Slashdot Mirror
Spammers Land Optusnet On spews.org Blacklist
downundarob writes: "In Australia there are essentially only two major backbone suppliers; eventually all traffic either rides on Telstra (Part govt. owned) or OptusNet (part of C&W Optus). According to this page OptusNet has gotten itself on spews.com blacklist, potentially causing issues for a large percentage of Australian Internet users." Update: 09/30 12:01 GMT by T :DanielS writes: "Looks like Optus did indeed back down; according to the SPEWS listing & delisting info page, Optus were removed after shutting down the DNS service."
http://spews.org perhaps?
--- Sigs are dumb.
How did that porn sneak into the article?
Someone is not checking the (non) links!
I highly doubt a porn site that pops up banner ads is a well regarded spammer blacklist site.
Joseph Elwell.
spews.com is a porn site for sale.... spews.org on the other hand. Might want to change that link before 18 year olds go to it.
All internet companies have a duty to stamp out spam. If they do not they get blacklisted. Maybe optusnet should try and do a better job at bringing joustice to spam throwers.
GoatPigSheep, the 3 most important food groups
Hmm, I read the article quickly, but it appears that they're blacklisting the ISP for not cracking down on spammers.
:)
This could not only be a pretty decent PR stunt, but a nice excuse for blocking the competition off as well.
[inserting some text here to kill the lameness filter]
Do you like German cars?
Could it be that /. is finally respecting Hormel's trademark? Was it out of goodwill or did the lawyers come a-callin'?
Oops.
I misread the article and thought that Telstra maintained a blacklist and had listed Optus. Dur.
Do you like German cars?
Mr Barry said Optus had been fooled by a simple ruse as the spam gang split its operations, setting up the computer with sites to be spammed in the US and hosting the domain name server at Optus.
It seems that the server running on the Optus network is only acting as a Domain server for the spamming. I would hope if this is the case, that the server actually doing the Spamming, which is in the states, has also been black listed.
Plus, as the article says, running a nameserver is not against the Terms and Conditions of Optus, so there is little they can do about this.
Anti-Spam people often seem to be so wrapped up in their cause, they often don't realise they are doing more harm than good, i.e. blocking half of Australia's email.
When did this happen? I actually like the new icon. The old one was a little disparaging to Hormel.
I could never stand SPAM anyway. I guess I'd eat it if I were trapped in a fallout shelter. Maybe.
Note that this is only for people who subscribe to Optus's OptusNet dial-up service. If you use Optus@Home, an account through another provider that uses C&W's bandwidth, or even if you use another Optus dial-up service besides OptusNet (Dingo Blue?), you won't be affected.
We're really in trouble if a porn site is running the spam blacklist! What's next, blocking all sites with non-sex content?
Travis
from www.spews.org:
Optusnet.com.au, reports they have shut down the dynamic-DNS spam service run by the Dean Westbury gang on their network. In response, the SPEWS listed network addresses were removed from the list.
Spam natzi say: OptusNet users, no /. for you 1 year.
dear lord... must be an international date line or something.
Optusnet.com.au, reports they have shut down the dynamic-DNS spam service run by the Dean Westbury gang on their network.
In response, the SPEWS listed network addresses were removed from the list.
Updated listing for Dean Westbury: http://spews.org/html/S453.html
Umm, why those blacklists are implemented on public backbones (like above.net, etc) ?
It's not like one of those anti-spam guys filters all connections to his personal machine,. If I pay to my ISPs and they pay to backbone, aren't they supposed to provide me with all the bandwith I want without filtering it ? How come someone on ISP could decide which mail I want to receive ? I'm paying for Internet, not for a part of Internet, and if I want to filter out spam, I would do so myself w/o anyone's help.
There was a recent case when macromedia.com wasn't accessible because some idiot mistaken it for a spam house - but WFT public backbone started using it ?
Shouldn't OpusNet be able to sue whatever ISP was doing filtering for breach of contract ? I presume contract does not say "any psycho could censor all IP packets if he thinks one of the name servers is might be used by spammer", so ISPs that do this filtering should be open for a lawsuit, at least from their users.
Obama 2012: our incompetent asshole is slightly less of an incompetent asshole than the other incompetent asshole !
How do you accomplish step 5 after completing step 3? Some logic.
Rubble's a good place to hide :)
:P
Just look at the ratio of people hiding in that rubble, Vs. the people FOUND in that rubble
Repeat steps 5 through 8 until they understand that sometimes it is necessary to punch back.
