I think parent comment was talking about hype vs reality rather than disagreeing with you.
"We're not hiring but AI is in the news" = "We're not hiring because of AI! Don't sell our stock!" It's independent of actual current or future AI adoption.
> If however you use a zero-copy format, the CPU can skip data that it doesn't care about, so you can 'exceed' the 6 GB/s limit.
You still have to load a 64-byte cache line at a time, and most CPUs do some amount of readahead, so you'll need a pretty large "blank" space to see these gains, larger than typical protobufs.
Ideally its a mix, a good PM should understand the customer/market more than the developer has time to do, and then they can have conversations with devs about how to most effectively fill needs. In reality, these PMs seem more like unicorns rather than expected table stakes, but hey.
It impeded the Iranian colonial project considerably. Influence of Iran sponsored militias in Iraq have declined. It limped in Syria as well, which allowed for the fall of Assad regime a year ago.
You realize he was there at Iraq's invitation? The only impact of killing him is that both the Iraqis and whomever took his place is guaranteed to never forget why the job was open.
Looking at the middle east right now compared to 2020 I see a much bigger shitshow, including Syria. Having a bunch of people die chaotically doesn't serve anyone's interest, it just creates the next generation of radicals.
Well, as always, who decides the leader is illegitimate? Are the Saudis illegitimate, according the the rubric we put on Maduro?
The UN deliberately has no mechanism for this because it's a talking shop intended to help avoid war by providing a talking venue. That's the whole idea, they're not the world police, there is no such thing. They're a forum.
I'm absolutely not defending any given dictator but history shows that every attempt to remove a dictator "for the greater good" is usually 1) selfishly motivated and 2) backfires horribly.
I'm arguing against the US installing leaders in Latin America, sorry if I was unclear. I happen to have some Chilean friends and stories from them, from the Pinochet era, have helped shape my perspective.
To phrase it more completely, regime change and general destabilization of Latin American countries has definitely led to the immigration crisis in the United States now. Lack of stable governments and economies has absolutely exacerbated the production and transportation of drugs into the United States. Hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans have been killed or disappeared by US-empowered gangs or governments.
Now that said, I don't know what the world would look like had their right to self-determination been preserved. Nobody knows. But as a general rule, countries whose power structures were not toyed with by colonial powers do better than countries whose power structures were toyed with.
Imagine if Hitler was removed before... Instead, foreign powers favored appeasement and trade; conservative elites thought they could control him, Nazi propaganda and terror consolidated power, and Germans were disillusioned with democracy after WW1.
> are you seriously saying Maduro had Hitler-like potential to ignite global war if we didn't stop him?
No, and in fact the comparison to Hitler felt out of place. I'm simply saying that it isn't as black and white that one should NEVER remove a head of state.
What I will concede is that catch 22 of not knowing how the future will play out, so how COULD you confidently and with wide agreement intervene BEFORE someone commits atrocities.
I'm still not convinced removing Hitler before his invasion of Poland would have been a good idea, it seems possible someone like Himmler would be just as capable of picking up Mein Kampf as an ideological framework to continue imperialism and kick off genocide. "Look what the Jews and communists did when we tried to stand up to them, they killed the leader of our movement," etc etc.
Once the genocide started though I do thing all considerations, including national stability and continuity, are lower priority than ending the genocide as fast as possible.
Like Hitler, Trump has (or rather, had, based on recent performance) the power of oratory. Himmler did not and I wonder if he would have been able to whip up the kind of fervor that Hitler did.
That's what made Trump so dangerous, it is insane that such terrible people have such a charismatic appeal. To me they are horrible men, to others they seem to come across as some kind of savior.
Basically, "leave it to the population to sort out themselves, even if they've lost the democratic means to do so," up until a government has gone so insane it's massacring its people, or other people.
So we should have done a much bigger intervention in Syria, much earlier? We should intervene in Sudan right now? We should finally intervene in Russia where they slaughter their own children and Ukrainians in a genocidal war of aggression? We should finally intervene in Palestine and destroy Hamas (and in Iran and destroy their Mullah-sponsors) who've committed a genocide on October 7th, killing thousands of Israelis and ten thousands of Palestinians?
