pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
No bio...
User ID: 278
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
6d ago
Seems like it might be, if the blood transfusions were for treating a psychological condition, and the supporting science was sketchy at best.
pusher_robot
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6d ago
It's a (former?) sometimes poster on this forum, which is why I tagged that user. However, I saw much the same sentiment among more prominent supporters, e.g., Matt Walsh.
I also don't think poor people rejoice in McDonald's anymore - we used to with 29 cent burgers and 39 cent cheese burgers twice a week
Clearly, lots of people are eating there, and I don't think it's the upper middle class.
pusher_robot
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7d ago
Cause or effect? Are these Democrats investigated because they have been declared PNG by the party? Or are they out with the party because they were investigated (or for the underlying reasons)?
pusher_robot
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7d ago
It's not gourmet coffee, but it's approximately diner-quality, and is fast and cheap. It's definitely superior to the coffee at many other fast food places, not to mention gas stations and truck stops.
EDIT: Is this a Euro thing about not liking drip coffee?
pusher_robot
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7d ago
Which is why, for instance, one of the tests for Fair Use in the US is whether or not the derivative work competes against the original work. In the case of AI art and other generative AI tools, there's a good argument to be made that the tools do compete with the original works. As such, regardless of the technical issues involved, this does reduce the incentives of illustrators by reducing their ability to monetize their illustrations.
Yes, but AI art does not rely on fair use. The argument that the copyright issue is nonsense is that in almost no other circumstances, except where a EULA is enforced, does copyright limit the way someone can use a work. It only means they can't copy it. But the case against AI art would have to extend the concept of copying a work beyond any reasonable point in order for those restrictions to apply. You can't copyright concepts or styles for this reason, only specific works. Obtaining legitimate copies of works and assimilating them for novel synthesis has never implicated copyright before.
pusher_robot
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8d ago
Maybe if you get the mocha/lattes you'd be pushing 1400 but their coffee (that is not actually offered in the US locations, so maybe it doesn't apply as much) is good enough there's no reason to bother.
What? US McDonald's definitely serves filter coffee. It's very popular and there was even a notable lawsuit over it.
pusher_robot
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9d ago
If they were truly valuable, they would be working in private schools where the school itself must generate revenue by performing valuable functions, not simply awarded money by the state which is extracted from captive taxpayers. Thus, they are not valuable, and are instead parasitic.
This is highly confounded by the fact that public spending has greatly crowded out the private school market. If your option is a public school which costs (after taxes and fees) nothing vs. a private school of about the same quality and costs thousands of dollars a semester, it would be irrational to take the latter option. If public schools didn't exist at all, there would undoubtedly be more private schools, needing to hire more teachers.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
9d ago
It is, you just have to use the app.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
9d ago
The amount of energy being expended over Trump's recent visit to a McDonald's is kind of interesting to me. It seems to have generated an extraordinary amount of media and online attention. On the supporter side, they are hailing it as a brilliant and deeply meaningful activity, simultaneously trolling Harris and celebrating the dignity of unskilled labor, and generating deeply Americana visuals. On the detractor side, they decry it an illogical and bizarre stunt, that it was fake because the store was not actually open, and compared it to Dukakis in the tank. Some have even doxxed the owner who wrote to the state to complain about labor regulations.
Meanwhile, McDonald's corporate HQ sent what I think is a very good memo to franchisees explaining the value of their goal of political inclusivity and how that manifests as allowing visits from anyone who asks and being proud of being important to American culture.
I think this is interesting because symbolically, it's something that cleaves much more at the red tribe/blue tribe dichotomy than the Democrat/Republican one. I think a lot of blue-tribers disdain McDonalds and consider it trashy, but can't really say so too loudly because the poorer members of their political coalition enjoy it. Trump has been mocked in the past for having the poor taste of actually liking McDonald's food as well as catering a White House dinner with it, widely seen as trashy and disrespectful. The imagery of Trump looking for all the world like a store manager from 3 decades ago I think also triggered some nostalgia - or perhaps post-traumatic stress - about the current state of customer service.
I don't have too much more to say and offer no predictions. It just seemed interesting as one of those things that seemed to trigger something unexpected in people for reasons that go way beyond the substance of the actual event, and figuring out what's resonating with people in either a positive or negative way, and possibly why, seems like a good path towards predicting future trends.
pusher_robot
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12d ago
The explanation is that the FBI doesn't need to make itself look good to the public, it needs to make the party in power look good to the public, so they can get the funding they want.
pusher_robot
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12d ago
No. To the extent the provisions were not reached (which evidence seems sketchy at best to me), they still delivered much more, in a much shorter period of time, than the other competitors.
pusher_robot
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13d ago
I would say that size is irrelevant, as opposed to value delivered. A contract for $10 million that delivers nothing of value, I would presume corrupt. A contract for $10 billion that actually delivers, say, a moon base, I would not. These FCC grants have long seemed corrupt to me because huge amounts of money get paid out to companies that result in hardly anybody getting new connectivity. Questionable value for the amount provided, and then execution and delivery far below expectations.