Unless it's a pacifist that also believes in justice through the rule of law... in which case, instead of hitting back, he simply has your ass arrested for assault.
He still gets to maintain his pacifist beliefs, you learn the meaning of justice and the power of restraint, and Bruno the Crack Dealer gets a boyfriend for a month.
At which point, you remember what your mom tried to teach you when you were five - "Violence never solves anything"... except for your minor case of being a tightass, which will be fixed quite nicely once Bruno's done with you.
Then you realize, maybe you wouldn't be in trouble in the first place if you hadn't been a jerk.
1. OptusNet is owned by Optus which is owned by Singapore's SingTel. Cable and Wireless sold Optus some time ago.
.au ultimately goes through them is a lie. For example, UUNet is a very large backbone provide in Australia. (Probably bigger than Optus)
2. Optus and Telstra aren't the only backbone providers in Australia, to say that all traffic in
I think we can mark downundarob down as +1 Troll.
Did Slashdot get tired of hearing from lawyers and remove the can of spam???
Even though I support any move against spammers, as would most /.ers, does it worry anyone how much influence these groups can freely wield over the net? We complain about ICANN being undemocratic, but when it comes to spam... argh, between a rock and a hard place :).
If that situation did perpetuate itself, would there be any legal liability on behalf of either Optus or spews.org for the intentional breach of service to the rest of Optus' customers? You would think that after a while the customers would start suing either or both parties to the dispute.
<!-- DHTML / JavaScript menu, popup tooltip, Ajax scripts -->
What happens when said pacifist punching thug decides to resist arrest and punches the cop? Having someone else do your violence for you doesn't make it better.
A few minor facts.
#1. Spews has very minor penetration. Going via
the optusnet mailservers I can't find anywhere
that actually bounced my mail while the block
was in place.
Consequence of which is that basically no-one
would have noticed the spews block.
#2. 'half of australia's traffic is unmitigated
nonsense. 'Optusnet' is the dial-up arm of
Optus and it currently ranked as the #3 (or #4
depending on who's counting) ISP in australia.
Their market share is nothing like 50%. 10% maybe.
#3. 'won't be able to reach large parts
of Europe and the US' is sheer junk. As mentioned
about, the number of sites that use spews appears
to be near zero. Does anyone know a major site
that actually _uses_ spews? I couldn't find one.
Optus isn't owned by Cable&Wireless anymore. Optus was sold to Singapore Telecom earlier this year.
At times like this, I kinda wish that ISP's would create an e-mail system where anyone wanting to send me an e-mail was charged, say, .02c, for instance. My e-mails could pay for part of my internet connection, and spammers wouldn't spam as much, because it'd highly raise the cost of messaging me. When the user read the message the first time, he would also have the option of waiving the fee for his friends, family, etc. I know it'd take a lot to implement this, but it'd be a really great system.
On another note: I've been getting Chinese spam at my e-mail address for quite a while now. At first, it was only coming from one address for a while, but now it's coming from multiple addresses. This would all be well and good, except I DON'T SPEAK CHINESE. Feh. We've gotta do something.
-=Lothsahn=-
The new logo is a pig made of SPAM. Why can't you see that? Personally I think it's better as it's slightly more bizarre than the all-too-obvious can of spam. Actually, they should rotate the various things the spam is made out of - pig, squirrel, sponges, Steve Ballmer, etc.
As will be undoubtably rehashed ad nauseum, here are the facts:
/.ing them (and their ad banners) in a bizzare advertising scheme...
1) Spews.com is a PORN site. Spews.org is the blacklister, here.
2) They've already removed the spammer & resolved this.
3) You need some means to remove stories or at least change the titles, since you haven't done so yet.
Please mod this down as far as possible--you'll need something to cheer you up & it's terribly redundant. Unless spew.com gives you some money for
Didn't president Bush say we should get ON with life?
The 6000+ people who died in a senseless attack are probably SOOO pleased that you are "getting on with your life" (watching Cowboy BeBop, building Lego models, playing with nerf guns, answering D&D polls, etc).
Yes, you should be so proud of your accomplishments since the attacks 3 weeks ago.