From a purely moral standpoint, my answer would be "yes, absolutely." Unfortunately, most of these interventions are not practically possible. Taking out a dictator in US's backyard is so much easier (and easier to do bloodlessly) than any of these examples.
Its very much for lack of trying. They had 4 years, we got no epstein files and they slow walked prosecutions to happen during the election, thinking it would help them. It didn't work, here we are.
It’s clear you didn’t follow these cases if your opinion is the SC slow walked them to enhance Democrats’ electoral out look. They secured multiple indictments and were heading to trial, which they were likely to win. Delays were caused by Trump appointed Judge Cannon and Trump appointed SCOTUS justices.
Securing indictments and going to trial is an instance of actually trying. So you really can’t say they didn’t try, because that is factually false. It’s true they could have done more, but they didn’t do nothing as others are saying.
I'm not a lawyer, and I didn't follow every motion, you're right. Still, in my book, fast walking would have meant moving faster. Venue shop if you have to. Release/declassify documents to make the bad guys look bad. There's lots of "improper" stuff they could have done and are currently getting owned by.
I'm not a lawyer either but I did follow the cases closely. My opinion is that Merrick Garland did a disservice to the country by not appointing a SC immediately, but beyond that Jack Smith moved with lightning speed in prosecuting the cases. Moreover, Congress did make the bad guys look bad -- they held a whole summer's worth of hearings where they prosecuted the case in public, offering plenty evidence. And I encourage you also to look at how it was the Supreme Court who slow walked their decisions, which ultimately benefitted Trump in obscene ways. You can't venue shop SCOTUS.
One thing about prosecuting a former POTUS for the first time is it has to survive the test of time. You can't behave like them if you want the prosecution to be legitimate, because they are lawless. But it was the failure of voters to do their due diligence to not elect a felon who bear the ultimate blame, as they are the final check. Now we bear the consequences. But again, not for lack of trying.
It's late where I am so I don't have a well-reasoned response, just wanted to say I understand what you're saying. It sucks, given what the current admin is getting away with, but I understand it.
With some charity, you can assume that people have default concern for Venezuelans.
The politics are baffling. There hasn't even been a case made that one could disagree with. Why are we killing Venezuelans and kidnapping their president? If this is for the greater good, where is that argument?
1. Most people from Venezuela are happy Maduro is out. A striking difference with people from Ukraine about the invasion. This is the most important thing about this and most people here in comments ignore it.
2. Maduro wasn't even the president. He was someone who took the country illegally with cartel people.
3. Why? Maduro was smuggling drugs in USA. Huge operations. And I guess there must be geopolitical reasons. You want China and Russia be there? And people from Venezuela were the biggest migration wave in the World last decades. You want millions of refugees?
I think one of the best arguments against US interventionalism when it comes to tyrants is just how 'variable' (let's say) the outcomes have been over the years. For every Panama, there's two or three Guatamalas, Irans or most recently Iraq. Generally the hard part is not the removal of the head of state, which for the US is usually pretty quick. It's what beurocratic structures remain functional and whether the power vacuum created brings something better and more robust, or just decades of violence.
I think Sarah Paine on dwarkesh has noted that it tends to go well when the countries already have fairly robust institutions and tends to go badly when they don't
As I'm not a historian, I can only note that it hasn't gone well recently even when multiple successive presidents want it to
> Most people from Venezuela are happy Maduro is out.
Based on what? There's a poll already about the US bombing Venezuela and kidnapping Maduro? There's a big difference between removing a leader through a legitimate domestic process and this.
What legitimate domestic process are you envisioning? He lost an election and stayed in power anyway. Any domestic process to remove him would look like a coup.
If there was drug trafficking, why has the administration failed to provide any evidence of it on the many boats they've destroyed and the many lives they've taken for it? Instead, the limited evidence we have points at the boats being entirely unrelated to drug trafficking.
