self defense acts are not homicides

They absolutely are. There’s even a term for it - justifiable homicide.

I think they’ve majorly underestimated how much the world is going to condemn this. It was one thing to “protect it’s citizens”, it’s another thing entirely to outright invade another nation.

I think you’re majorly overestimating how much the world cares.

Israel has been invading other nations literally continuously throughout its existence. You can debate that it is to “protect it’s citizens”, and there may even be some truth to that sometimes, but it’s clearly generally been the aggressor since its founding. And (almost) nobody cared.

I’d be shocked if Europe doesn’t sanction Israel

Some strong-worded letters will surely be sent, and politicians will call on “all sides to stop the hostilities”, which in practice means Israel gets to keep whatever it could occupy. Maybe a couple of somewhat left-leaning countries (Spain, Sweden, Norway, etc) will sanction Israel individually, but then they don’t have much trade by this point anyway so they have no negotiating power. As for the rest, trading (including trading weapons) with Israel is profitable monetarily and beneficial politically, so not much will really change.

It is a valid defense, but it is not a part of the definition of defamation. I think it’s similar to how “self-defense” is a valid defense for homicide.

I was also surprised about this, but I took this quote directly from the judgement in question. As I think about it, it starts to make more sense - literally, defamation is dis (break into pieces/remove/…) + famo (fame/reputation). The word itself only conveys that someone’s reputation was injured, not that it was injured unjustly. IIUC the words for “unjust defamation” are specifically libel and slander, under common law. I think it’s similar to how there’s “homicide” (the act of one person killing another) which can be legal (e.g. self-defense) or criminal (e.g. murder). At least that’s my understanding of it.

I think the headline is incorrect - it didn’t win the lawsuit, it just got past the preliminary hearing and to substantive arguments (https://caseboard.io/cases/75bb8071-86c7-4032-bd34-e9d66eed1249). AFAIU now both parties will argue whether the contents of the report are true.

I don’t think it does necessarily,

Meanings will be considered defamatory at common law if they “substantially affect in an adverse manner the attitude of other people towards a Claimant, or have a tendency to do so”

This definition doesn’t consider the truth of the statement or even whether it is provable, merely whether it affects opinion.

AFAIU this ruling just means that the lawsuit can carry forward to substantive arguments.

I’ve found the entire text of the judgement here: https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/KB/2024/3276.html

It’s also full of legalese, but as far as I understand the court did not rule on the verity of the statements, only on whether they are defamatory:

14. Meanings will be considered defamatory at common law if they “substantially affect in an adverse manner the attitude of other people towards a Claimant, or have a tendency to do so”

…

Conclusion:

…

54. The meanings of both publications are of fact and both are defamatory at common law with a Chase level 2 meaning.

This just means that a lawsuit can move on to factual arguments (i.e. arguments about the truth of those statements). Whoever is more convincing to the judge will win. So IIUC at least, the headline of this post is incorrect.

Since this actually sounds like a good decision… Over/under on Trump promising to double the amount of nukes and turn China into a nuclear wasteland unless they do something for him, by the end of next week?

Given the rate of executions during Trump’s last tenure, I think it’s feasible he would’ve crucified Jesus for the crime of existing while brown, if given the chance

Ending the program entirely signals a drastic change in strategy, perhaps to hard power.

That’s… rather unnerving, but expected given the mask-off nazism now on display. I can only hope that this backfires quickly and not too many lives are lost in the process.

Also I will still mourn the loss of whatever funding USAID was providing, as now many of those facilities will inevitably close down. Life is rough in those places already, can’t imagine the horror of learning that you no longer have a hospital because a rich fuck on the other side of the world wanted to see his number go up.

The vast majority of USAID went to support regime change and help the ruling classes of those we are friendly with. A minority went to helping people.

Do you have a source for that? I honestly thought that USAID was one of the very few “good” things that US was doing (although as always with imperialist countries, it was ultimately in pursuit of soft power, but I digress). I’ve seen many USAID-sponsored hospitals, kindergartens and museums in poor/developing countries. The numbers they themselves produce (I could only find this 2016/2017 report easily: https://www.cgdev.org/publication/foreign-assistance-agency-brief-usaid) seem to corroborate that the plurality of spending goes towards Health, with Health + Disaster Assistance being the majority. “Development Assistance” + “Transition Initiatives” + “Complex Crises Fund” (part of which is probably all the political stuff) is slightly more than a third of their spending.

TLDR: closest ever to human extinction by one second compared to 2023 (when it was 90). Most current threats already existed back then (with the exception of AI) and have seen only mild increases.