ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
No bio...
User ID: 626
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
10hr ago
WhatsApp and telegram still rely on your phone number.
As a tracking / anti-spam measure, not because it's technically necessary.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
1d ago
Was holding off with posting, hoping I could show something off, but I'm still in research mode. The crawler / search index things looks like it's going to be too complicated right now, so I was revisiting my old turn everything into RSS solution, seeing if I can strap on a crawler on it. Miniflux even has some tools that could be extended to handle it... but it's not particularly extension-friendly. I was trying to come up with a way to rearrange my modifications so it will be easier to keep it up to date with the main repository, but so far it only gave me a headache.
How have you been doing @Southkraut?
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
1d ago
Wait, it's hip to hate Infinite Jest now? I think I might need to start liking it...
This is a bit like our conversation on "classical liberals". You're operating on broad categories that possibly include me, but pick extreme off-the-wall examples that are a poor fit to the category.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
2d ago
In the part where the constitution gives the branches particular enumerated powers and "the power to regulate" isn't assigned to the president.
So this all rests on the Constitution not giving specific powers to a particular branch of the federal government? Do you have any idea how many ships have sailed from that port?
This is a bullshit argument and you know it. People complain incessantly about the abuses of their own side-- particuarly with the technocrat and left-populist factions of the democrats having been at odds since 2016.
No, I don't know it. First, unless by "populist left" you mean people like Glenn Greenwald, this doesn't even seem all that true to me, and secondly, we're not just talking about what the left would consider abuse in the context of an intra-left battle, we're talking about things not allowed by the constitution.
There's a difference between killing one person and killing ten people, even if they're both murder.
I'm yet to hear the argument for why what's happening now is comparable to the guy killing ten people rather than one.
I'm still struggling to understand why you think the best remedy to presidential abuses of power is to cheer them on when they abrogate to themselves even more powers to abuse.
For the same reason I wouldn't feel bad about flirting with a colleague, after I found my wife cheated on me.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
2d ago
Did you read mine? I'm asking about conflict theory not Kulak, FC already gave you a response why he's not a great example for you.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
2d ago
Congress said it, right now, by not passing a law to do it themselves.
Where is it said that only Congress can do it, and only by passing a law?
Two wrongs doesn't make a right, buddy.
If literally no one who is bothered by this voiced their protest about the past abuses, how am I supposed to believe they consider it to be two wrongs?
Especially when this latest wrong enables dramatically more impactful wrongs in later presidents.
That doesn't make it different from past abuses.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
2d ago
Congress set up the federal bureacracy with an intended balance of power.
Where was it said that the balance of power was intended to be at heavily ideologically progressive skew of the pre-Trump level? Why should anyone care after all the abuses of the executive from FDR to Obama?
I think this is a delusional take
No, U.
To be clear, are you claiming that there are no massively-commercially-successful musical artists today?
No, he's claiming there's none that have the cultural impact of those in the past, and he's right. Your explanations only confirm this, though they are wrong in the sense that were the causes of past artists' status that you identified reproduced, it would not inflate them to the level of the people he mentioned. That is: you can put Taylor Swift's music in every movie, and none of it will matter because movies lost their cultural impact as well.
In the meantime, the soundtrack of the 2020s is not difficult to identify if you just look at what artists are selling the most albums, having their music streamed the most often on Spotify and other similar services, whose concert tours are the most successful, who appear the most on TV, etc. Taylor Swift still dominates, plus the aforementioned Olivia Rodrigo and The Weeknd, Ariana Grande, Sabrina Carpenter, Billie Eilish, Harry Styles, Doja Cat, BTS, Chappell Roan
Taylor Swift is the only one that's remotely close to what he's talking about, and that's by the skin of her teeth.
Aside from FC's point, how does conflict theory see any notion that people should try understanding their opponents as akin to betrayal?
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
3d ago
I believe the original version of the joke is doing a 360 and walking away, which only implies moonwalking, and which would make this a spoiled version of the joke, but I'm not sure how many layers of irony we're on right now.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
3d ago
Europe should obviously do a 180 and moonwalk out of the ring.
That would be moonwalking into the ring.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
4d ago
But America has consistently presented Europe with the other option
It would be nice if they never presented us with either.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
4d ago
More speech is banned on Musk's Twitter than Dorsey's Twitter. (Trivially, because most Twitter censorship is done by foreign governments, and DorseyTwitter consistently resisted to the best of its ability whereas Musk rolls over if he finds the government in question friendly.)
I'm not prepared to concede either part if that argument in nothing but your word. DorseyTwitter banned something like half of the accounts I followed, most of which are either American or Anglo, so I don't believe it's due to foreign goverents, nor do I believe that there are more bans than we used to have.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
4d ago
I don't think they can
Obscuring what they do behind a lofty sounding NGO increases their chances of being undetected, and your approach only gives them more time to cone up with better cover.
and I don't think being shut down immediately affects their ability to do that
It is already demonstrated that it did.
Most of the information was already public (DataRepublican didn't need the freeze to make those websites.
Can you demonstrate that the majority of Ukrainian "independent" media was funded through USAID, using only the dataset used by DataRepublican? I doubt even the Ukrainian media itself knew the extent on which they depend on the US.
They would also scream if their funding was going to be cut off in N days! (For the same reason they're screaming even though the freeze was blocked).
