I am not at all surprised this cost her the election.

Israel doesn’t need to do ANYTHING differently to complete its genocide of Gaza and the West Bank. It is already on that road, actively engaging in a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Palestinians. And the Biden/Harris team have, through their inaction, fully endorsed this genocide.

Kamala was so comically bad on Palestine that the only hair-brained thing they could come up with to defend her stance was, “well…well…Trump will let the Israelis do a genocide EVEN FASTER!”

Kamala’s campaign slogan was, “a vote for Mussolini is better than a vote for Hitler!”

And then she was surprised when enough liberal voters in swing states stayed home to cost her the election. It turns out, there are plenty of people who will NOT turn out to vote for Mussolini just because Hitler is also on the ballot. They won’t vote for either of them; they’ll just say “a pox on both your houses!” and stay home.

Is a vote for Mussolini better than a vote for Hitler? Objectively, probably yes. Hitler objectively did a lot worse harm than Mussolini. But you also can’t be shocked when people refuse to hold their noses and vote for Mussolini, just because Hitler might be objectively worse. Ultimately, it’s your fucking fault for expecting people to vote for Mussolini.

I mean, aren’t they? The only real difference I can see between Kamala and Trump on Palestine is that Kamala prefers a more respectable version of genocide. She supports genocide, but she just wants it to be done slowly and quietly. Trump is on board with a fast and overt genocide. Their policies lead to the same outcome; Trump is just a lot more honest about it.

I voted for Kamala, but be honest. The only difference between Kamala and Trump in terms of Palestine is that Trump supports a fast overt genocide, while Kamala supports a slow and quiet genocide. Neither of them care two shits if every last Palestinian is exterminated. Kamala just wants the genocide to be slow and quiet enough that she doesn’t have to answer awkward questions about it.

Let’s be honest, I voted for Harris. But her message was essentially:

“Vote for Kamala Harris. She will enable a slow genocide. But her opponent, Donald Trump, will enable a fast genocide. She is clearly the superior choice.”

Saying that Kamala would be better than Trump was objectively true. However, it was also just shit, brain-dead, zero-awareness messaging. You cannot practically run on a message of, “yes, I will enable genocide, but my opponent will enable it WORSE!”

It’s just a shit, poorly thought out message. Who actually is this for? Those pro-Zionist voters won’t be persuaded either way. Those who want to see the Palestinians genocided will go with Trump instead, as he’ll get the job done faster. Those opposed to genocide were asked to hold their nose and vote for someone who should be on trial at the Hague, simply because she was running against someone who deserves to be on trial at the Hague even more!

It’s like running a campaign saying, “yes, I have some Nazi tendencies, but my opponent is a full-on avowed Nazi. My opponent is objectively worse.”

A statement can be true, while also being just complete shit in terms of campaign strategy.

“Yes, my candidate is Mussolini, but her opponent is Hitler! Clearly a vote for Mussolini is better than a vote for Hitler!”

In many cities, nighttime noise level is limited by decibel level. But even low-level noise is allowed if below some level. So you could have some extremely quiet speakers gently wafting spooky sounds while you do this. Or if that’s a bridge too far, whose to say you don’t personally just like listening to Gregorian chants and quiet levels while you work?

Life pro tip for those nocturnal. Even those nocturnal folks need to mow their lawns. For modestly sized lawns, a scythe can be a great option! It’s also perfectly legal to mow your lawn with a scythe at three in the morning, dressed in a long black hooded robe.

Hezbollah clearly needs to seize a 20 km chunk of northern Israel to serve as a security buffer zone for the people of Lebanon.

Letting cars into cities was a mistake from the beginning. Cars should be required to park on parking lots or garages at the edge of the city. The only large motorized vehicles allowed within cities should be trains, buses driven by professional drivers, and delivery vehicles limited by governors to the speed of a bicycle. The only forms of motorized personal transit allowed should be e-bikes and scooters that can travel no faster than a human-powered bicycle is capable of traveling. Cars should be used only for getting between towns and cities, not for traveling within them.

I didn’t know that was a thing. Thanks! I’m honestly surprised some MBA bean counter hasn’t replaced those with a chip of some sort by now. Really cool!

Any mechanical regulation process that used to be handled by actual machine parts. Think of the centrifugal governor, this beautiful and elegant mechanical device just for regulating the speed of a steam engine. Sure, a computer chip could do it a lot better today, and we’re not even building steam engines quite like those anymore. But still, mechanically controlled things are just genuinely a lot cooler.

Or hell, even for computing, take a look at the elaborate mechanical computers that were used to calculate firing solutions on old battleships. Again, silicon computers perform objectively better in nearly every way, but there’s something objectively cool about solving an set of equations on an elaborate arrangement of clockwork.