Has all the coolest spam songs.Q :w ww.orca.bc.ca/spamalbum/+spamalbum
l in k.txt
n k. mp3
http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:9uo5LNULpn
My favorite lyrics
http://www.orca.bc.ca/spamalbum/lyrics/pacific-
and Favorite acompanying song
http://www.orca.bc.ca/spamalbum/256k/pacific-li
Enjoy! Laugh! Be Happy!
Death to spam.
1.) This forum is for discussion of relevant scientific and technical issues, not for chest-thumping and anti-terrorist rantings. Having said that, watch me violate my own Rule #1.
2.) How long are you going to sit around and mope? Get "Back to Business as Usual" and help to rebuild the economy of the country you are sobbing about.
3.) How is continuing to whine about this helping? The U.S. military and government are doing all they can at the moment. If you just can't wait for them, enlist in the armed services, or become a Bounty Hunter - make a quick $5 million!
There was one evening some months ago where I made a CVS error which resulted in Earthlink's MX servers accepting connections from every single IP attempting to connect. Two servers (of many) died instantly and the previous version of the blockfile had to be reinstated just to get sendmail accepting connections again. The rest of the servers slowed to a crawl. Mail that was in the spool at the time was delayed up to an hour and a half. And that was missing the denyfile that we use for... I'd say 7 minutes.
He either comes off as a real interesting guy with encyclopedic knowledge,or a pathological liar with an ax to grind
http://www.spamhaus.org/top10.lasso
Now that I know of your policies, I'll be making sure to take my business elsewhere in the future.
There's a big debate on the news.admin.new-abuse.email newsgroup about Spews and their policies about not allowing contact from blocked people except for a newsgroup which isn't their own, NANAE. I have mixed views on it. Frankly, as far as I'm concerned, not accepting mail to abuse@ and postmaster@ for a given domain is a blatent violation of the RFCs. I reject around 32k pieces of spam a week. Abuse@ and postmaster@ always accept mail, even from blocked domains. There should be some reliable way of contacting these people if I get listed. My $.02 anyhow. Night all.
Blocking general IP traffic in this manner is a very disturbing trend, one that seemed to get started with Above.net, notably mentioned on /. when peacefire.org was blocked.
cue all the zealots who believe this is a good thing
I'm getting sick of hearing about all these high
horse wannabe spam knights in shining armour.
bottom line - no one of any size or magnitude
uses this 'spews' service and the sort of
impact it will have on the majority newbie
population on optusnet is zero. even the fairly
balanced and liberal MAPS service seems to have
lost a significant number of subscribers since
the change to subscription only.
kudos to the 'journalist' writing the
article in the Australian for being
completely clueless and publishing
sensationalist drivell again. you go girl.
i hate spam and spammers as much (if not more)
as than the next guy but this should never had
made it into the mainstream press.
if a spammer is listed in a forest, and no
one cares about the forest, is he really listed
at all?
They're dead.
Not a single one of them gives a sh1t if we eventually decide to get on with our lives. There is an understandable impulse to not forget those who died. But get some perspective: these will be the least forgettable 6000 deaths we've ever seen. Everyone's been crying for almost three weeks now. We can get on with our lives without "dishonoring the memories" of anyone. The events of this past month have made a lot of people like you come out of the woodwork and it's amazing and disturbing to see how many idiots like you there are.
You should really be ashamed of yourself. You're trying to enforce this mourning period to last as long as it possibly can as though you're really enjoying it, and you loudly disapprove of every ounce of joy and normalcy you find left in the world. Stop tsk-tsking people who aren't constantly talking about terrorism, and go do something that will really help. Spend some money on consumer goods. Buy some stocks. Hell, go take unnecessary flights. And please stop throwing a fit every time you see things getting back to normal.
I'm just amazed that political correctness has now been taken over by conservatives! Damn!
BTW- support Bill Maher and sign the petition to keep Politically Incorrect on the air!
A while back Telstra Bigpond had the same problem, where someone had been relaying via their mail server. Telstra Bigpond is the only broadband provider in many areas of Australia, so this is a problem. I sent an angry email to their mail administrator questioning is ability as a systems administrator, and telling how to fix the problem and get it off the blacklist.
I would not retaliate. Violence leads to even more violence.
notch one up for the anti-spammers,
total score: spammers - billions upon of billions of emails, antispammers: 2 or 3.
the this battle's been won, but we still have the entire war ahead of us.
-----------
i can see the MPAA using this as an anti-digital audio tactic, spamming people from a specific network that has alot of MP3 traffic, until the network is blacklisted, and threaten to continue to spam/keep the network blacklisted until they limit the transmission of MP3's across that network.
just an idea.
moox. for a new generation.