This makes no sense. Screaming only increases their chances of being cut, staying silent gives them a chance of being missed, and to regroup without notifying their political opponents.
And it was already public knowledge that USAID funds media across the world, including the individual outlets.
Anyone saying that the majority of Ukrainian media is entirely funded by USAID would be portrayed as a conspiracy theorist. You'd be the first insisting that there's no evidence for such a claim.
Rubio says in that clip that USAID wasn't being cooperative, but he doesn't mention it being related to a freeze, which is the thing I was asking about.
Oh, come on! What do you think he was talking about, if not the freeze, given the date of the interview?
I actually saw him say the exact same thing when asked if Trump's approach wasn't too drastic, and something more gradual wasn't warranted.
and Elon's able to get his hands on the info that isn't public because Trump lets him, not because of a freeze.
Like, Trump didn't freeze Treasury funding, but DOGE still got access on Trump's authority, I don't see how USAID is different.
Like I said in the other comment, by your own staandard this solution has not worked yet.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
5d ago
Trump didn't freeze Treasury funding, but DOGE still got access on Trump's authority
I'll answer the rest later, but for now very quickly - their access was revoked by a judge.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
5d ago
given that I have literally never voted for a Democrat in my life and I regularly criticize communists.
That's literally the same argument I always used for saying I'm not on the right (until very recently). How compelling do you find it in my case?
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
5d ago
I'd bet on Vance before betting on Elon here.
Also, Trump posts on Truth, and only reposts screenshots to Twitter, if this is his first "real" tweet. that means he or his team wanted to get eyes on it. Whether it's a distraction or a trial baloon, for better or worse, it seems to be a calculated move.
I do not think you're thinking clearly about this. Elon does not get different information if he cuts everything now, vs sending out an order to cut everything in 60 days. In both cases, he has to make factual determinations about how important the womens' organizations in Myanmar are.
Cool, and I think you're the one not thinking clearly. The idea that the information will be the same is an unproven assumption. USAID can easily pretend that the women's organisations in Myanmar are doing something else entirely, which is more palatable to the current administration.
I don't understand how immediately freezing funding makes it easier to collect this data, I think that's something that was imagined after the fact to justify the freezes. (And, again, most of the freezes have themselves been blocked, so...)
What don't you understand about the entirety of Ukrainian "independent" media, and half of European leftist rags screaming about their funding being cut? We already heard the scream regardless of whether or the freeze has been blocked, so we know for sure that this is how they're funded. You're assuming and/or implying that the information would be just as readily available without the cuts, but you're not making any argument for that.
I do not think this is true? DOGE staff were inside the USAID building and had access to their computer systems. Freezing USAID doesn't affect their ability to do that.
I got it from Marco Rubio, who said it in an interview. I recall another one, where he said it specifically in response to not taking a more gradual approach, but can't find it now. In other words what you're describing is the direct result of the crackdown, not of USAID cooperating.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
6d ago
I remember Naomi Wolf's book that looked into this getting pulped, because she made some embarrassing error, thinking she found many cases of gay people sentenced to death, but it turned out she misunderstood some legal term that meant the sentence was never carried out.
Don't remember if the other part of this was that the sentences that were carried out involved child molestation, but maybe this puts you on the right track.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
6d ago
If it's so simple, howcome literally no sense be died that until now?
... what? Some programs will say "we are destroying fentanyl labs in Mexico", and not get frozen. Others won't say that, because they're funding womens' organizations in myanmar, and will get frozen
Except "women's organizations in Myanmar" will be under an "if you cut this, billions will die" item, and it will look like there's really nothing to cut.
It's the exact same thing that's happening now, except the fentanyl one doesn't get frozen.
Are you implying that all these programs clearly star what they're actually doing, and no one will try to hide their operation under a title that's more palatable to the current administration?
don't think your logic here makes sense? How does the instant freeze help Musk distinguish between programs that do and don't deserve to be cut, vs just collecting the information without doing the freeze?
How do you collect that information without the freeze? USAID refused to cooperate with an audit, that's the entire reason their funding was frozen. It was only then that we discovered that all the "independent" media in Ukraine were funded by them. You know this. How do you propose anyone finds out where all this money ends up without the freeze?
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
6d ago
... From the OP: "forcing programs to come forward and say, “look, we’re actually something you want to keep because X, please give us some money”, without also shutting down the anti-fentanyl work in mexico. obviously?
And literally every single program will say that, resulting in nothing changing, and nobody knowing there's anything that should be cut. Again, what good is letting them do that? Or put another way: how does that plausibly lead to cutting away the waste?
It is not working yet! Judges have blocked almost all of his big cuts
So? It already exposed who needs constant o be cut. When the Supreme Court ruling comes around, they'll know exactly where to take the hatchet to.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
6d ago
In this case, Trump could have just said 'this funding freeze will go into effect in 90 days', and the agencies and departments would've all started begging for their money pretty quickly, without actually being defunded
And what would that accomplish? You think USAID would say "Ok, you got us! We won't sponsored subversive operations in Eastern Europe anymore, and will focus on vaccines for Africans"? I think they'd use the 90 days to set up more NGO's that fund NGO's, to pretend that they never sponsored subversion to begin with.
I also think the only reason people are protesting his actions is that they know this is the only thing that would work.
Yes, stereotype accuracy is one of the strongest and most reproducible effects in social science.
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