I do.
And Duterte has not told anyone that he was going to make things different in the jail front. The point was that he is making the ramshackle of the system they have even worse.
These were legitimate polls run by legitimate pollsters. Its wasn’t an internet poll (the huffington article has an embedded internet poll that shows that huffington post readers are much more in line with you than 1000 random interviewees).
Are you disputing the validity of the poll?
No, no it does not. I’ve asked GIGO to provide evidence that extrajudicial killings were a precursor or sign that someone was going to become a dictator. He could not. Instead he pointed to cases where dictators engaged in extrajudicial killing after they became dictators.
None of them did it while they had 90%+ approval ratings. He may become a dictator but I don’t see how there is much more chance of him becoming a dictator than George W Bush.
Was there a large organized criminal presence in Hungary based on smuggling VCRs into Romania? No? Then what’s your point?
You asked for a cite not a study.
I don’t think anything would END alcohol consumption. But its not like we didn’t know who Al Capone was.
Death squads? They are responsible for all the killings in the Philippines? You sure about that? I thought it was people settling personal grievances or cops going cowboy.
Then Bush and to a lesser extent Obama are also dictators in training?
Argumentum ad populum?
As far as I can tell, my position is really not that popular. Or do you think that using Dutarte’s popularity as part of my argument has something to do with argumentum ad populum?
I thought it was pretty clear that I bring up his popularity to point out that a person with a 90% approval rating is REALLY hard to call a dictator, a lot of people might call that an expression of democracy.
It was an internet poll, that’s what YouGov is:
The HuffPost/YouGov polls were conducted Feb. 13-14 and Jan. 29-30 this year and Nov. 23-24 last year, each among 1,000 U.S. adults using a sample selected from YouGov’s opt-in online panel to match the demographics and other characteristics of the adult U.S. population.
You join YouGov, give demographic info, then participate in polls. It’s a self-selected group. I doubt their poll is worthless, but you should know what it is before touting it.
In any case, polls can always get different results based on the phrasing of questions and such. I merely demonstrated a growing movement, that’s all. It won’t happen tomorrow, nor do I think it’ll be during my grandchildren’s day.
Er, are you sure about that? If someone promised on the campaign trail to, say, abolish the legislature and end elections, and made good on those promises in office, they’d indeed be a dictator, just a popular one. The two aren’t mutually exclusive.
Isn’t extrajudicial anything a precursor or a sign that a leader is becoming a dictator? Again, dictatorship is defined by absolute authority, not unpopularity.
Bush was a war criminal; his crimes were directed at non-citizens of the US. Duterte is going after his own citizens and government.
That drug-growing operations in Mexico wouldn’t be a “criminal presence” in Mexico, if the drugs were not illegal. Violence only and corruption accompanies the business of drugs because they are illegal. How would their being illegal elsewhere reverse-engineer violence in Mexico?
I don’t doubt that Mao tried to end drug use, I doubt that he succeeded, and that whatever success there was could be attributed to executions.
How about ending violence and corruption linked to gangs of bootleggers? Decriminalization worked perfectly; would a terror campaign do so well?
Cops “going cowboy” are death squads, and it’s not unheard of for death squads to use their powers to deal with personal grudges along the way.
The point is grossly missed: While I do think Bush should had been but on trial Duterte should be too, but for even worse abuses.
What you are doing repeatedly is another logical fallacy: the fallacy of relative privation, The “not as bad as” argument.
It doesn’t morally absolve Duterte of any wrongs to say "but Bush!, but Obama!.
This actually says that you have no clue about what an argumentum as populum is. The popularity of the argument or the one making the argument is not the issue.
As the history of the Philippines shows, Ferdinand Marcos got the approval of 88% of the voters in 1981, years after observers already qualified him as a dictator. The point again was that popular approval is very helpful for a dictator.
But, as the people showed, most can indeed later see how a mistake was giving him that approval. (of course Marcos did put a sham opposition candidate in place, but still most voted for Marcos and the real opposition boycotted the election) Again, an error is an error even if millions think it is a good idea at the time.