Like it or lump it. If other people don't like the crowd a certain someone hangs with, those people are free to be as judgemental as *they* feel inclined to be. This goes for companies too. It's the curse of free markets around the world; people get to choose who they deal with. It hardly rises to the level of extortion, but who am I to interupt bad analogy theater?
Maybe one bad apple spoils the bunch, or maybe one shouldn't throw the baby out with bath water. But who is anyone, to tell anyone else, who they MUST associate with, and what odious behavior they MUST endure in the process?
In short: "Negative Ghostrider, the pattern is pull."
--Jimmy has fancy plans; and pants to match.
It's funny, you make one typo and you're viewing a porn site. What's the web coming to!!!
What about connect.com / aapt ...
Your weak bitches!
Did you forget "We Americans are" before the quoted words above? Then you'll at least have a complete sentence.
Also, please don't assume that all or even the majority of "Yurpeens" are socialist. I was born and I live in a country in "Yurp" and I intensively hate socialism with every fiber of my body.
Nah, I'm not european... (can't even spell the fuckin' place) ... actually southern hemisphere.
Hell, I don't really mind if you americans want to just go out and mindlessly bomb the fuck out of some innocent people. I'm just pointing out that it'd be a rather shallow, and illogical move.
Fortunatly for the rest of the world, Bush has some good advisors by his side who are thinking "Hmm, who the fuck are we going to target" rather than "Someone has to pay. someone has to pay now"
Fer the record too, I'm not a big socialist fan either. Give me capitilism or give me death.
spam (spm)
n.
Unsolicited e-mail, often of a commercial nature, sent indiscriminately to multiple mailing lists, individuals, or newsgroups; junk e-mail.
And a couple more definitions just to be clear on what the above is saying:
junk
adj.
1.Cheap, shoddy, or worthless
2.Having a superficial appeal or utility, but lacking substance
and
unsolicited (ns-ls-td)
adj.
Not looked for or requested; unsought
Dictionary.com rules.
optus are good to their customers and provide a quality service, and i see it as them being punished
telstra on the other hand, deserve punishment, just for generally being fucking shit
Ooh.. the Microsoft redefinition of sentience at work again, I see.
Qwest and UUNet I can do without, but Sprint has some darned nifty services (Sprint ION, if it ever gets out the door). That, and us USAA members get all sorts of discounts from Sprint (EarthLink, long distance, PCS, etc.). So my current solution to that problem is to send a letter to USAA (who seem very privacy-oriented) and asking them if they really want to associate with a company that has such a reputation. I figure they can put more pressure on Sprint to change their ways than I can.
In checking some of the spews.org listings for the spammers involved, I noticed that several of them list their HOME TELEPHONE NUMBERS on their whois records...
...at 3 A.M.?
Shouldn't we show them how much we LIKE their
service(s)... say by calling them up and telling them
I think that's a great idea myself....
Ah but that's the problem when pacifists say blanket statements like "violence begets more violence." the cop will have to use at least a minimum amount of violence to arrest the thug.
it would be more accurate to say "indiscriminate violence begets more indiscriminate violence" but the pacifists don't say that, and that's not what the us is doing (so far)
Tell that to Rodney King. Or that wallet-wielding Haitian in NYC.
True, but in general, the police are more trustworthy than someone who has just been punched in the face by the aggressor. Also, there are procedures for complaining about and reining in police.
At first the chinese and japanese porn links were amusing, but they're pretty tame by american standards. What does surprise me is some of the stuff that comes from otherwise reputable american companies. I'd have never thought that a company like HP would resort to sleazey SPAM adverts and earn a place on my never-buy-from list but they do. even got one signed by Carly Fiorina herself, so I guess that it means that she can't claim plausable denieability now.
ISP's charging for SMTP wouldn't really work because it just as easy to send from somewhere else, i.e. our verio account lets us send mail through our server, it's marked as having originated at our site with no real way to tell where it came from before. inshort the SMTP traffic goes through the ISP as packets, they don't realy know whats in 'em just where they are going.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Repeat steps 5 through 8 until they understand that sometimes it is necessary to punch back.
At which point, you prove his point that "violence begets more violence," which is proven even more if you decide to hit him again.
As you can see, no one wins when someone resorts to force rather than words.
