Totally agreed, that's all I'm getting at. I don't think they're gonna win, I just think they're gonna try real hard and leave a lot of people dead (and a small group of people very rich) like usual.

Likely. I think we'll see a lot of drones and big missiles and carpet bombing type stuff before any boots hit the ground, if even at all.

I don't disagree; it certainly wouldn't be a walk in the park the way Desert Storm was portrayed as, but all the middle east excursions so far have felt pretty phoned-in and half-assed, like they never really had a good enough reason to full-on invade anywhere, just station a bunch of troops to conduct police actions and target the specific and relatively small groups (while naturally casualty-ing huge numbers of otherwise un-involved civilians, of course).

Those felt like they were invasions sold as being based on the pretext that there were some dangerous people in an otherwise neutral country that had to be rooted out, or the state apparatus as a potential threat with enhanced capabilities (chemical weapons, well-organized individual bombers etc).

I worry that the actual state launching actual clear-as-day attacks (justified though they may be in reality) would be such a juicy pretext to not just send in some troops to occupy, but to really start crazy bombing at a new scale we haven't seen yet. If they consider this a full WW2 level mobilization, I'm not saying they would win, but at least the conflict is going to be way bigger and more intense and direct than anything we've seen in a long time outside of the eastern bloc.

Again, it would be a huge shit-show no doubt, and very possibly unsuccessful, but I think the cost to human life will be on an entirely different scale than we are used to in the last 30-odd years (which has already been catastrophic, obviously).

And of course on top of all that, just about everybody involved is nuclear equipped, so anyone that's feels they are losing too badly could always just...

I got tricked into buying the software version of the one about colonial era ships, because the person working the book fair told me you could launch cannon balls and blow up the dude in the toilet, like it was some kinda wacky action game, and I was a wacky little action dude at the time so of course I had to check that out.

Turns out it was closer to Encarta but without the Mind Maze part. The guy blowing up was a tiny little animation, and you could not, in fact, fire the cannon at all. Something something disappointment immeasurable etc.

To be fair, it was a much more effective electoral strategy than the follow-up:

we're not going to do shit if you vote for us!

actually, doing nothing would be way better than what we were planning, not to mention way harder to buck our lobbyists that want us to do the terrible things, so we're going to fuck things up pretty bad if you vote for us. but the other guy might fuck things up slightly more, and it's your fault either way! but we won't do anything to stop it, because that's too hard/we don't care, ~~good luck~~ fuck you!"

Just use the same "inflation" math the grocery stores and fast food restaurants use, and you'll find you're owed just shy of $10.8 million.

Tag yourself

No, I absolutely will not.

Yeah I was about to make a similar post - just had a big debate with some older family friends at a party my parents had that are die-hard dems (which was nice, as they're way further left then most other people there).

They were aghast when I said I wasn't voting blue, and had no idea who Claudia or the PSL are, of course.

Got a lot of "this is the most important election ever" and "if he wins democracy is over" of course. But the one that really chapped my biscuits was saying that if he wins, then [my family member] will lose access to reproductive health care and IVF in particular.

So I said yeah right, neither side is going to change a damn thing about that, because they both see it as way too valuable of a carrot/stick to give up campaigning and fundraising on it. If the dems care so much about it, why haven't they actually done anything about it?

"Well Biden's wanted to, but he's been hamstrung by the extremist right!"

So what about those years when he had full congressional majority?

"Oh well yeah, I mean I guess he could have done more there..."

And then we got called away to the rest of the party and never got to continue.

Bonus points for my insistence that both parties intend on continuing the genocide - but ofc he is going to do it worse somehow. When I said I'm not going to vote for Genocide Light™️, they said, "Hell yeah I am! It's better than the other option!", and I sadly beat a dead horse a little more about there actually being more options available and maybe you actually don't have to put your stamp of approval on genocide-with-rainbow-flag-characteristics.

Also bonus-bonus points for one of the two (very sweet, kickass person generally) asking "So what does genocide mean again?" in a completely honest, non-hostile way, indicating that they simply had not engaged with even the thought of such a thing happening before this conversation.

And these are the two that always get in trouble for being too vocal about their left-ish political opinions at these functions.

Really such a bizarre way to word a policy initiative.

Like, "oh we need to give billions in bank bailouts in order to protect the wealth of all the ~[black]~ hedge fund managers! See! We're doing this for racial justice!"

My favorite line on this subject: only call the police when the situation would be improved by the addition of an easily frightened maniac with a gun.

That is to say, usually don't.

Seriously, I'm always telling people about this. The most adament speeders are always the "fuck the government", you can't tell me what to do, come-and-take-it types, and it just baffles me because like, yeah, they will come and take it; in fact they love to!

You are giving the pigs a free pass to fully legally and justifiably pull you over any time they feel like it.

Obviously they'll still pull over anyone at any time and retroactively make up a reason, but at least then they are starting on shaky ground, and you've got a way better chance of beating any charges later.

If you hate the pigs so much, why would you make their job so easy? Especially if you're riding dirty in any way, then that just multiplies everything above a thousand times. And naturally, those that are the most cavalier about doing that always seems to be the ones that love speeding the most.

According to my grocery co-shopper, it tastes a little tiny bit different in an unexplainable way, and this minute differentiation is worth several dollars at a time apparently.