Rising fascism in the US

You clearly lumped me in with those who favour gun ownership

I said it was easy, stop giving weapons to Israel and stop using the UN veto.

You managed to ignore that alright.

South Africa launches genocide case against Israel at UN's top court

South Africa said it had approached the UN’s international court of justice (ICJ) under the Geneva convention with respect to acts committed by Israel in Gaza.

In a statement, South Africa said it was ‘“gravely concerned with the plight of civilians” caught in Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip “due to the indiscriminate use of force and forcible removal of inhabitants.”

It said there were “ongoing reports of international crimes, such as crimes against humanity and war crimes” being committed as well as “reports that acts meeting the threshold of genocide” in the Palestinian territory.

"An application in this regard was filed before the court on 29 December 2023 in which the court is requested to declare on an urgent basis that Israel is in breach of its obligations in terms of the genocide convention, should immediately cease all acts and measures in breach of those obligations and take a number of related actions."

It said South Africa “condemns all violence and attacks against all civilians, including Israelis”, adding that it had continuously called for an immediate and permanent ceasefire and for talks to resume “that will end the violence arising from the continued belligerent occupation of Palestine”.

The Guardian

Israel Rejects South Africa's 'Baseless' Pursuit of Genocide Order From Top UN Court for Conduct in Gaza

'Israel has failed to prevent genocide' in Gaza, South Africa said. Israel's Foreign Ministry responded, calling the court application a baseless 'blood libel'
[...]
Israel rejected "with disgust" South Africa's genocide case against it, calling the case a baseless "blood libel" with no legal merit, and said it was committed to abiding by international law in its war on Hamas in Gaza.

"South Africa is collaborating with a terrorist group that calls for Israel's destruction," a statement from Israel's Foreign Ministry said. "The people of Gaza are not an enemy of Israel, who is making efforts to limit harm to non-combatants."

u/glennn was the one that made that charge, not I.

Special counsel Jack Smith hits back at Trump’s immunity claims

Special counsel Jack Smith has hit back at Donald Trump’s claim of immunity from criminal prosecution in a new court filing.

Mr Smith’s office argued in a Saturday filing that Mr Trump’s claim “threatens to license Presidents to commit crimes to remain in office.”

The filing came in the federal election subversion case ahead of 9 January oral arguments before a US appeals court in Washington DC, reported CNN.

“The defendant asserts (Br.1) that this prosecution ‘threatens … to shatter the very bedrock of our Republic.’ To the contrary: it is the defendant’s claim that he cannot be held to answer for the charges that he engaged in an unprecedented effort to retain power through criminal means, despite having lost the election, that threatens the democratic and constitutional foundation of our Republic,” Mr Smith wrote.

“This Court should affirm and issue the mandate expeditiously to further the public’s — and the defendant’s — compelling interest in a prompt resolution of this case,” he added.

Mr Trump has pleaded not guilty to four counts, including conspiring to defraud the United States and to obstruct an official proceeding.

The one-term president has appealed a district court’s ruling that he is not entitled to immunity for any crimes committed while he was in the White House.

In his filing, the special counsel’s office stated that it would be dangerous to give a president that kind of broad immunity.

“The implications of the defendant’s broad immunity theory are sobering. In his view, a court should treat a President’s criminal conduct as immune from prosecution as long as it takes the form of correspondence with a state official about a matter in which there is a federal interest, a meeting with a member of the Executive Branch, or a statement on a matter of public concern,” the filing stated.

“That approach would grant immunity from criminal prosecution to a President who accepts a bribe in exchange for directing a lucrative government contract to the payer; a President who instructs the FBI Director to plant incriminating evidence on a political enemy; a President who orders the National Guard to murder his most prominent critics; or a President who sells nuclear secrets to a foreign adversary, because in each of these scenarios, the President could assert that he was simply executing the laws; or communicating with the Department of Justice; or discharging his powers as Commander-in-Chief; or engaging in foreign diplomacy.”