Ah but that's the problem when pacifists say blanket statements like "violence begets more violence." the cop will have to use at least a minimum amount of violence to arrest the thug.
Of course, if the thug hadn't used force against someone in the first place, the cop wouldn't be in a position to use force against the thug.
Are you starting to get it now? Punishment is all well and good, but it's a reaction to the real problem, which is that some people see violence as a viable solution that will stop problems.
Allow me to use a computer security anaolgy for a moment:
Your machine has been 0wned. Severely. Do you:
a) Try to 0wn your attacker's machine back, possibly hitting machines owned by innocents in the process, or do you
b) Rebuild your machine, stronger than it was before, with the holes patched so that you can continue using it as intended?
Picture this: John Q Australian can't get his email and calls Optus. Now in reality he'll get some runaround, but if he were to have a logical conversation with Optus it would go along these lines:
User: Why can't I get my email?
Optus: We've been blackholed by a large U.S. blackhole list.
User: Why?
Optus: Because of some spammers using Optus.
User: WELL KICK THEIR BLOODY ASSES OFF!!!
Naturally, this is not the way the actual phone conversation will go. Doubtless Optus will explain it away, if they explain it at all, with "technical difficulties". But the sheer number of angry letters, calls, and emails will put pressure on them to fix the damn problem.
What YOU don't realize is that spam is everyone's problem. I'm glad of blackholes like MAPS and spews. I'm glad my ISP uses them, and if my ISP stopped using them I'd find a new ISP. Because I don't enjoy having my time wasted, I don't enjoy having my ISP costs being inflated by the cost of handling spam, and I don't enjoy being treated like a cash cow by rude assholes the world over. If an ISP gets on a blacklist, they need only throw the spam in the trash to get out, and they all know this. Lazy corporations uninterested in stopping spamming customers because it mostly eats OTHER people's resources, does not impress me favorably.
Blocking half Australia's email? I see that as a GREAT thing. This will focus LOTS of anger and pressure on Optus, who will either shape up quick or begin to lose money. Corporations tend to hate that second option, I've found.
-Kasreyn
Kasreyn: Cheerfully playing the part of Devil's Advocate to hairtrigger
Bounce ALL uu.net originated spam to sales@uu.net and info@uu.net
Make their sales staff deal with the consequences of selling pink contracts. My accounts almost never receive spam from uu.net spammers anymore. They have been told to leave me alone because they are tired of dealing with the backlash.
If everyone would bounce spam from unresponsive isps like this, it might discourage the sale of pink contracts. Its not like uu.net can turn of sales@ without a major headache. Serves the vermin right
The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers. Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 2, Act 4, Scene 2
i agree that a world without violence would be a wonderful thing. but there are people out there who enjoy committing acts of violence against people who just roll over and take it. all it takes is one hitler to stew the pot, and maintaining a pacifist stance becomes untenable. the swiss remain neutral in every international conflicts, but they still have an army for a reason. even they realize that sometimes you have to use force to defend yourself.
the computer security analogy is flawed because an 0wned computer can be restored to its original state. that's why it's ok to say "oh well, i got owned, time to look for patches." 5000 people's lives cannot. and "patching all the holes" that caused the incident, namely a free and open society, the existence of the state of israel and military bases in saudi arabia, and our not subscribing to their twisted form of islam isn't acceptable.
but i'll play the game anyways. taking your computer analogy, say your computer is running a popular service with global access. say someone devises an attack so insidious that there is no way to patch or secure it and keep the service running at the same time. the attack is well disguised so you don't exactly which computer it's coming from, but through investigative work you narrow it down to a subnet with ~100 machines on it. do you:
a.) give up and stop running the service
b.) block the subnet, which will cost 99 innocent people access to your service but will allow the rest of the internet to access it?
At times like this, I kinda wish that ISP's would create an e-mail system where anyone wanting to send me an e-mail was charged, say, .02c, for instance.
What you want already exists. It is called X.400.
I can see the MPAA using this as an anti-digital audio tactic, spamming people from a specific network that has alot of MP3 traffic, until the network is blacklisted, and threaten to continue to spam/keep the network blacklisted until they limit the transmission of MP3's across that network.
Many of those who use blocking lists do so only for the email protocols.
Over 6000 people have been murdered in a single shot.
What's the first thing you think about?
A Assume the only response will be "carpetbombing" and post an inappropriate analogy in an attempt to claim intellectual superiority?
