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FiveHourMarathon

a worthless check, a total wreck, a flop

17 followers   follows 6 users  
joined 2022 September 04 22:02:26 UTC

And every gimmick hungry yob

Digging gold from rock n roll

Grabs the mic to tell us

he'll die before he's sold

But I believe in this

And it's been tested by research

He who fucks nuns

Will later join the church


				
User ID: 195


				
				
				

			

		

	














	


		


			



	

		

			

			

				

					

						

							
						

						

							
							

								
FiveHourMarathon


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
a worthless check, a total wreck, a flop

				
				
				

				

					17 followers  

					follows 6 users  

					joined 2022 September 04 22:02:26 UTC
				


				
					

					
And every gimmick hungry yob


Digging gold from rock n roll


Grabs the mic to tell us


he'll die before he's sold


But I believe in this


And it's been tested by research


He who fucks nuns


Will later join the church



				

				

				

				

				

					

					

					
					
					

					
User ID: 195


					
					
					
				

			


					

						
					



		

	

 











			
			

			
			

			




	


		

			
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	 Hot Bump Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
	



		

	






	

		
		

		
		
	

	

  







		

			
			
				Midterms Megathread
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


G.2. "Pick another protein? I'd rather pick another senator" is the best political ad of the year.




It's insane that this is the broad consensus, because to me what she said was obviously good advice and they're punishing her for telling them the truth.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Sure, but if you're a local business, you sometimes need things from the state government in a way that you don't from Washington. You need a relationship with your local state rep and your governor/AG/commissioner of such and so, you need a functioning state government to pass laws and do things for you.


Texas business interests can't just sit out the next however many years and wait for Republicans to come back. They're going to have to form relationships with Democrats.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Texas Dems flipped the state house.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
OpenAI? Anthropic, which on its website says of itself "AI research and products that put safety at the frontier. AI will have a vast impact on the world. Anthropic is a public benefit corporation dedicated to securing its benefits and mitigating its risks."? Deepseek: "DeepSeek is an AI research company focused on building world-leading general artificial intelligence."


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Good on you, brother. I broadly agree with a lot of your points here.




Obviously, Iran is very unpopular. I still accept Trump's judgment that it was the right thing to do and I still believe that the war is (plainly) a military success. (Call me crazy!)




Accepting that you aren't crazy and that it was the right thing to do and is a military success, how do you feel about the procedural aspects of how the war was started? The war effort lacked a congressional declaration or any kind of approval, but even writing that off because we don't declare anything anymore, it lacked a significant public effort to sell the war to the public in advance. Maybe I'm an optimist about the voting public's sophistication, but I think that some of the disapproval of the war stems from the failure to seek even a fig leaf of any kind of democratic legitimacy and approval. Which raises my question to you, as an intelligent pro-war interlocutor: if a successful morally correct war is launched in a way that is illegitimate, what is the correct punishment to inflict on those who started it? If it's "Nothing, it worked out" then the idea of democratic legitimacy is a dead letter and the president has plenary power to declare war, that seems untenable.


I don't think people think through those procedural questions, but I do think the way the war was started and executed ("We won!" "we're about to make a deal" "We're about to end Iranian civilization forever") left a lot of people confused and maybe a little miffed, and dragged down the approval rating. You appear to be correct at this point that the strait of Hormuz is mostly useable for commercial traffic, with a mildly increased risk tolerance. But the repeated announcements have ruined presidential credibility.




A lot of my friends who were loyal Trump guys are crashing out now. I do think it's still too soon to call this the death of MAGA, and there is no going back to the old establishment Republican consensus.




A good guide here is the trajectory of GWOT-PATRIOT Act-Neocon consensus between 2006-2008. Everyone said that the voters rejected Dubya and the wars, but Obama kept most of it in place, and it became part of core American governance. Elections have consequences. A lot of MAGA is going to absorbed into the core American synthesis, for both parties. MAGA might die, the same way "Hipsters" aren't around anymore. But MAGA stuff is everywhere, like how I can go to a local microbrewery on my way home and pick up beer.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Well...


But I should be kind. What is the justification for using SI over AI?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I understand the domain names are a fun way to extract rent for nothing, but are they really that important in any structural sense? Especially in an internet that is dominated by social media, and then even more when it is dominated by AI itself, domain names feel more and more secondary to one's experience of the internet.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
SI is nice as a tell you're dealing with a cultist, a moron, or someone arguing in bad faith. Like neopronouns or land acknowledgements.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Midterms Megathread
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
By 2030 we won't believe this ever happened.


Wins this big are always multi-causal. In the same way that huge businesses involve multiple points of luck and skill lining up, or that every championship sports team involves a couple of players having career years.


But this will have major impacts on the future of the country. Will Texas be purple in 2028? Certainly both sides will have to consider it in play, and Dems will have two years in the Governor's mansion to engineer it further. If Texas goes Blue, the Republican path to the presidency changes completely.


This won't necessarily happen, but preventing it from happening will require effort by Republicans, and trying to make it happen will lead to efforts from Democrats. Policies are going to change in order to accommodate these goals.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
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Is your theory that Paxton is actually a principled public servant and not a wildly corrupt whoremonger forced to trot out his own betrayed ex-wife for advertisements?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
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I mean sure, but he's got around 35 others so he should only be 3% upset about it.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
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Someone on twitter described the Michigan Democratic ratfucking as like "defecting to Germany during the fall of Berlin."


That's pretty much accurate.


I have trouble even feeling bad for Elon when he gets targeted with Lawfare at this point.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
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Men voted 49% blue to 49% red, Women voted 58% blue to 40% red, White Men voted 43% blue to 55% red.