If the administration had evidence, it would be in its best interest to have shared it already. Instead they keep on pushing points they can barely articulate and that conflict with known information.
They indicted Maduro and his cronies in 2020, before anything with the boats. And the "why" might be that there is no standard that a government needs to release the information they make decisions on. In fact, it's more standard to not release it under the guide of "sources and methods". In any case, are the boats even related to Maduro or just some other thing?
> Not in itself, but the trafficking of drugs into the US is a US issue.
They are already backtracking on the "Cartel de los Soles" accusation, after finally realizing there's no such organization, but it was always a slang frase about corruption in the military. Maduro cannot possibly lead an organization that doesn't exist. Source: NYT.
The indictment removed almost all of the mentions of this cartel, now phrasing the accusation in much broader, vague terms.
It wouldn't surprise me if at some stage they changed tack entirely and tried a different angle than drug trafficking, since, let's face it:
We did. And if he was successful, and then started threatening Canada, I think I'd be totally fine with Canada performing a special operation and taking him to stand trial.
And if that doesn't work? You could, for example, envision a situation where 10% of the people are well treated and armed by the government. It'd be very hard for an unarmed ill-treated 90% to conduct any kind of uprising if the government was sufficiently well organized and brutal.
The word “exiled” implies these people were forced out by the Maduro regime, which is not the case; virtually all of them left the country due to deteriorating economic conditions.
Venezuelans for the past 5+ years have been the most or almost the most numerous asylum seekers in the US. And "poor economic conditions" or general poverty is not a valid reason to claim asylum
> Venezuelans for the past 5+ years have been the most or almost the most numerous asylum seekers in the US.
That by itself does not demonstrate that the majority have been exiled, even if we want to expand the definition of "exile" to be inclusive of those who were not actually forced to leave, but felt it was necessary to leave due to political persecution.
The majority of Venezuelans will never have a legal option to reside in the United States. This incentivizes Venezuelans to make asylum claims in order to gain entry. Similar abuses of the asylum process are seen at far smaller scales in Canada and the European Union.
What sort of persecution are these people claiming to have experienced, and more specifically, what rights are they alleging to have been deprived of by the Maduro regime?
Please, educate yourself on Maduro and the people of Venezuela. It would be hard to find a less popular leader. A quarter of Venezuelans have fled the country under his regime. 82% of Venezuelans are living in poverty and he has presided over hyperinflation. Exit polls showed him losing the last election in a landslide and he stole the country anyway.
Well the videos of ~200,000 Venezuelan people partying in the capitol of Argentina is a start. As well as many other pictures and videos of gatherings wherever there is significant Venezuelan refugees.
My question wasn't about whether he was popular, it was about whether people approve of this specific military action by the US. People can hate their leaders and still not want a foreign country directly replacing them.
In this case you are just objectively wrong. Venezuelans are thrilled with this military action. They are happy they don't have to die by the millions to oust their dictator. For many, this was the best-case scenario (assuming democratic elections are held at some point in the future.)
Normal Venezuelans saw absolutely zero benefit from whatever oil revenue there was, so even in the worst case scenario, which is not a given, their lives would not be different.
I think there's massive astroturfing with the usual talking points about drug trafficking, Maduro a dictator, Venezuelans are "Happy" plastered everywhere to try and distract from the naked fact of the oil.
First off, I'll give you credit for at least trying to justify this, it puts you ahead of the administration that can't even bother.
Second off, only #3b above (geopolitics) could possibly count at all. We support dozens of dictators, don't give a darn about their people as long as it's geopolitically useful. So I've been conditioned to assume it's bullshit when someone says "we're doing it for the people there".
Third, and to your #3.. it's Venezuela. No disrespect to the people there but it's not exactly the lynchpin of international relations. Is this really worth it? For some crude which is really high in sulfur and not even that important given fracking? Even if I'm a Henry Kissinger psychopath, this still doesn't make sense.