You’re right. But its not an internet poll in the same sense that the poll in the huffington post article was an internet poll. Anyways as you implied, there is no real reason to think that the people taking the poll are any less likely to support legalization of drugs than the general population.
Yes, I see that there are corner cases where this is true.
I have trouble with the notion of a democratic dictator. A dictator (especially the way GIGO means it) is someone who is holding onto power by force and thwarting the democratic process.
And neither are dictators.
Well, they would still have to be smugglers to get the product into the USA. Don’t you think that the same competition that exists now in that criminal enterprise would exist in a Mexico with legalized drugs?
I don’t know. I think decriminalization was the best solution for us. Prohibition was not poplar or very well enforced and this created an opportunity to make a shit ton of money for moderate levels of risk.
The unpopularity of prohibition no doubt contributed to the weak enforcement but if your objective is to rid society of the ills associated with alcohol (rape, murder, accidental death, violence, alcoholism, ruined lives and families, etc), what other mechanism would you have proposed to achieve that goal or are you saying “fuck it, nothing you can do”
You think that the cops weren’t settling personal grudges before?
No, you don’t understand. I’m not saying that Dutarte is OK because Bush and Obama are bad too. I’m saying that bush and Obama are doing bad things but they are not going down some road that inevitably leads to dictatorship. But somehow you seem to be able to predict with a high level of certainty that Dutarte will become a dictator.
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This actually says that you have no clue about what an argumentum as populum is. The popularity of the argument or the one making the argument is not the issue.
[quote]
WTF are you talking about?
“In argumentation theory, an argumentum ad populum (Latin for “appeal to the people”) is a fallacious argument that concludes that a proposition is true because many or most people believe it: “If many believe so, it is so.””
I am surprised he only got 88%, he could have gotten 188%.
You are not making sense. on the one hand, he was popular on the other hand the election was a sham.
Are you talking about the 1981 election that was boycotted by most of the opposition parties? The one held after Marcos had been running the country in his iron grip for almost ten years? After anyone who dared speak out against Marcos was jailed, forced into exile, or simply shot? That election?
Fun fact: After Marcos declared victory, then-Vice President George H.W. Bush attended his inauguration and toasted him saying, “We love your adherence to democratic principles and to the democratic process.”
Yes, that election, the thing that you miss is that even with all that against it being a democratic thing, and everyone else seeing that that was a joke and people around the world noted the fraud… the turnout was heavy.
The sad thing is that I have seen that with many dictatorships. While a lot can be put as the population being scared, the reality is that in the last election that Marcos did try to steal against Corazon Aquino, the election was a close one, even when looking at the numbers the opposition estimated were the correct ones.
So the point stands, even if there is an element of terror on how a dictator keeps power there is still the issue that many in the Philippines are prone to accept authoritarianism and even to be ruled by a dictator that only offers lip service to democracy.
For anyone that knows that democracy has issues, but that it beats the alternatives, it is clear that the ones that supported Marcos were still wrong.
You seem to argue as if other things are not agreed upon, I do understand that the support of the people will not be there if Bush and Obama had skipped the constitution and the bill of rights just to avoid due process against drug traffickers. Indeed skipping human rights and due process is one big element of why one can be called a dictator by human rights organizations and other observers that take history into account.
What you posted was:
“As far as I can tell, my position is really not that popular.”
Hence that reply.
Then you said:
“Or do you think that using Dutarte’s popularity as part of my argument has something to do with argumentum ad populum?”
And that is clearly it is so, but you are trying to deny that.
Again the point was made because even when they are not using democracy dictators still depend on the support of a good number of the population.
You only think that is so by forgetting that many dictators do depend a lot from the support of a good number of the population.
I also saw that in El Salvador. It also takes place when the news media is also owned by the reactionaries in the military government. The dictators only need to get close to a plurality, so the fraud can be plausibly explained away. And then the planned ballot stuffing and other shenanigans does the rest to get the impossible numbers.
Wait. So now you are saying that the extrajudicial killings are not an indicator of his becoming a dictator in the future, you are saying that it is an indicator that he is a dictator right now? And you dismiss the fact that he was popularly elected by pointing to a rigged election in 1981?