You call this stark? Your lede had me thinking it was at least 70-30 either way.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
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I'm not sure "Trump is an inveterate liar and just be sayin' shit sometimes" is really an argument that the Republicans are more principled when it comes to gibs.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
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Homeboy, Trump literally promised $5k debt financed cash free and clear if the Republicans won. The gibs are out of control.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
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Abbott is a function of Paxton.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Midterms Megathread
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Abbott






Outrun




I see what you did there


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Polling isn't (and never was - 1992 in the UK remains infamous in the industry) good enough to call close elections, and the 2026 Senate election is close.




The thing that has always been most curious to me: How many people vote for the wrong person? Like, literally vote by mistake. They walk in planning to vote for Rogers, they sit down at the table and vote for Rogers, they walk out and would tell you that they voted for Rogers, but they actually filled out their ballot for Sayed.


It clearly can't be zero. That would be impossible. Speaking particularly currently as the father of a newborn, no comparable task has 100% accuracy rates.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Probably? I'm counting "winning big" as "taking the Senate" which was considered the reach goal before the campaign season started. It's totally within the realm of probabilities that there Democrats don't the Senate or that they don't take the house, 1/4 and 1/20 per the market odds. But I think a miss of that magnitude will break any sense of trust or credibility polling has had on the culture, either they're useless horoscopes or Trump's various vote-repair efforts have succeeded in altering the rules and making them useless.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for November 1, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Make sure you measure the actual dimensions of the TV and, preferably, hold up a piece of cardboard in the wallspace you intend to use for it. A lot of times people end up with an absurdly large TV because shopping in store, 65" feels like a reasonable compromise position, only to get home and find it either doesn't fit or dominates a too-small room.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 2, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Nate Silver is at this point essentially saying that there's no way to soften, or unskew, or fiddle with the mechanisms in the polls and produce a Republican win: either the Democrats win big, or polling as we know it is useless.


This concerns me, in that polling is a significant part of how Americans understand the world. It may be that polls are no better than horoscopes, often with less math!, but it can't be denied that millions of Americans understand the polls as meaningful information about the world. A polling miss this large will break people's brains.


One of the refrains of the 2020 election conspiracists has always been a reasonable motte: It doesn't really matter if the election was stolen, if enough people think it was stolen than it damages the legitimacy of democracy and the government etc must step in and seriously investigate the allegations of wrongdoing to assuage those concerns. If the confidence of the public is shaken, it must be restored, even if the allegations are factually false.


I'm worried that this is gonna be the big one. Democrats lose, when Democrats have abundant "objective" evidence that they're going to win, and as a result a large part of the D electorate decides that elections are fake and fixed. Or Democrats win, and Trump refuses to accept the result for whatever reason, and gets enough traction to make it a real problem for everyone.


Probably, nothing ever happens. But I'm worried. The polls are unequivocal at this point, the result may not line up with it.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Random Musings on the State of TheMotte
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Tom Brady did it for a long time with the Patriots.




Tom Brady routinely took lower pay than he could have with the Pats, he never took the league minimum. Lebron joining the Sixers for free is a totally different animal. A player taking a pay cut to allow for salary cap room for a better team is one thing, a player who is top 25 in the NBA taking the league minimum is another.


The sixers probably won't play well, for a variety of reasons. But if they do, it'll be an interesting discourse.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 26, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Automatic weapons are not the biggest deal. But what are you going to do about armored vehicles? Really hard to kill a tank with your AR-15.






The days of Washington when an armed, motivated local population could defeat a great power (though not on their home continent) in open battle are long over.




This is such a stupid motte-and-bailey. Sure, if you ask a marine captain: "Can you take control of a small town if all the men in it are armed with semi-automatic rifles?" The answer is obvious.


But if you ask him: "You have to take control of this small town. Would you rather that all the men in it had semi-automatic rifles, or foam pool noodles?" The answer is also obvious.


Civilian ownership of AR-15s doesn't have to be a win-now button to be useful.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Random Musings on the State of TheMotte
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's amazing how cursed the Sixers have been as a franchise that this team isn't a bigger story.


-- I honestly think this team, win or lose, will be remembered as more insane than it was ten years from now. Given I'm a homer so I think that VJ and Maxey are going on to great careers; people are going to look back on this team and see Lebron the GOAT, Embiid an MVP level player, stars in Brown, Maxey and Edgecombe. Without thinking that Lebron and Embiid were past their primes while VJ and Tyrese hadn't hit theirs yet. I think in terms of each player at their peak talent, this might end up being the best starting 5 we'll ever see, even if it's not actually the best basketball team.


-- How high does this team have to finish for the NBA to crack down on the Lebron Loophole this offseason? If the Sixers weren't such a joke of a franchise over the last decade plus, we'd already be hearing about how they unfairly got a superstar for free and it undermines parity. Like obviously if they get a ring, but do wear about it if they make the semis? Win the NBA cup lol?


-- My parents' parasocial relationship with Tyrese Maxey went nuclear when Lebron basically said he came to Philly to hang out with him. He's always smiling, always calls the sideline interviewer "ma'am," and now he's so nice that the GOAT basically made his team decision on Tyrese being his new best friend. My mother will not hear any Maxey slander.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 25, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


He also correctly understands that his wife, on the other hand, at the level of her social station as the queen, and that she does have actual political backing (certainly from her far-away royal family, possibly from other local aristocrats sharing her views).




That is a great example of poorly written patriarchy. She would never act this way, because no one would support her in it. Her father would be in favor of her being forced to do her duty. There's no way anyone is taking her side here. And if the fear is that she'll have him assassinated, the best way to protect yourself from that is to get a child on her.


Like, I get that there is an explanation for it, I just found the explanation so poor that it ruined the book for me.