Cool theory.

Not a theory. There are now lawsuits in motion due to this.

Adorable that these people don’t think that this election won’t see even more voting fraud than the last one.

I mean, if the last one was stolen, why wouldn’t the next one be, as well? He’s going to have three more years to build systems that ensure a permanent Republican ascendency.

many small or medium-sized companies "will tell you they actually can't find workers to do the job".

Hahahahahahahaaa… BULLSHIT.

There are PLENTY of workers out there, there just aren’t many willing to work for sub-poverty wages.

If your business relies on H1B workers in order to exist, then you either have an abysmally shitty business plan, or you’re pulling too much out of the company for your own benefit.

Man you are wound up so tight

And too much of this world is painted with the same fucking brush, when that’s the worst possible thing that can be done.

Too many people taking too many cognitive shortcuts, refusing to dig deeper or acknowledge details and differences or even accept facts and evidence over their pet ideologies because it’s too hard for their pablum-fed goldfish brains to handle.

So I push back. Sometimes a slap in the face wakes people up when nothing else does.

personal insults

Oh, yes. Because criticizing someone’s lack of real-world experience - with context - is so very much like trying to shame a person into silence by attacking their character instead of their argument.

Like, apples and oranges are the same species, no?

Nuance, due. It exists. It’s a real thing.

This was all a calculated strategy to make independent farmers go bankrupt and into foreclosure, so that the big agritech companies could snag prime agricultural land for pennies on the dollar.

At some point, most food will be grown by corporations that can set whatever price they want for that food, and people will have to pay that price or starve to death. It’s the definition of “captured audience” that makes the Parasite Class extract so much wealth from the working class and become so fantastically wealthy.

At this point, I wouldn’t blame any company that immediately ceased expansions in America and started to consider moving existing production facilities to adjacent countries, like Canada.

I have hoarding tendencies due to a history of poverty. Not poor any more, at least not grindingly poor, but the trauma remains.

As a result, over the last two decades I have built up a rather brutally pragmatic system of “does it have long-term utility” style of purging and standardization that allows me to let go of a lot of junk.

For example, we have standardized on six different box configurations, starting with avocado boxes from Costco (the more square kind without the access dip on the one long side) as the physically largest ones, due to their high utility and frequent likelihood of being used. All other box styles get tossed unless we have an immediate use for it, whereupon it gets tossed into the recycling as soon as that use is over.

Is it perfect? No. But it’s effective and the simplicity lowers decision-based stress.

Aside from the Rotary Un-Phone, there are pretty much no dumb phones anymore. Those that market themselves as dumb are just reskinned full-fat platforms.

Even almost all flip phones are smart phones with a dumb skin, as they run either Android or KaiOS.

The main reason why I would switch is for device security - a true dumb phone OS that operates purely out of the ROM and has no ability to install anything that could survive a reboot.

And for something that primitive, it would be a flip phone on par with the Motorola StarTac. Simple black-on-green screen, low-res display, with a calendar and address book as the only non-phone, non-SMS functionality.

You need only to look at his ideology to realize that Charlie Kirk was 100% in support of his own assassination.

And that he would have also been 100% in favour of this professor’s right to speak her mind.

This, exactly. They’re letting the violent bullies dictate the terms.

And that never ends well.

IMO anon’s statement about body count was badly phrased, but it makes sense for me under limited circumstances.

For the last few decades, my opinion has held firm on a simple philosophy:

If I never ask out a woman I’m interested in, and they date guy after guy, then I have nothing to complain about. They never knew about my interest, and so they were never given the chance to accept or reject my interest. There is no way in hell that I could hold their body count against them, and I have only myself to blame for not stepping up and asking them out when I had the chance.

But if I do ask a woman out, and they clearly and immediately reject me in favour of someone else, then I am obviously not an interest for them. They have clearly and unambiguously rejected me, so what standing do I have to not believe that? You can’t get a more sure sign. If they then rack up other relationships, each and every one of those is another nail in the coffin of any potential relationship. They have made an explicit statement that I am of far less desirability than other options, and that door closes permanently, and gets barred and locked for good measure.

Because if she comes sniffing around again, then it is screamingly obvious that I am not her second-best, third-best, or even n^th best option… I am her backup-backup-backup plan that she is “settling for” because all of her better options ran out.

And at that point… thanks but no thanks. That’s a path down which I have absolutely no desire to trod, because down that path lies doubt and second-guessing that can only poison me, my mental health, and my happiness. If she had no interest in me when I asked, then I will absolutely trust her for having told me the complete truth, and I will hold that truth as unchanging, unimpeachable gospel.