The guy has been in office for a matter of months and has enjoyed very high popularity ratings and he is already a dictator?
If you want to call him a dick, that’s fine but I don’t see how he is a dictator.
Just for shits and giggles, what do you think argumentum ad populum means?
So you think that 88% of the population supported Marcos in 1981?
I am mostly familiar with military dictators and they mostly rely on support from the military. They rely on force, threat of the use of force and the acquiescence of the population.
So STILL not democratically elected. But this democratically elected President is a dictator already because you just know deep down in your heart that he will not give up office when he is supposed to.
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Well, full stop there, it is not really good to continue when you are making a game of making endless straw men.
For example you are trying to make me say that 88% did vote for Marcos, I clearly mentioned that fraud and shenanigans were there in the end too, as in addition to the high turnout of people that did go to the polls. So while there was a boycott of the election the bastard Marcos did anyhow point out to the turnout as clear support for him. The point I made is that dictators indeed just need to get close to a plurality to pull not only an electoral fraud, but to continue to be in power.
I’m not strawmanning. I’m trying to read your posts in a way that makes them rational and relevant. What you are telling me is that your posts are not really relevant.
What possible relevance could a fraudulent election in 1981 during the Marcos regime be to a free and fair election in the Philippines this year?
You are just throwing shit against the wall in your effort to call this guy a dictator and waiting to see if anything sticks.
Simply put, there is nothing you have presented that provides evidence that this policy of extrajudicial killing is a precursor to dictatorship.
Simply put, there is no resemblance between the 1981 election during the Marcos regime and the election that Dutarte won this year.
Simply put, you just don’t like the guy because he has a policy that you find offensive and want to frame him as a dictator a few months into his first term as president.
As others in this thread already mentioned, they do understand the posts, and they also cite them. What you claim here is very underwhelming.
I don’t know that this is true; we’re talking about a self-selected group vs. a random group. I can only speculate about whether people who sign up for YouGov are are disproportionally this or that, but it’s hardly unthinkable.
That doesn’t square with the dictionary definition. If they have absolute power, then they are a dictator, even if they are popular. Or don’t you think Hitler was a dictator?
Sure. But starting one’s term by ignoring the rule of law, and going after the checks on one’s power (the legislature, judiciary, and press) is certainly a red flag. We’ll see what the future holds.
In the same sense that competition exists among Mexican factories, farmers, cell phone providers, and whatnot. Consider the case of “coyotes”, who smuggle people from Mexico to the US. It’s legal in Mexico - nothing illegal about getting into a car or truck - and illegal in the US. Where is the violence and corruption in Mexico from this activity? It doesn’t exist.
Harm reduction; the same thing the smarter-than-us nations of Europe are doing, or beginning to do. We’ll get there, eventually.
Possibly, but without legal sanction from the President. If Duterte hasn’t actually changed anything, then what are we debating?
I agree with you that this is not a Gallup poll. I don’t think that the polls would skew very much due to the self selection. Based on the relative popularity of legalizing marijuana in the poll, it looks like these are not a bunch of anti-drug people who are taking the poll.
Oxford dictionary: dic·ta·tor. 1.a ruler with total power over a country, typically one who has obtained power by force.
Sure, there are famous examples of popularly elected politicians that have become dictators but this is not the common template that “history” provides.
Dutarte has been in politics a long time and has never attempted to take control by force. Hitler did, and failed.
Yeah, its not a great sign but for the fact that he ran on exactly this (still not a great sign but not as alarming when he telegraphed his intent for months before he got elected).
Everyone goes after the checks on their power. Obama points fingers at the obstructionist Republicans and wags his finger at the Supreme Court for Citizens United. Dutarte has yet to jail or kill his political opponents (this would be a really good predictor of impending dictatorship). Just calling them names and accusing them of corruption is shit that we see here (heck this entire presidential election has been Republicans effectively accusing Hillary of corruption of one sort or another). The only real difference between this guy and a run of the mill politician here is that he has openly advocated extrajudicial killings. Does this make him a dictator?
