I don't think we can say, since it's possible (likely?) that his premises aren't even true.

Israel has already trotted out all of the same "mistakes were made" rhetoric, and certainly if they haven't already, they will state that they'll try to learn from it to make changes. So there's really no difference as far as that goes

The biggest difference I see between the incidents is only relevant to Americans - then it was our government controlling the narrative at home, and now it's a foreign government, failing to control the narrative abroad.

I have little doubt that the narrative about Gaza that Israelis are being fed now is roughly the same as the narrative Americans were being fed about Iraq and Afghanistan, which at least leaves the possibility that the actual underlying realities were and are also roughly the same. And if so, what Kirby is actually doing is not comparing the incidents and responses in and of themselves, but essentially just playing off of the differences between the version the people at home get and the version outsiders get - depending on Americans actually believing the American rhetoric then, even as they don't believe the Israeli rhetoric now. That's really the only way you end up with the notion that America sincerely did regret it and admit to it and set about making changes, rather than just, as Israel is doing now (from an outside perspective) paying lip service to all of that.

So what he's actually possibly demonstrating, certainly inadvertently, is that the US was just as full of shit then as Israel is now.

So basically the US government is a gigantic Trump - rising up in self-righteous fury at the very idea that anyone might dare to charge them for the crimes they've brazenly committed.

I can't imagine what it must be like to be so morally bankrupt.

Clearly, they know that what they're doing in Gaza is evil, and they know that the only hope they have of evading the entirely justified condemnation of the rest of the world is to hide it.

History will not judge them kindly. No matter what they do, they're not going to be able to hide the evidence of their evil forever.

No surprise there.

Israel's actions in Gaza are morally indefensible.

So its defenders cannot, and for the most part don't even bother to try to, sincerely engage with criticism.

Instead, they rely on diversions, misrepresentations, character assassination, censorship, intimidation, harassment and violence, simply because that's all they have.

Gosh - who would've thought that people might have a negative view of an explicitly elitist and xenophobic ideology bent on the violent appropriation of land and the wholesale slaughter of any of the "filthy animals" currently living there who might dare to oppose them?

Naturally.

There are two main ways in which people can try to further a political position they've taken - they can either argue for the position or they can attempt to discredit those who argue against it.

If the position they're trying to further is so illogical or immoral that they can't frame any arguments in its favor, then attempting to discredit its opponents is the only thing they have left.

Trickle-down psychopathy.

Of course parts of it are secret.

It's a plan for controlling and in some cases dismantling the agencies that stand in the way of a relative few hard right, fake Christian, authoritarian shitstains being able to do whatever they want to whoever they want whenever they want.

We can be certain that the agencies they intend to use to impose and enforce what they fully intend to be effectively a dictatorship will remain entirely intact, and likely be expanded.

The swamp isn't going to be drained - it's simply going to be repositioned in a way that better serves the interests of those hard right, fake Christian, authoritarian shitstains.

Of course they want to keep the details of that secret. If the details of which agencies they intend to control or dismantle became known, then not only would more ideological opponents rouse themselves to active opposition, but it's even possible that, emotionally compromised and deliberately misinformed as they are, some significant number of right-wing voters could come to recognize the hard, cold fact that in the long run, they're going to suffer right alongside everyone else.

On brand.

No surprise there - she's a crass opportunist with no principles and no empathy; what else is she going to do?

It's likely that she isn't even dissembling - that she's sincerely defending her actions because she's so psychologically crippled that she genuinely can't see how anyone could legitimately take exception to them.

Yep.

The goal is to be able to say something while evading responsibility for having said it.

Yes - he framed his statement with one of the stock phrases that people use when they want to be able to say something, then later, if necessary, claim that that's not really what they said

I don't think a news source has a responsibility to include that bit of transparent rhetorical trickery in a headline.

So... is he desperately dishonest or insane?

Because none of that hysterical gibberish made even the slightest bit of sense.

Exactly, and that's bizarre.

We actually live in a world in which politicians are expected to be dishonest, amoral and corrupt fuckwads and the few in Washington who aren't are outcasts even in their own party. And we just accept that. It's insane.

It's so bizarre to me that a politician saying that the grotesquely corrupt psychopath in charge of an apartheid nation that's carrying out a genocide on one front and an incremental land grab on another while they also try to provoke yet another nation into attacking so they can play the victim as they continue their egregious crimes "should resign" is a newsworthy event.

The world is in the hands of insane monsters.

...a revolt from the far right over the exclusion of restrictions they had sought to abortion access, transgender care, and racial diversity and inclusion policies at the Pentagon.

That's all just smoke and mirrors - emotive fodder to feed to the base to obscure their actual goal, which is simply to serve Russian interests by denying aid to Ukraine.

The strategy's simple and obvious - insist on tacking on (entirely irrelevant) things that the Democrats will never vote for, then self-righteously vote against the bill when those things are inevitably not included.

And the goal is simple and obvious too - to conjure up a justification for voting against the aid that they can sell to the base, since, Tucker Carlson's efforts notwithstanding, the base isn't yet ready to join the MAGA politicians in swearing fealty to Russia.

Best of luck to them.

It's true in essentially all industries, but it's especially obvious in rideshare that there's a layer of parasites who get paid far too much money for nothing beyond the fact that they won the fight for the position of "parasite who gets paid far too much money for doing nothing."

Anything that might even just decrease the number of overpaid parasites would be a benefit not just to the concerned industry, but to society as a whole.

Russia is seeking to subvert Western support for Ukraine and disrupt the domestic politics of the United States and European countries, through propaganda campaigns supporting isolationist and extremist policies...

And it's certainly not a coincidence that those isolationist and extremist policies are being actively promoted by the MAGA Republicans.

law enforcement officials who support the law say that the boards subject their officers to unwanted scrutiny.

Exactly. The thugs, thieves, murderers and rapists are uncomfortable with the fact that the public is becoming aware of the fact that they're thugs, thieves, murderers and rapists, and they want to go back to being able to beat, steal, murder and rape with impunity, and that requires eliminating oversight. So they're actively moving to eliminate meaningful oversight.

It really is just that simple.

Holy shit - look at that face.

You can see it in every line and wrinkle - that's not just an expression he made at some point - it's his normal resting expression.

That's the face of a man who has spent his entire life being angry and hateful.