B Tell the victims to shut up and like it?
Score -2:
-1 for feeding a troll
-2 for upsetting your delusion that your analogy was actually valid logic.
First thing: Godwin's Law invoked, you lose:)
Second thing: Hitler did not come out of nowhere. It's arguable that he was able to take power due to the situation created in the wake of World War I, where a Germany crippled by brutal war reparations was unable to establish a strong republic. And WWI came out of nations tied into mutual defense treaties being drawn into a small, local conflict, until one went across the line and struck. And that can be explained by...
See what I'm getting at? We can go back forever trying to find the root of all this violence, but sooner or later, a society is going to have to stand up and say "no more!" People will want peace so much, that governments will have to get out of their way and let them have it (thank you Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower for that quote). We can justify retaliation after retaliation by saying "there will always be violence, so we have to defend ourselves", but the slaughter of innocents won't stop until a nation, preferably a large, influential one, openly refuses to fight any more, and will put its energy instead into building bridges, peacefully promoting freedom and liberty for all, and quit trying to get "one up on the other guy." In short, lead by example. If we can't learn from those who live a non-violent existence, if we keep forgetting our parents' exhortations to walk away from a fight, if we can't learn to resist the urge to fight, then maybe we'll solve the problem by wiping ourselves out first. In the name of defense, of course - "we had to destroy the species to save it!" and all.
but the problem is for your solution to work for you solution to work the entire world needs to come to this conclusion simultaneously. for example, if the us and the uk said in world war II said "that's it! we renounce violence as a means to solve conflicts" and disbanded their militaries i imagine hitler would have gleefully taken the opportunity to plant the nazi flag over all four corners of the globe.
there are people out there who wouldn't learn the lesson, and would instead move to take advantage of it. i think if the united states were to lead by example, disband the military, and renounce violence altogether it would be an unmitigated disaster. specifically one of many numerous unfriendly and militaristic dictatorships would take advantage. without u.s. security guarantees, the north koreans would most likely invade the south, and china would move to invade taiwan, iraq would invade kuwait and possibly saudi arabia, and so on. millions would die in the ensuing chaos.
i want what you want, i just don't think the answer for the US is as easy as giving up violence. someday, maybe. just not today.
for example, if the us and the uk said in world war II said "that's it! we renounce violence as a means to solve conflicts" and disbanded their militaries i imagine hitler would have gleefully taken the opportunity to plant the nazi flag over all four corners of the globe.
.sig from another Slash-based site, "It's either nonviolence or nonexistence." Examples of a better world must be created for others to learn from, even if a physically stronger force destroys them out of hatred, want, wrongs committed in the past, and such.
See, you keep jumping back into points in the past and saying "well, if we'd done that then, we'd be dead, so it can't work now!" I argue that if someone doesn't take the opportunity now to try a different way, it will never happen, and there will never be a point in history we can point to and say "see? That group refused to use force, and they lived a happier life, unlike the barbarians that destroyed them, so let's emulate the peaceful people."
I never said it would be easy, or that it could happen tomorrow, but I disagree that it would require the whole world at once to change. Much of what we've built came slowly, drawing lessons from the past in short spurts, in small sections of the world. Now it's time for a brave, courageous few to learn the ultimate lesson of the past - that violence and divisiveness wins nothing, in the end. Or, to lift a
To turn the old Hitler chestnut around... imagine if ol' Adolf hadn't been a vicious anti-Semite hell-bent on power and control, but a powerful pacifist advocate looking to create a better Germany out of the rubble of war, one where Germans and non-Germans, Jews and Gentiles, people of all races could create something better and freer out of the ashes of past hatred. Imagine how different history would have been if those in power hadn't been belligerent, but beneficient. In short, replace Hitler with Ghandi or MLK in 1923's NSDAP (which was a real socialist party before Hitler came into prominence, not the perversion of "national socialism" he and others created) and predict the course of history from there, assuming all other factors unchanged. What lessons would develop out of that situation?
I don't need to go back to world war ii. i gave specific examples of what i think would happen if the u.s. renounced the use of force now (invasions of s. korea, taiwan, kuwait, etc.) - millions would die in the resulting wars. american military might currently safeguards the lives and livelihoods of millions of people against dictators who would rather get everything they want by force than half of what they want through negotiation. and those people the u.s. once protected wouldn't admire the americans for their stance, they'd be angry because the pledge to protect them was broken.