Why is there so much violence right along the US Mexico border? Aren’t the drug traffickers engaging in violent competition to see who gets to move their drugs?
I do not dispute that violence and criminal activity would decrease. After all there is domestic consumption and at the very least, the violence associated with that now legal activity would drop. There would probably be less violence associated with drug trafficking generally but the drugs are funding vast criminal enterprises and as long as you need criminals to make money on the stuff by smuggling it to the USA (legal recreational marijuana sales are not a profitable as the illegal kind for a variety of reasons), drugs trafficking will continue to fund those criminal enterprises and the violence associated with them.
And what of all the harm the prohibitionists were concerned about? What percentage of domestic abuse do you think occurs while the abuser is drunk? What percentage of rapes do you think are associated with alcohol? What percentage of automobile accidents and deaths do you think are associated with alcohol? The list goes on and on. The reason alcohol is legal is because it is popular and damn the consequences. When pot gets similarly popular, I think pot will become legal too and the social harms of pot are significantly lower than alcohol. But I don’t think that things like crystal meth and heroin are any less dangerous than alcohol.
If the USA and Mexico legalizes all drugs, I suspect that drug related violence would drop significantly but we would see an increase in other social ills. What do you think the chances are that we will decriminalize crystal meth and heroin?
Dutarte has absolutely changed things. There are thousands of dead drug dealers that were plying their trade a few months ago. Cops are killing drug dealers, not just settling personal grievances. We are debating whether a concerted effort to kill drug dealers can reduce drug related violence.
Huh, another failure to see the time line. The putch by Hitler was ignored by many Germans later as being disqualifying. He was in any case elected thanks to the system in place.
Now, Duterte BTW got less than 40% support in the election that got him to be president. Still democratic, but less than getting a mandate as many would say.
I don’t know why you feel like you have to premise our disagreements on my lack of knowledge of history or anything else like that. I try real hard to make sense of the nonsense you write sometimes. So if you could just assume that I have access to the internet and Wikipedia that would make this conversation a lot less tedious.
My point is that the attempted coup by Hitler is something that might have indicated his despotic tendencies. There is no similar example of despotic tendencies by Dutarte. Human rights abuses, sure. Tyranny, not yet.
And now he has a 90%+ approval rating.
Actually what took place shows that you are making statements that are at odds with history.
When an early reference to Hitler was made it was to make the point that actually getting to power using democracy does happen. So, just making sure others are aware of that because Hitler did indeed try with violence first, but he failed. Hanging only to the early failure can confuse many as the writer of the article makes a point about.
I don’t know how self-selection would skew things; I merely wanted to point it out, as it’s an additional x-factor.
“Typically”, but not always. Plenty of dictators got into office without force, Hitler included. As I said, dictators can and often do have popular support, so Dutarte’s approval rating is irrelevant to whether or not he’s a dictator. I agree that he isn’t, but there’s certainly a danger.
Obama didn’t threaten to kill judges that disagreed with him, though. Duterte has. A threat of violence is a use of force. Again, we’ll see how things play out.
By itself, no.
This goes to why black markets have violence in the first place: lack of access to courts, incredibly high stakes for failure, and the need to corrupt law enforcement in order to operate. There’s a reason black markets (drugs, prostitution, etc) are far more violent than regular markets.
I’ll settle for a decrease, for the purpose of discussion.
That’s what harm reduction policies are aimed at fixing. Instead of putting resources into jailing drug/alcohol/whatever users and dealers, resources are put into mitigating the harmful effects, many of which stem from prohibition itself. Details of the Swiss and Portugese programs were linked to earlier, feel free to peruse.
That’s not what happened in Switzerland or Portugal, though, those social ills decreased, because prohibition makes them worse.
In my lifetime (I’m 31)? 90%. There’s some grey area, of course; if you can’t go to prison for drug use, but you’re court-mandated to attend treatment, is that decriminalization? You can see these sorts of questions in the HuffPo/YouGov poll you linked to; people didn’t want to legalize harder drugs, but they also opposed jail time for drug use.
The jury’s out on that.