Radio War Nerd EP #56 — The Sikhs

Given our experiences over the last few decades, I really enjoy the beatings you dish out to neocons on a regular basis. That said, are any of them actually willing to come on the show? I'd be curious to hear them defend their position ideologically & pragmatically. On the one hand i've never seen one of them sit down and philosophically state the underpinnings of their"shining city on the hill" stuff (i assume it'd be some utilitarian/effects based argument). Whether it's that or something else, i think it'd be great to hear why that phil. framework makes sense in this context and whether their policy perscriptions are actually superior even if you accept their framework (presumaby vs what I assume to be brecher's realpolitik and/or dolan's effete internationalism).

I appreciate the deep dive on Sikh history here. My Indian friends always seemed to speak of the Sikh with a sort of respectful fear.

Loved the show.

complimentary

Great. I listened to the BBC In our time podcast on The Sikhs just last week and was nice to hear this as complement/contrast.

I do not understand how you cannot be a nihilist Gary :) The older I get, the more I see, the more I learn, the less faith I have in any sort of cosmic justice. It just seems to me that the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.

The bankers didn't need to be bailed out to save the world economy, it is more than capable of taking that blow. Also bailing savers would have been much cheaper. That saving the economy crap is just hot air used by the elites to bail out their friends. In capitalism taking losses vital it proves you are incompetent or dishonest and your business model sucks. I think leftists just bought that crap because they like to hear George Bush say that capitalism didn't work and for that emotion they where willing to let criminal banksters get away with murder at the cost of trillions of dollars and a gutting of the working class purchasing power through Federal Reserve money printing!

Hoping for a program on CyberWar soon. Perhaps highlighting Tor, Russophobia and disinformation.

Love the show so far. regarding Trump and his supporters: I grew up in rural North Dakota and know these people quite well. Trump only represents a break from neoliberalism in tone. His policies are very pro-business and anti-government. He is neoliberalism's right wing. Less tolerant regarding social issues, but still market fundamentalist. And his supporters are drawn to him because of identity politics. Yes, that identity is largely white, but it's more complicated than that. It's an identity that sees America in idealistic terms. (Bill Cosby before all the raping went public.) One that doesn't tolerate all these protests that are happening. He's the common sense candidate that tells it like it is. The underlying economics are there, but for most people that's not the conscious issue. (A lot of my personal "friends" have done quite well under Obama, but still think he has ruined the country.) Some of these people really are scary and will have to be confronted eventually because an urban and demographic shifting United States will never be their "real" country. But there's no turning back now.

Also re: Duterte, his sudden tilt to China and open praise of the Chinese Communist party. Check out his speeches on the Cold War.

I got linked this recently <a href="http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2015/07/13/1476508/duterte-declares-support-gay-marriage-lgbt-rights" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2015/07/13/1476508/duterte-declares-support-gay-marriage-lgbt-rights</a> and it at least slightly undercuts Duterte's image as aggressively populist, I have a real hard time imagining a tough-on-crime type populist in the US openly supporting LGBT rights.

Isn't the whole of warfare about cheating? Being where the enemy is not, misleading him about your intentions, ducking his fire, making most of your assets while trying to nulllify his, etc.?