Trump Wasn't THAT bad?

I am not sure how you define “support peaked”. By what metric?

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The chart you kindly provided above shows US arms sales to Saudi peaked in 2017 or so.

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ah, let me provide numbers.

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The thing is in 2017 Saudis were threatening to buy Russian weapons and reducing investment in US treasury. hence he made those sales that year.
The problem with Saudi Arabia started in 1991 when they wanted no nuke zone after the gulf war and we refused. Despite the fact that Res 687 passed in UNSC. (because we wanted Israel to have nukes). Obama tried to patch it with Iran deal and weapons sales and Saudis weren’t happy with it. Because that didn’t address possibility of Israel getting nukes. And Trump and Biden have been trying to patch that up with stuff like weapons sales and pardon to MBS but it hasn’t really worked. Its quite complicated. I mean we don’t ideologically get along with Saudis but they are kind of necessary to keep the economy afloat

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“On May 20, 2017, U.S. President Donald Trump and Saudi Arabia’s Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud signed a series of letters of intent for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to purchase arms from the United States totaling US$110 billion immediately,[1] and $350 billion over 10 years”

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The quoted numbers also match the 1st chart you posted and not the 2nd.

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The first chart is deals made and the second is actual arms transferred.

Also the first chart is cumulative over years. So Trump’s sales are stacked on top of Obama’s. going from 250 M to around 2200 M over 8 years. So again. The Yemen conflict is Obama’s brainchild and he expanded the weapons exported and exported the most weapons till date. The problem is he did have many in the pipeline which he didn’t officially complete to kick the can down the road because he was already getting a lot of heat for the sales he had already done. Like bush did with the economy towards the end of his term.

Fom the same link you provided " In 2016, the [Obama administration] proposed a series of arms deals worth $115 billion, including warships, helicopters, and maintenance"

Saudis don’t care that the admin changed which is why they were threatening to reduce investment in treasury and buy arms for Russia. Unless they got what was promised to them. Because they had massively lowered oil prices for Obama to help tame the economy. Something they had already done during his 8 years because of which Obama agreed to sell them these arms. And they wanted what was due in exchange. Considering that and the fact that damage to Us relationship with Saudis was also because of his policy, I cannot in good conscience blame Trump or Biden for their actions regarding this. I only blame Biden for the direct bombing he has started now which didn’t need to happen and his slowing of peace negotiations.

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If that were true the Chart would ONLY GO UP unless the US took arms away. Yours is an argument seeking facts, not facts supporting an argument.

You read only half the description. It illustrates deals not actual arms transferred. Deals can get cancelled you know. Like Biden also did. Actual arms transferred is the second chart. Deals get cancelled on a regular basis for arms sales. Please read before you make wild assumptions.

Also please note this is a SIPRI TIV chart. which measures military capability of weapons as well.

Hmmm, please tell me more.

About?

I would also like to point out that I think your assumption is that just because there was more sale of weapons in $ value to a certain country, you think that the lethality of the war said country is involved in increases. That isn’t always the case.

The yellow line is cumulative deaths and blue bars are monthly deaths.

hence the assertion that more weapons sales = more deaths is flawed.

This is also relevant to Ukraine war for example (aid and sales). When we say the money has been allocated or we agreed to send aid, that doesn’t mean the weapons have been transferred and are being used in Ukraine the next day or the next week. The money will go to defence contractors who will produce weapons and then they will be shipped. The process could take anywhere from 2 months to 2 years depending on the type of weapons. Then they may or may not be used in Ukraine.

You also have to consider lethality of weapons sold. For example you could be selling 100 night vision goggles or 100 assault rifles. Not the same thing. Or selling $100 million worth of radar systems =/= $100 million worth of HIMARS. Even selling 40 bullets =/= 40 armor piercing bullets.

And HOW a country uses the weapon is also relevant. Are they doing targeted strikes or are they just cluster bombing for example.

And it doesn’t take into account other practices that cause death. For example blockades and sanctions that would starve and kill millions without a single bomb. Or diseases that break out due to lack of clean water etc.

Plus we also often don’t sell weapons to a country directly. So for example, while we are sending direct aid to Ukraine, we are also sending weapons to replace weapons that NATO countries are sending to Ukraine.

We often use our own military to conduct military operations in certain wars. So for example, Biden isn’t selling weapons to Saudis but he is directly bombing Yemen.

I am not commenting on what the causes were for the pattern of civilian deaths in the graph I am merely pointing out that trying to say
sending arms = less peace is a flawed assumption.
As is saying decreasing arms sales = more peace.

And in the :rightwards_hand:climate change is a hoax:pinching_hand: department:

Earth likely just had its hottest day in thousands of years

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yeah I already said, Trump’s two bad things are going to be killing the climate agenda and trade war with China. He is not even pretending to care about the climate. Didnt even address the question in the debate. Just sidestepped into saying “we had the cleanest H-2-O”. lol!

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Hey -I’m still sick and tired of all the winning we had with him as president, and how he shut down ISIS in 24 hours.

Too bad making electricity, even if I were to believe him, has nothing to do with a power grid distribution system…

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Trump has more superpowers than all of Marvel and DC put together! Unless you count honesty and empathy as superpowers, but why would we go and do that? :joy:

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I remember watching Clinton turn the Democrats into All Inclusive Capitalists that replaced the need for a Republican Party altogether, who, in turn, embraced the reactionary sections of this country in order to merely survive, while everyone became politically lazy in this country at the same time. (For God’s Sakes, I even remember the Greenpeace Activists falling all over themselves over being invited to the White House for Dinner, so that 'ole Bill could tell them that “I feel your pain” and do nothing else). Therefore, It has been a slow and steady grind to the Right, until Sanders scared the Hell out of everyone in the upper echelon of Society and launched a grass roots campaign that would have worked if, in fact, he was truly a Social Democrat and had been determined to stay in the campaign for the purpose of winning. Instead, we got the Modern Day Marie Antoinette in the form of Hillary Clinton, who proved that the Democrats are absolute masters at losing at virtually everything they attempt to do. As great as Obama becoming the first Black President was (something that was long overdue), people forget that he allowed the bailout of Wall Street under his watch, which cost a lot of American Tax Payers their homes and livelihood as a result. I would argue that this is what laid the groundwork for Trump to come to power, even though the level of Racism in this country can’t be underestimated either. Unfortunately, it’s time for the Billionaire/Predator class to suffer consequences for their Psychopathic Pursuit of Power since at least the 70s, which is going to be a hard thing to pull off since both parties have been completely corrupted by them. I kind of see this whole thing as a test to see just how much those in power can get away with. Time will tell if they are successful.

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One hundred percent–I couldn’t have said it better!

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Democrats lost their freaking minds after they were crushed post-1968 politicking. So they made a hard turn to the right and have never looked back since. They cant tolerate progressives at all. If Hillary had had any sense she would have appointed Bernie in her Cabinet for something. Maybe people would have bothered to vote for her after the backstabbing. But WWE are talking about a woman who thought it was okay to say things like “I have public positions and private positions” in public, call half the country deplorable and not campaign in Wisconsin. Democrats don’t need republicans, they are perfectly capable of chopping down their own roots.
And this latest madness goes back to 2008. The rift between Hillary and Obama has never healed. These two powerful people continue to increase the rifts and will end up destroying the party unless they make up or one of them caves.

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If Hillary had gone to Wisconsin and said “We will have a $15 hour min wage” she would have won

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