Re: thack45 (Post 7345525)
...You're all for attacking the right until it comes to American Imperialism.

It's not just Palestinians it's Iraqis, and a whole host of other Arabs killed with American weapons and dismissed by mealy mouthed people like you.

You're saying that because of the history of the British Empire America cannot be criticised in any way... That if American and Israel wiped out the Palestinians that would be fine and dandy because of the horrors of British rule.

And not just political thinkers and concerned citizens – in 1899 House Speaker Thomas Brackett Reid (one of the most powerful politicians in the country) broke with the Republican administration over what he considered its expansionist policy toward Cuba, Hawaii, and the Philippines. He resigned from the House in protest.

[...]
But, in a way, the money is a side issue: most Substacks are free. What’s important is that, as social media degenerates into fragmented chaos, Substack has evolved into a significant part of our culture’s public sphere. Some of the most thoughtful long-form writing around nowadays can be found on the platform.

From the outset, the founders were emphatic about their commitment to free speech. A decision to subscribe to a writer’s posts was a matter between the subscriber and the writer. The platform’s owners would apply a “high, high bar” before intervening in content. It was important that users of the platform be able to debate opposing views, etc, etc. The usual “marketplace of ideas” guff, in other words.

You can guess where this is heading. The platform that aspired to be “the last, best hope for civility on the internet” turns out to have a “Nazi problem”. “Just beneath the surface,” says Substack writer Jonathan Katz in the Atlantic, “the platform has become a home and propagator of white supremacy and antisemitism. Substack has not only been hosting writers who post overtly Nazi rhetoric on the platform; it profits from many of them.”

Katz found 16 newsletters sporting “overt Nazi symbols, including the swastika and the sonnenrad, in their logos or in prominent graphics”. One calls itself “a National Socialist newsletter”. A Substack called White-Papers, bearing the tagline “Your pro-White policy destination,” is “one of several that openly promote the ‘great replacement’ conspiracy theory [which contends that white people are being stripped of their power by the rising demographic of non-white migrants] that inspired mass shootings in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Christchurch, New Zealand and other places”. And so on.

Prompted by this, more than 200 Substack writers wrote an open letter to the platform’s founders asking a simple question: “Why are you platforming and monetising Nazis?” On 21 December, McKenzie, who bills himself “co-founder and chief writing officer”, replied. He and his colleagues “have heard and have been listening” to the complaints. They wished to make it clear that they didn’t like Nazis either, but “some people do hold those and other extreme views. Given that, we don’t think that censorship (including through demonetising publications) makes the problem go away – in fact, it makes it worse … subjecting ideas to open discourse is the best way to strip bad ideas of their power. We are committed to upholding and protecting freedom of expression, even when it hurts.”

Aw, shucks. Such a sweet, innocent lad. The redoubtable Substacker Margaret Atwood was having none of it, pointing out that most, if not all, of the aforementioned Nazis were breaking the platform’s own rules. “You can’t have both the terms of service you have spelled out and a bunch of individual publishers who violate those terms of service. One or the other has got to go, and hiding under the sofa and pretending it isn’t happening will not make your dilemma go away. Nor will some laudable rhetoric about free speech.”

Spot on. And, as the veteran journalist Casey Newton has also noted, the correct number of Nazis on Substack is zero.

On November 14, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz made another argument in defence of Israel.

“Israel is a democracy – this has to be said very clearly,” Scholz said in response to a comment by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who said Israel’s legitimacy was “being questioned due to its own fascism”.

“There is no doubt about this,” said the German leader. “And we will emphasise in every conversation and at every opportunity that this is our view.”

The modern German republic, which, for generations, has tried to make amends for its Nazi past and its role in the Holocaust during the second world war, has long made Israel’s security its Staatsräson (“reason of state”) – a term first coined in an essay by Germany’s former ambassador to Israel, Rudolf Dreßler, in the early 2000s.