Comparing tragedies is always pointless. (well… it’s a great way to piss off people, if that’s the goal)

Israeli actions cannot be justified based on any arithmetic consideration on the number of Israeli people killed on Oct 7th: that would just be retaliating against civilians (something the Nazi were rather keen on some 80 years ago… it must be said that AFAIK, even then, they “only” killed ten civilians for each of their own lost).

Military action in Gaza (“civilized” military action, not this massacre) would only have been justified if it was absolutely necessary in order to avoid further Israeli victims, and… I’ve not heard even one single person (left or right-leaning, expert or not) saying that in the coming decades, after the bloodbath is over, we are to expect a decline in the number of terror attacks against Israeli people.

It would seem like we are all expecting Putin to sweet-talk Trump once again?

Isn’t it to be expected that, as a war goes on, people get exhausted and start to want out?

The point should be whether Ukraine or Russia will want out first, and that doesn’t depend only on public opinion.

What a nice era to live in… humanity is really showing its worth these years.

We should really start being less tolerant of intolerant people.

Well… he got what he wanted from the EU, didn’t he?

I agree that he wants stupid things and that his policies will most probably backfire, but that’s a different issue.

Not only the so-called agreement with von del Leyen was a PR win: IIUC its only consequence was that US tariffs went from 10% to 15% and that the EU put away its “bazooka” while promising investments in the US (BTW I honestly don’t understand how that would work… it’s not like von der Leyen has a sovereign fund that she can direct to invest in the US) and to buy more US stuff.

Agreed! Handing him easy wins only makes him thirsty for more easy wins.

PPC as in Pay Per Click?

(I wanted to check the about page but the footer is under an infinite scroll… AI must have done the coding too)

I did mean to suggest fees should be tailored to gross revenues.

I should however have used a less ambiguous expression than “Shein made some 32B”… sorry about that.

To be as clear/explicit as possible, I don’t mean to say each country should fine based on global revenues: of course they should only consider the revenues generated in that country.

In the case of Shein and Italy revenues could be around 2 billions (I got this figure from a blog post so take it with due caution) so the 1.6 million fee would be less than 0.1% the revenue.

Note that trying to determine from the outside how much of a company’s profit “comes from” a specific country is basically impossible (which I guess is why digital service taxes consider gross revenues rather than profits).

Can’t you make that argument for any tax?

Yes, that’s exactly the point. We could calculate how much taxing 100EUR per pair of horrible white terry socks would make in theory, and then people would just stop buying white socks and we wouldn’t make whatever number we calculated (it would still be a win in my book).

They charge as much as they can based on supply and demand.

Not really: ticket prices (at least the economy ones) are mostly driven by competition and so cost is a big component of price.

Anyway, I wasn’t arguing against taxing aviation: I was arguing that supporting extra taxation based on a “study” (in quotes because IIUC it’s a publication from an interest group rather than an actual, peer reviewed, scientific study *) that solely calculates the potential theoric revenue is… it’s just stupid.

* and even proper scientific studies are kinda a dime a dozen for any economic theory and its contrary, which doesn’t however mean we shouldn’t at least try to think about what actual, practical, tangible consequences a change in economic policy is likely have

For reference, wikipedia says Shein made some 32B USD (ie. 32.000 millions) in 2023.

I’m sure they are concerned about the possiblity of paying Italy’s 1.16M fee (or the French 40M one), but… we should really tailor fees to companies’ revenues if we want them to matter.

…or you could read it as the announced agreement between Trump and von der Leyen being 100% insubstantial, not changing that the US are charging tariffs (and IIUC 5% more than before the announcement) for no reason, and not changing that the EU is doing absolutely nothing about it.

I wish we reached out to other WTO members and just embargo the US.

As much as I like the idea of anyone but me rich and evil individuals and corporations paying more taxes, wouldn’t this result in airlines dumping the extra cost on customers and in private planes being registered in some tax haven (and leaving the EU every six months to avoid taxation, quite possibly flying empty)?

I mean… I’m not saying it’s necessarily a bad idea… I’m just saying that “studies” that just calculate how much could be made from some policy change as if the increased tax revenue was the only consequence are not solid bases for policy change.

Which of these ones you think is more likely?

1. the police head reported the results of a scientific study that explores the correlation between crimes and porn preferences
2. some idiot boomer finally managed to visit pornhub and was shocked by what they found

(not saying the boomer would be the police head - I don’t know him and for all I know he’s a person of at least average intelligence)

Does that mean 15% both ways?

edit: apprently, it’s 15% US tariff and no changes on the EU side

Not many Israeli are actually wanted by the ICC… IIRC the list is limited to just Netanyahu and Gallant.

Don’t get me wrong, I do hope we will someday have Nuremberg-style trials (minus the hangings, of course) for Israeli crimes against humanity, but I honestly doubt that will ever happen… actually, I doubt anyone (not even Netanyahu and Gallant) will serve even a single day in jail for them.

The whole point behind international institutions is that nations should back them, but nowadays no global superpower recognizes the ICC and all of them (plus a lot of regional powers) are governed by people who either is or would very much like to become an autocrat.

(if you are thinking “what about the EU?”… it’s not a global superpower, basically because it doesn’t want to be one)

We are probably on the same page (?) but you are definitely fighting a straw man now.

For clarity, let me just note that “actually going out and killing people with guns” is what, for example, the Russian did in Bucha and (part of) what Israel is doing every day in Gaza (plus innumerable other instances in recent and non-recent history).

I believe there are things worse than death

IMO deciding between death and other fates is something each person can only do for themselves. When it comes to deciding between death or any other fate for another, we must IMO always assume death is the worse option (unless of course the person says otherwise and we have reason to believe they are capable of decision making).

It’s worse than actually going out and killing people with guns.

Please, let’s avoid doing pointless rankings of war crimes: nothing of any value comes from arguing that one is worse than another.