pusher_robot
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18d ago
How are you getting to "always" from an n=1?
pusher_robot
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19d ago
Shifting the vibes is by far the most important economic contributor. Talking about lower taxes and then not lowering them will likely bring in far more revenue than talking about raising taxes and then not raising them.
pusher_robot
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20d ago
I thought about this some more, and I think another sticking point is that this is an iterative game, and people know it is an iterated game. So, if you want them to be able to concede when they're wrong, there has to be done easy to do so that doesn't undermine their future ability to raise the same issue. I think a lot of people would probably grant that at least there is no solid evidence of widespread fraud in 2020, if they didn't also sense that this would be used against them, either immediately to demand more concessions, or in the future to demand acceptance of actual wrongdoing. It's a clear case of arguments as soldiers, and nobody is going to agree to unilateral disarmament. This explains both why people resist being moved from their public position but also why they seem to weigh it as a low priority.
At this point it seems like the idea that elections are rigged is functionally unfalsifiable.
So is the idea that elections are not rigged. The real argument is over priors.
ETA:
Is there anything the government could feasibly do to nudge Republicans towards accepting the results of the election in the event that Trump loses?
Most posters are talking about regaining trust, but I'll point out that's not part of the question: you could achieve the result of "nudging" people to accept the results - at least publicly - by much more harshly punishing nonacceptance.
Also, I believe the majority of the value of the aid given to Ukraine in particularly is not cash, but arms, ammo, and loans.
From https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-24-107232:
Of the approximately $62.3 billion provided to the Department of Defense, it had obligated about $52.3 billion, such as for procuring missiles, ammunition, and combat vehicles for Ukraine and to replace U.S. stocks. In its own reporting, DOD combines this formal obligated amount with internal commitments to convey its financial commitments. Of the approximately $46.1 billion provided to the Department of State and the U.S. Agency for International Development, the two agencies had obligated about $44.4 billion, such as to support the Ukrainian government's civilian budget, including salaries for first responders, health workers, and educators. Of the approximately $3.4 billion provided to the Department of Health and Human Services, it had obligated about $3.1 billion, such as in grants for supporting Ukrainian refugees settling in the U.S. Of the approximately $1.6 billion provided to eight U.S. agencies and offices covered in this review, they had obligated about $1.4 billion, such as for nuclear security and sanctions enforcement.
So, it appears at least a near majority (51.1 of 103.4 billions) are in fact cash disbursements.
ETA: Not intending to dispute the post above, just adding context that the balance is pretty close.
pusher_robot
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28d ago
Incredulous? Have you been to Haiti?
pusher_robot
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1mo ago
It seems to me even if you’re the only one who wants Mediterranean and there’s no hope of swaying enough to your side, you still come off badly if you can’t even be bothered to say that.
Interesting, that doesn't match my intuition at all. If my party mostly wants pizza or tacos and I know they are not interested in sushi like I am, bringing up sushi at all only impedes collective decision making and may come across as whining. If I am truly indifferent between pizza and tacos, my input is useless at best.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1mo ago
Declaring something a federal holiday does not automatically mean any workers except government employees get the day off. For example, I am required to work on Juneteenth day and MLK day and a number of other federal holidays, and many service sector workers must work on other more widely observed holidays so that people can still buy groceries and have electricity and report fires.
A better option would be to treat it like jury duty and require employers to permit up to 4 hours of unpaid leave on voting day during polling hours, and allow some nominal nonrefundable amount like $100 to be deducted from taxable income for anyone with hourly wages recorded as having voted.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1mo ago
Less. Bird bunting is a common wealthy blue tribe activity. More if he had been deer hunting.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1mo ago
There are prominent republicans opposing Trump, does that make them blue tribe?
Indubitably yes! Remember that the red/blue split was not supposed to cleave on party affiliation or even ideology, but cultural affiliation. A republican from, say, the northeast, who comes from money and lives on an estate is going to be blue tribe almost without fail.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1mo ago
It would be - the common man is pretty happy with their insurance-provided health care, as opposed to VA or Medicare.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1mo ago
It's a drop in the bucket compared to the amount of government money laundered through NGOs and contracts back to the DNC.
Sure, but there's two things working against you. First is the reason that many people who genuinely want to be thin are nevertheless fat: lack of will power to not do what feels good in the moment. You may recognize fully that you need some conservatives on staff, and go out and recruit them, and nonetheless find that you simply don't have the will power to stand up for them when they (and you by proxy) are attacked by your allies, or even to grant them with a similar level of respect and authority that you would give to your allies. So, they end up leaving for less hostile environments, as would be totally expected.
The other is the principal-agent problem. You may want conservative on your staff, you may even be a conservative yourself, but if enough of your staff are willing to actually torpedo your organization and are credibly able to do so, you may find that your hand is forced and that your only options are a completely left organization or none at all. In this sense, the left engages in some union-adjacent workplace activity to effectively force a closed shop. Once you're in this situation, it's going to be very difficult to get out without replacing almost your entire staff and also countering their efforts at sabotage in the process, a difficult task even before we consider the effects of solidarity from other left media institutions.
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