I am saying that a wide majority of Venezolans are totally happy about this and most people here aren't concerned about this at all. They just want to talk about their pet political point.
About what are the reasons behind this I (and most people commenting here) can only have educated guess, but I wouldn't discard so easily to weaken cartels as a reason. It is the third (Cuba and Nicaragua the others) Country they got to totally control and the most important and they are powerful and organized enough to keep spreading, and they are supported by China.
Maduro lost elections. 8 millions of exilees can't love him. And I interact daily with exilees. You can disagree. It is hard to believe narco dictators have too much love from people anyway.
We are talking about 20% of the population here. A massive wave.
They would be impoverished, imprisoned or dead have they not fled. Hard to believe people who stayed are happy about this.
But check the news, the web, talk to people objectively.I can be wrong, but I think the evidence is overwhelming, statistically speaking.Check for yourself.
My Venezuelan friends in the US are for the most part very happy about it. And this is not a gotcha at all, but I haven’t seen much about Venezuela in exporting fent to the US coming from anyone outside the Trump camp
No doubt that exilees do not love him. But it was about a "wide majority" who hold that opinion. There are lots of russian refugees for example as well and they are not a fan of Putin. But back at home he still seems to enjoy majority support in a broad sense at least and I have no inside knowledge into Venezuela at all.
I see you keep repeating this exact statement every time you are challenged and asked for actual sources. Others have pointed out that when you do provide some sources, they end up contradicting your position. If all you have is videos of people celebrating, then you can find plenty of those from Jan 6th. Does that mean that Biden lost the elections and the people of the United States approved of the attempted coup?
At this point, it's hard to imagine that you are actually arguing in good faith.
Any argument along the lines of "Venezuelans aren't happy with this" out of touch with Venezuelan culture. They do not have to die by the millions to oust a dictator that killed thousands and caused 20% to emigrate. They are happy with this.
That is what OP is saying: HN users, in order to promote their personal politics, are being concerned for a people that don't want and actively reject your concern because they are happy with the outcome.
HN is doing the equivalent of (a) denying Venezuelans appreciate this, and when that fails (b) claiming they know better than Venezuelans wrt whether this is good or bad for them.
> That is what OP is saying: HN users, in order to promote their personal politics, are being concerned for a people that don't want and actively reject your concern because they are happy with the outcome.
> (b) claiming they know better than Venezuelans wrt whether this is good or bad for them.
Well, this isn't surprising at all. At least these two points also apply to the right within the US, the HN bubble doesn't even try to understand their actual views either.
> HN is doing the equivalent of (a) denying Venezuelans appreciate this, and when that fails (b) claiming they know better than Venezuelans wrt whether this is good or bad for them.
It’s very dangerous to do the “right thing” for the wrong reasons in a complex situation. This is step 1. Does anyone have faith that the Trump admin will properly execute steps 2..N?
I would have some respect if the administration announced that it would support a provisional government led by the apparent winner of the last election in Venezuela. As such it seems to be that the administration has left the existing power structure in place and established a client/patron relationship with the leadership. This is revolting.
> It’s very dangerous to do the “right thing” for the wrong reasons in a complex situation.
Venezuelans do not care for this train of thought. No one else was going to do it, and their equivalent of Hitler has just been ousted.
Far better, from their perspective, to have the evil guy removed than endless do-nothing hand-wringing from the international community that shares your train of thought.
Democratically held elections will be run again in the country.
The "wrong reasons" can still be mutually beneficial. The US gets its oil and Venezuela gets its dictator disappeared.
It's not clear what this is really about. Trump doesn't care about the people of the US, much less Venezuela, but there seems to be a widespread consensus that Maduro was a nogoodnik who won't be missed. I have no idea what the mood on the ground really is.
As for drugs, if Trump cared about drugs, he wouldn't pardon so many drug kingpins.
