[0xDEAFBEAD]

>The US is on an obvious authoritarian path; complete with threatening their neighbors, murdering innocent civilians, and locking up innocent people in droves

Prediction markets suggest the next US president is most likely one of the following people: Gavin Newsom, Jon Ossoff, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Kamala Harris, JD Vance, Marco Rubio.

It's not obvious to me that the US is on an "authoritarian path".

Would you say that e.g. Europe is on an "authoritarian path" with the popularity of government censorship there? https://eternallyradicalidea.com/p/the-situation-for-free-sp...

Your comment seems like more of a diatribe than a serious analysis of likely future scenarios.

[psychoslave]

>Would you say that e.g. Europe is on an "authoritarian path" with the popularity of government censorship there?

As an European citizen living in Europe, definitely yes it is, and not only for the "mere" censorship factor. Maybe not yet as down the road and maybe not going as fast as US. But that’s not something that one can really be content of.

[vrganj]

Prediction Markets are people gambling.

There's armed goons nabbing people off the streets and murdering political opponents patrolling American cities right now.

[0xDEAFBEAD]

>Prediction Markets are people gambling.

If you think the market has it wrong, why don't you make money by betting against it?

https://polymarket.com/event/presidential-election-winner-20...

>There's armed goons nabbing people off the streets and murdering political opponents patrolling American cities right now.

What is the actual per-capita rate of big flashy news stories? Remember that the US has a population of 340 million. One-in-a-million events will occur every day; they aren't necessarily representative.

[watwut]

> If you think the market has it wrong, why don't you make money by betting against it?

Because I am not gambler. And it is not "market" it is a casino. It does not predict, people put in bets. And like I said, while I understand gambling appeal on an emotional level, I decided to not be a gambler.

> One-in-a-million events will occur every day; they aren't necessarily representative.

It is literal official policy. Not a random event.

[vrganj]

> If you think the market has it wrong, why don't you make money by betting against it?

I don't just think "the market has it wrong", I think a market is wrong conceptually. It is not an epistemological tool, it's rich people gambling - a money-weighted accumulation of guesses - and I'd rather not partake.

> What is the actual per-capita rate of big flashy news stories?

What is the appropriate rate of brownshirts murdering political opponents? Which level of kids being nabbed from their homes is acceptable?

[0xDEAFBEAD]

>I don't just think "the market has it wrong", I think a market is wrong conceptually. I'd rather not join the other degenerate gamblers.

"My beliefs are unfalsifiable"

>What is the appropriate rate of brownshirts murdering political opponents? Which level of kids being nabbed from their homes is acceptable?

Tom Homan, Trump's border czar, also served in the Obama administration. Obama gave him a medal for his deportation work. People like you will frame the same activity quite differently depending on whether you like the people who are doing it.

In any case, I didn't deny that the US had a problem with authoritarianism. I said it wasn't obvious that it was on an "authoritarian path". See for example https://www.npr.org/2026/04/04/nx-s1-5768273/after-minnesota...

I'll bet you yourself would happily justify the EU authoritarianism here: https://eternallyradicalidea.com/p/the-situation-for-free-sp... You seem like the sort of person who has an authoritarian mentality. You'll happily support cops arresting people for saying things online, but if cops arrest people for illegally entering a country, that somehow crosses a line into "authoritarianism". Am I right?

[vrganj]

My claim is falsifiable by facts, not by casino odds. Show me the armed abductions aren’t happening. Show me the administration hasn’t threatened neighbors or purged civil servants. Those are the relevant facts. "What does Polymarket say about 2028?" is a Bayesian dodge, not a rebuttal.

The article you linked describes ICE officers killing two U.S. citizens, tear-gassing neighborhoods, and deputizing local police as a "force multiplier" to create a "sea change in local policing". You cited this as evidence the US is not on an authoritarian path. Maybe we have different definitions of "authoritarianism", but I don't see how this helps your case?

From there you pivoted to "but Obama," then "but Europe," then to psychoanalyzing my "mentality." I haven’t defended the EU, or Obama, or any censorship regime. You’re shadowboxing a partisan cartoon because the actual evidence - federal agents abducting residents, your own NPR link - is too uncomfortable to engage with directly

[0xDEAFBEAD]

>My beliefs are falsifiable, but not by rich people making guesses.

How convenient that you continually fail to make any statement about what would falsify your beliefs.

>Obama was a war criminal bombing brown kids with drones. I care not for his medals.

Irrelevant for my point regarding whether the US is "on a path to authoritarianism". If you think any sort of immigration enforcement is unacceptably authoritarian, then the US has always been authoritarian by your definition, and the "path to authoritarianism" stuff is rather beside the point.

>It is notable that you quickly pivoted to whataboutism and ad hominems. I have laid out my case, your reaction was to first try to obscure through number games and then to pivot to attacking me as a messenger. Not once did you engage with the substance.

What could be "engaging with the substance" more than asking how common a particular type of event actually is? Numbers are what allow us to determine what is an isolated (if unacceptable) incident and what is a common occurrence or increasing trend.

Don't tell me about "substance" when you haven't provided a single concrete data point supporting your position--I've provided multiple (NPR link, prediction market data).

All you've done in this thread is shared your own personal feelings about "armed goons" enforcing immigration law. If you're going to make your arguments primarily on the basis of your personal impressions, then yes, your ability to make those assessments fairly becomes a topic of conversation.

Furthermore, the real question of this subthread is whether the US is authoritarian relative to other countries. In which case the activities of other countries (such as European censorship) are relevant to our assessment.

There are, in fact, indices which try to compare levels of authoritarianism across countries in an apples-to-apples way, rather than doing as you do, and forming vague impressions on the basis of viral news stories. Here is one by The Economist for instance: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index

Anyways good luck, at this point I'm confident that you lack the intellectual honesty to change your mind on the basis of anything I might say, so there's no point in continuing further.