recedite wrote: Perhaps you are unaware that nearly every country in the region is already at war? In the last week or so the ex president of Yemen was assasinated after trying to change sides in one war, and the PM of Lebanon was mysteriously detained in Saudi for some kind of re-education. The Israelis have bombed Syria, which has also been bombing itself. The Yemenis are starving and Quatar is under another blockade, but fortunately the Quataris are so rich they can fly in enough caviar to keep themselves going. The only stable country is Jordan, and the king there has already signalled his displeasure at the embassy move with a yawn. He is a guy that survives by never getting involved. The Palestinians living in Jerusalem are already under Israeli lockdown.
recedite wrote: So who exactly is going to get upset over this?
robinph wrote: » Because it's the opposite of what Obama did.
recedite wrote: » Perhaps you are unaware that nearly every country in the region is already at war? In the last week or so the ex president of Yemen was assasinated after trying to change sides in one war, and the PM of Lebanon was mysteriously detained in Saudi for some kind of re-education. The Israelis have bombed Syria, which has also been bombing itself. The Yemenis are starving and Quatar is under another blockade, but fortunately the Quataris are so rich they can fly in enough caviar to keep themselves going. The only stable country is Jordan, and the king there has already signalled his displeasure at the embassy move with a yawn. He is a guy that survives by never getting involved. The Palestinians living in Jerusalem are already under Israeli lockdown. So who exactly is going to get upset over this?
Leroy42 wrote: » What is the thinking behind moving the embassy? I can seen the potential downsides but can't see what the upside is. Any ideas?
StringerBell wrote: » It completely removes any credibility the US has in peace talks between the Israelis and Palestinians.
StringerBell wrote: » Na, not this time. A departure from the usual policy of whatever he did lets undo that. Its clear enough I think that his foreign policy is once again not as a result of any long term strategy, more to pander to domestic interests. What's the worst that can happen from his point of view anyway? Some violence or attacks, anger? Nothing that will affect him directly negatively. Its akin to taunting someone until they punch you, then pointing at that as evidence they are violent and justify pre conceived ideas already held about them.
Leroy42 wrote: » Well you did because RTE had the balls to claim that in a violent region, as you yourself have acknowledged, a significant change in the current situation to aid one side over the other could provoke violence. Exactly what is it that you were complaining about?
MadYaker wrote: » So because the region is already unstable provoking more instability is fine?
recedite wrote: » What peace talks? Obama liked to talk about a two state solution in which Palestinians and Israaelis would live happily ever after as good neighbours, sharing one city as two capitals. Maybe a bit like Berlin, divided by a wall or something. Its not realistic. Trump is firmly on the Israeli side. At the same time, he also has the Saudis onside, which is a good trick to pull. Yet again he is fulfilling a clearly signalled election promise. People may find it shocking that a politician would keep an election promise, but The Donald is no ordinary politician and he has been keeping election promises all along. Now is the perfect time to move the embassy, with Israel strong and the neighbours busy making war on each other. Some day there will be a single country there and Jerusalem will be the undisputed capital. As with Lebanon, all the people will eventually bury the hatchet and cobble together some sort of agreement in the interests of peace and prosperity.
BillyBobBS wrote: » I had my doubts before President Trump came into office but he has shown beyond any reasonable doubt he is a fantastic president and this further cements him as possibly the greatest president of our generation.
recedite wrote: » I was laughing at RTE's prediction that a region engulfed in violence would be provoked into violence by Trump moving the US embassy from one Israeli city to another. Actually if the region gets so upset that they abandon all the other wars in order to picket the US embassy, it'll be a Great day for peace in the region
Billy86 wrote: » Essentially yeah, just keep using military and political force and it'll fall in line. Just like we did with the British, and now we're all a happy family in this United Kingdom of Great Britain and Irel-- oh, wait.
recedite wrote: Most people accept now that the two state solution for Ireland has not been a great success over the last 100 years. Perhaps it was the least worst option at the time, but that's about the best that can be said about it.
Leroy42 wrote: » I'm sure if people ever came into your house with some baseless claim and then not only took over parts of the house but then took whatever they wanted you would be just fine with it.
recedite wrote: » Most people accept now that the two state solution for Ireland has not been a great success over the last 100 years. Perhaps it was the least worst option at the time, but that's about the best that can be said about it.
Tell me how wrote: » So what's your point?
recedite wrote: Two state solutions may not be the "happy ever after" that their proponents would like to believe they are.
Tell me how wrote: » He missed out on Time's person of the year. They gave it to "The silence breakers". Women who spoke out against having been abused. Probably a reasonable recipient, if not one person.
recedite wrote: » Two state solutions may not be the "happy ever after" that their proponents would like to believe they are.
Billy86 wrote: » Colin Kaepernick would have been utterly hilarious to be honest, in terms of reaction. "Funny" in a difference sense though, how the 'silence breakers' that came out against Trump are seen by his fans as sluts, whores and liars.
recedite wrote: » I was laughing at RTE's prediction that a region engulfed in violence would be provoked into violence by Trump moving the US embassy from one Israeli city to another.
It doesn’t allow businesses to take as many tax breaks but, in theory, is also supposed to have a lower rate. Except not under the Senate bill. When Mitch McConnell & Co. revived the AMT, they absentmindedly left it at its current rate of 20 percent, the same as the new, lower rate of the corporate income tax that the bill included. As a result, many companies won’t be able to use tax breaks that were supposed to be preserved in the legislation, including the extremely popular credit for research and development costs. Corporate accountants started freaking out about this over the weekend, but the situation reached high farce when a group of lawyers from Davis Polk pointed out that, by leaving the AMT intact, Republicans had essentially undermined their bill’s most important changes to the international tax code. Without getting too stuck in the weeds, the GOP’s bill was supposed to take the U.S. from a “worldwide” system of taxation, where the IRS tries to take a cut of profits American companies earn anywhere on the globe, to a modified “territorial” system, where companies could bring back their profits either tax-free or at a much lower rate. With the AMT still kicking around at 20 percent, though, “the United States would continue to operate under a worldwide system of taxation,” the lawyers wrote. Keeping the AMT was supposed to raise $40 billion, but that already appears to be a gross underestimate. (The figure came from Congress’ Joint Committee on Taxation, whose analysts I can only assume were running on Red Bull and fumes while trying to provide the GOP with last-minute scores.) NYU Law professor and tax expert Lily Batchelder concludes that the AMT will actually cost companies at least $329 billion—good for limiting the blow to the deficit, bad for the corporations who are supposed to be stumping for this legislative Frankenstein—just based on the value of the R&D credits and international exemptions that have been rendered useless.
Billy86 wrote: » Also the tax bill the Republicans all (I think all? Certainly at least 50 of 52) happily signed despite having not looked at it, and it literally having handwritten corrections and scribbles in the margins, remember that one? Yeah, there was a $289,000,000,000 error in there. You couldn't make this amateur hour sh** up - https://slate.com/business/2017/12/senate-republicans-may-have-made-a-usd260-billion-mistake-in-their-tax-bill.html