Some say this has to do with asserting control over China's oil imports, but according to https://www.energypolicy.columbia.edu/sites/default/files/fi... and other sources, Venezuela barely makes it into the list of China's top 10 suppliers. So while China is indeed Venezuela's best customer, this argument doesn't seem persuasive unless I'm missing something. Venezuela's next-highest volume customer is the US itself.
My guess is drugs, not because Trump cares, but because they had become too powerful, controlling Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua, as well as a wide net of politicians.
Thanks for engaging in good faith, but you know that China is selling more cars to all of Latin America than us currently, right?
Will this engagement deepen Latin American trust and respect for the US or the opposite? China makes it very clear that they do not give a shit about politics and just want to do good business, they're deepening ties that way. What's our plan? Invade random countries and tell them they better not cross us? How long does that work?
Full diaclosure: I am from Argentina. I interact daily with exilees from Venezuela. They are coworkers, they drive my Uber. They are totally happy about this.
About trust and respect, I don't see any change. Leftist will keep their mantra and Normal people will mind their business.
About the 'master plan'. No one commenting here really knows. As I mentioned to avoid criminal cartels controlling three countries and spreading it is not something I would discard. Imagine if they get nukes. Or they can start to systematicallly buy politicians in USA, as they do in Mexico.
Increasing the supply of oil will lower its price. Bringing production in Venezuela back online will have this effect. Historically they have produced three million barrels per day, currently that number is closer to one million.
Russia is funding its war in Ukraine with profits on thier oil production. All else being equal, this makes it harder for them to keep doing that. They reportedly spent $6 billion on air defense systems in Venezuela, not for no reason.
Lower oil prices also reduce China’s dependence on Russia for energy. Reducing the incentive for those two countries two cooperate would be in US interests.
Energy is fungible and lower oil prices will help reduce the cost to operate AI data centers. On the margin it will improve their profitability and reduce public backlash about rising electricity prices in the US.
A large portion of the migrant crisis in the US has been driven by Venezuelan refugees fleeing Maduro’s gross mismanagement of the country. If the subsequent government can bring prosperity back to the country it also reduces illegal immigration in the US, something the current US administration clearly supports.
Lots of positive things could result here and you don’t have to be a “Kissinger psychopath” to imagine them and hope they materialize.
Ok, but at the cost of American freedoms? We are a country ruled by laws not people. Everything about this operation violated this principle. Are you willing to give up your freedoms in order to create cheap oil so that your scenarios play out? My ancestors didn't die on the battlefield to support such things.
What freedoms did you lose today? The Patriot Act was signed into law two decades ago. I can’t remember the last time Congress passed a declaration of war prior to the President engaging in military action.
I’m sympathetic to your sentiment but that train left the station likely before you were born.
I'm very likely older than you so I have total context going back to the 1970's. Your question is silly. You don't suddenly lose freedoms, they erode. The current executive overreach is without precedent. In prior administrations congress was involved. Even during the second Iraq war congress was involved and time was taken to make a justification. The action of today was by executive fiat.
I am still confused about this. Is the goal for US companies to extract Venezuelan oil, or is it to suppress Venezuelan oil exports altogether? Or are both goals orthogonal?
I don't think oil has something to do with this. As I have mentioned I think the main reason is the cartel has become too powerful and menacing, controlling three countries and expanding.
Everyone claimed we invaded Iraq back in the early 2000s to take their oil, but the US spent a whole bunch of money on the military operations, and opened up oil and gas to basically every other country, including geopolitical rivals like China and Russia. Maybe "oil" is too simple of an explanation.
Oil is important but as lever to pull on because it affects China.
The invasion is meant to orient the US to fight China. We are cutting away the Middle East war baggage, trying to end the Ukraine war baggage so we can focus on China. Russia would be a nice ally against China.
China was moving around Lat Am and we are removing the communists from the hemisphere.
China likes oil. Loves oil but can’t get enough oil which is why it’s building solar and nuclear so quickly. The US can clamp down on the oil if Venezuela is an ally. So the US wants a strong Venezuela that can’t be used against us.
It’s hard to conduct war without oil.
