zephyreks @ zephyreks @programming.dev

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"THE U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT encouraged the Pakistani government in a March 7, 2022, meeting to remove Imran Khan as prime minister over his neutrality on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, according to a classified Pakistani government document obtained by The Intercept."

https://theintercept.com/2023/08/09/imran-khan-pakistan-cypher-ukraine-russia/

Who would have thought that the charges were bogus? Who would have thought...

Overall satisfaction in my experience was still pretty high. Did people have complaints? Of course. But, well, looking at the alternative...

Fuck man, if the US didn't pay so well it really would feel like a third-world country. Transit? Nonexistent. Roads? Falling apart. Drugs? A core component of society. Police? Insanely corrupt and racist. Crime? Rising as you sleep, but at least violent crimes are falling. Time spent on useless bureaucratic bullshit? Infinite. Wealth inequality? Of course. Healthcare? The fuck is that? Life expectancy? Low. Sanitation and drinking water? Clearly still questionable. Traffic accidents? Everywhere. Electrical grid? Literally falling apart in some places.

Plus, the democratic system inherently polarizes people towards dissatisfaction. In a democracy, you might be dissatisfied if you think someone could do better. Without a vote, you're dissatisfied if you think the government is not acting in your best interests.

None of those countries have negotiated with TikTok for a plan of operations: they've been following guidelines shared by US intelligence... Are you at all surprised by their behaviour?

I've told you multiple options for accessing Science... Y'know, one of the most prestigious journals in the world.

The role of democracy is to make government responsible to its constituents rather than to the rulers: democracy was founded on the idea that the monarchy fucking sucks and wealth/power should be better distributed.

China's government is still accountable to its constituents, just in a different way than the US. Instead of winning and losing elections, getting increased or reduced responsibilities (promotion and demotion) is the primary way of managing accountability. The primary failure mode of China's government is rampant corruption that decouples the promotion/demotion mechanism from actual constituent well-being, which is why stopping that is the platform that Xi Jinping rose to power on.

People always talk about civil liberties in China, but frankly Asian culture is notoriously conservative. LGBT rights are still an active topic across East and Southeast Asia (and indeed even in the US). Religious freedoms are just... not really a big concern when most of your population isn't religious. Freedom of speech exists up until they begin calling for government reform/replacement: protests are a dominant form of expressing displeasure to local and municipal governments (the Jasic workers protest was quelled, but the company was punished by government policy that fucked their short-term growth prospects), and can even influence national politics (see the protests against COVID-19 lockdowns and the resultant opening of policy on COVID-19). The War On Terror rears it's head in ugly ways, but all indigenous minorities get handled with affirmative action policies that encourage economic independence.

Getting over the great firewall is fairly trivial in practice, particularly for the young and tech savvy. The prevalence of studying (4.4 million students) and travel abroad (who the fuck knows) makes it even more trivial to learn and spread news from other perspectives. Activism is prosecuted a fair chunk more, but it's not like activists in the West are given carte blanche either.

Is it less progressive than urban West Coast/Northeast US? Absolutely. Is the government as accountable as in democracies like the Nordic states or Switzerland? Absolutely not. Then again, you wouldn't expect it to be. Chinese culture is far closer to that of right-wing America (without the bible thumping and gun toting lol) than it is to that of left-wing America, nevermind left-wing Europe.

I'm really not sure what your confusion is. Do you not have access? I think it's on scihub, but you can also probably access it at your local library.

That isn't what trace means, though.

This is the data averaged over the tanks: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abc1507

The variance in concentrations is massive. The concentrations on average is barely below legal limits and the bioaccumulation factor for these isotopes is fairly sizable in marine life.

Tepco is cutting corners on this release. They have a history of cutting corners and they will continue to cut corners. The cleanup is a massive money sink for the Japanese government and is something they are eager to be rid of (also, y'know, some old people dying is probably good for Japan's demographics). Unfortunately for Japan, they aren't the only people eating fish caught in Japan.

Literally the entire PRISM operation? It gathered internet traffic from all major US tech companies and could pretty much access any data those companies had on you.

The US can't really force a foreign entity to comply, so this is the next best thing. If anything, it means that TikTok's systems are so robust that US alphabet agencies haven't found an easy way in yet.

It literally is.

If you're too lazy to click the source, that's a you problem mate.

Must have been.

I sent you the article, you just haven't opened it.

The US has consensual access to pretty much every major player in the social media marketplace (as we know from the Snowden leaks)... Except TikTok.

Until TikTok opens itself up to US surveillance, they should be banning it to push users towards platforms that the US does have access to. Watch them roll back the bans if these policies actually get implemented.

But the traces in the wastewater are fairly high, falling just below legal food limits (ignoring that bioaccumulation by definition accumulates toxins from the water into animals).

It's literally in the article

[citation needed]

China bet hard on developing countries because the developed world isn't growing at a rate that can keep up with China's economic growth targets. In fact, we're very quickly running towards the crossover point for Chinese trade dependence on the West vs. on the rest of the world.

Also, a big chunk of Chinese exports to the West is in computers and consumer electronics... Markets which have seen a huge slowdown due to commoditization and aggressive political lobbying from the US.

Launches got really cheap recently.

I mean... Are they wrong? The Osprey is a piece of shit and it deserves to be called out for being one.

Honestly not against this? Canada delegates education to the provinces and does fine.