Roland Gerritsen van der Hoop

Alternatively all this mayhem plays very well for someone else.

Thanks for your insights. I appreciate the thoughtful discussion.

And I certainly do not have your military experience. I just served in the draft.

I admit that @tom-effing-paine.bsky.social makes a good case why it could be “legal” once the hostilities started.

It does not make it moral, though.

I see your point. So the moment the US and Israel decided to start hostile actions the warship became “fair game” even if no war was openly declared.

So it makes it “legal” but still incredibly immoral. We look like criminals nevertheless.

I actually served but fail to see your point. There are rules for a reason. They protect our soldiers as well. Otherwise it is the rule of the jungle and Nuremberg after that.

If we were at war, surely it would be a legitimate target and the Iranians would know it was. We still are not “at war”, as far as I can asses, and so this could be a war crime, no matter how much you dislike or fear Iran.

That is hardly a good excuse for killing people for no other reason than to make a splash.

I have no problem with our forces taking out terrorists and missile sites. But this was different.

How so? Did it pose a threat to Americans? Did it play a role in Iranian operations against Israel or us? If not, it would only be a legitimate target once we declared war against Iran, which as far as I know we never did.

It is criminal to detain the adults for a misdemeanor that would never get any American in jail for longer than a day.

It is atrocious to detain children.

We are committing Nuremberg level crimes and I wonder how any “Christian” can defend this.

That should have been the excuse from the beginning, but Trump blew that up with his insane claim the Iranians did it themselves, losing any credibility right there.

He needs a protection detail, for sure.

That is blatant nonsense. I can see the validity in taking out a threat without declaring war but this was plain murder serving no other purpose than gloating over the senseless deaths of sailors to satisfy a bloodthirsty insane crusader.

No, you cannot. Unless you are a blistering idiot caught in a lie.

You are overthinking this. They are one of two things: complete effing morons (which I think is the most likely option) or extremely delusional about the science.

No. You just are an idiot and he is an idiot not having cleared the party line of lying with you.

Professor Nichols, how is it legitimate to sink a warship not posing a threat in even the most remote fashion without having declared war?

Shameful and disgraceful does not begin to describe the GOP cowards who have blocked a more prominent placing. Many of these wimps were fearing for their lives during Trump’s insurrection and they were actually guarded by these brave officers. Utter disgust is what they deserve.

But it kept our eyes off the testimony of a 13-year old girl who alleges being sexually abused by our present president.

So there is that.

Are you really serious asking that question?

What are these two clowns doing there in the first place? They have not been appointed or confirmed. They are at best defending Trump's interests and at worst Putin's.

Is this man really so immensely stupid that he

1) thinks we can trust liars like Putin on their word and
2) Trump followers are so stupid trusting Putin on his word?
Well, OK, I give you the second one.

If the government is really interested in uncovering massive fraud I would direct it into other directions, like any of Trump's business friends or family.

It is the ultimate consequence of a political "philosophy", fascism, that is inherently anti-intellectual and values extreme loyalty over everything else, especially over knowledge, experience, veracity, honor, and empathy.

We are living in the era of shamelessness where you can just make up stuff about people you do not like and threaten to take away their citizenship because you do not like them. Insane.

The President of the United States admits in public he just makes stuff up and he is still president?

With all things Trump does ask yourself "who is benefitting?"

Isn't it strange the answer always appears to be "Vladimir Putin"?

Russia, Russia, Russia. He was projecting, not denying.

Who was it that funded Osama Bin Laden? Not Mandami.

Ask her to list what exactly they have done and why an armed conflict was considered the only option. Because we do not understand it. Assuming the president did not lie to us when he said Iran's nuclear program had been destroyed, what exactly is the threat?

Bloomberg News should consider the fact that Trump lies all the time.