The US has a strong incentive to make sure Venezuela comes out strong, and the Chinese have a strong incentive to not let that happen.
Sure, but don't forget the oil on your educated guess. There are other reasons besides the official being said. There's no invasion for justice, there's always an underlying motive for this scale of invasion. Presidents are not kidnapped because of narco traffic
Whatever you and I say about this are educated guesses.
He wasn't the president. My educated guess is that with Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela, together with China support cartel become too powerful. They systematicallly buy politicians in México, Spain, Colombia, probably Brazil and Argentina. They expanded too much. But again, it is just speculation.
I'm not Venezuelan, but I am Brazilian, so I consider myself closer to the problem than people outside of South America. If the cartels were the real problem, the US would have invaded Mexico or Brazil a long time ago.
Maduro was not fairly elected, it was a fraud, but he was the de facto head of state of Venezuela.
The whole cartel excuse is just a sham in my opinion, it is all about power, sending the example and getting the oil. Maduro, and Chavez before him, challenged the US grip on SA, and actively fought american interest in the region.
Maduro lost elections. 8 millions of exilees can't love him. And I interact daily with exilees. There are already videos if people celebrating in Caracas and all over the World. You can disagree. It is hard to believe narco dictators have too much love from people anyway.
They would be impoverished, imprisoned or dead have they not fled. Hard to believe people who stayed are happy about this. And exilees are 20% of Venezuela's population. It was a massive wave.
Asking questions in good faith is not appropriate?
If difference exist between two people then the quickest way to resolve them is to reveal them. It seems some people prefer to paw around in the dark out of deference. I did not believe this was part of the "hacker ethic."
> Asking questions in good faith is not appropriate?
You aren't asking questions in good faith, you're trying to score points.
> It seems some people prefer to paw around in the dark out of deference.
You're doing it here, implying that I'm a deferential coward instead of stating it outright. I would urge you to review the site guidelines. The only reason this site is worth visiting in the first place is because it isn't ordinarily full of the sort of Reddit-style commentary you're engaging in right now.
Thoroughly answering somebody's questions and refuting their points is not appropriate for this forum?
We should all agree with each other and sing along how lucky Venezuelans are that US, the self proclaimed world police, came to steal their oil and bomb their capital (terrorism/war crime)?
1) the method the US performed is irrespective of popular sentiment. If we were to buck the rules, I'm not sure if Venezuela would make the top 10 targets.
3) Trump pardoned the Honduras president. The drug smuggling excuse is moot. This is a power grab, as usual. And it came from Trump's mouth. We're no better than Russia if we choose to go with this narrative.
> Why? Maduro was smuggling drugs in USA. Huge operations.
What are you talking about? The war on drugs is just a bad excuse. Trump keeps claiming that Venezuela is responsible for the fentanyl crisis, which is demonstrably wrong.
And if the US administration was so worried about drugs, why did Trump pardon Juan Orlando Hernández, ex-president of Honduras, who had been sentenced to 45 years for drug trafficking? https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9qewln7912o
If Russia rolled into the United States tomorrow and deposed Trump, _most people_ would "be happy" trump was out.
It's not important at all. I've seen this exact line repeated all over the Internet today, almost like it's not a real sentiment and instead a pre seeded talking point to muddy the waters.
It is amusing to see the consent factory so efficiently spit this shit out though.
> you can assume that people have default concern for Venezuelans.
Let’s be real, the vast majority of Americans couldn’t even place Venezuela on a map.
The default state for humans isn’t caring about everything and everyone, nobody has the mental capacity or resources to do that.
We only care about something when we are incentivized to by actual self interest, familial bond, or emotional stories that align this 3rd party with our familial instincts via empathy.
I am perpetrating the exact wrong the parent poster referenced but: this is why liberalism is such a good principle and political position. It's almost a meta-position, and it provides clarity in circumstances like these.
"We're not hiring but AI is in the news" = "We're not hiring because of AI! Don't sell our stock!" It's independent of actual current or future AI adoption.
reply