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You know i'd be fine with no mask laws for ice, if wearing a mask during a protest meant the police can just snipe you legally.
Probably for average people. But political leaders tend to know where the public is. If there were a large offline contingent of democratic voters who are shocked, angered, and horrified by political violence, you would have seen democratic leaders in Congress, in state and local politics, or who are political influencers taking a rather large step back, issuing actual condemnations of the acts (now plural btw) of violence against political opponents. So where is that? Where are people for whom politics and political science are their profession, whose job depends on getting it right with the public, or whose rating depend on not alienating the public who get the message of “normal people absolutely do not want political violence.?”
That would also tend to mean that not many on the left are liking and sharing such content, which is to me a signal as well.
I don’t see many unequivocal comments that say the targeting of ICE or Charlie Kirk are wrong, I don’t see a ratcheting down of rhetoric, or even calls for such. That’s pretty darn bad. The only rhetorical blowback was the two-day cancellation of Jimmy Kimmel and a couple of stations still not wanting to air the show. Most of the left including mainstream professional broadcasters on the left seem to view any calls to tone it down, or to maybe just maybe not publish things that call Kirk evil White Christian Nationalist before he even gets a funeral (thus justifying the homicide) are widely seen as “censorship” and any company that does so is to expect liberals canceling their subscription (which is why Disney folded). That’s not “we don’t want anything like this to happen again.” That’s not even “we feel bad for our part of creating this environment.” It’s basically “we at best don’t care if people get shot.”
You mean they’re generally sedentary and eat ultra processed junk food? It’s not much of a mystery that the generation of my parents in 1960 were healthier and lacked man-boobs — they went outside and played sports in real life using their real muscles. Mom cooked at home using such exotic ingredients as chicken, beef, pork, flour, milk, eggs, and fresh vegetables. Amazing how eating real food and playing sports outside with real people made them healthy.
Definitely the spooks.
A lame offer, indistinguishable from what we have right now.
Counter-offer: You concede that most Communists were, even at their worst, less evil than the Nazis, and I will acknowledge that some Communists were as evil as the Nazis (e. g. the Khmer Rouge).
I don't recall which subproject he was a part of, but regarding the one I brought up, I disagree with "not controllable". They may have unacceptable side effects, the results may be too generic for practical use by intelleigence agencies, the procedures themselves may be impossible to apply without detection, and again too convoluted to be practical compared to more standard methods, but I'm not sure where the "they don't work" idea is coming from.
I got him to kill six kids and then off himself! Top that!
Crowley: replaces customer support with dodgy LLM chatbots
True, the MKUltra brainwashing experiments did change Kaczynski's beliefs but not in a controllable or desirable way, from the point of view of the manipulators.
...regardless, it is my observation that American politicians are big on the performative aspects of politics
For structural and cultural reasons, there is no distinction between a King and a CEO in the American system, so mayors, governors and presidential hopefuls need to demonstrate their ability to do both. A British Prime Minister needs to do a lot less performing because the royals take on most of the performance burden of making the country look and feel like a country. And we have similar institutions at local levels - the traditional British (Lord) Mayor has largely ceremonial and representative functions while the leader of the majority group on the council is making policy, setting budgets etc.
If? Tomorrow?
Also, anonymity is not a privilege we grant most state officials. There are no anonymous judges, or AGs.
You're correct, perhaps we should. I want anonymous courts stamping classified orders going after self identified antifa groups and other domestic-terrorism-lite groups. Hell the anonymous courts should rubber stamp drone strikes against coyotes and drug cartels. Can't retaliate when you don't know who gives out the orders.
In a healthy democracy random "organized" antifa groups would be allowed to exist funded by darkpool liberal money. In a healthy democracy one part of the political body wouldn't be trying to pull a fast one and import as many immigrants as possible in an attempt to "stack the vote" in their favor.
One compelling Trump thesis is he thinks he's found a cheat code where he doesn't even have to finish doing things. He can just start things, talk about what it's intended to do as if it's already done, and expects to reap the same benefits even if nothing actually happens at all like he describes as the policy takes place - or more likely, collapses under its own weight quickly.
One of the main criticisms Dominic Cummings makes of the British political class is that this was the main way Blair thought about governing, and the only way Cameron and Johnson did. People were talking about the "permanent campaign" as something that started in the Clinton administration, although in Clinton's White House the key political operator was a pollster (Dick Morris) and not a PR/comms person like Alastair Campbell or Malcolm Tucker - something that Cummings calls out as significantly less harmful. Conventional wisdom is that this development was partly driven by the need to generate content for cable news.
In so far as Trump's style is different from earlier versions of the permanent campaign, it is that David Cameron would announce Project Shoebox with grand promises and then both Cameron and the press would ignore what the project actually did, whereas Donald Trump will announce Project Shoebox and then post a fish tale on social media about how Project Shoebox has already made the national foot four sizes larger in only a month.
I am centrist when it comes to the topic of abortion. On one hand I am thrilled with the idea of killing unborn babies, but on the other hand I am not willing to let women decide anything.
If MKUltra worked practically, there'd be more signs of its use. The CIA and associated goons wouldn't need to torture people at Guantanamo or Abu Ghraib, they could just brainwash them!
But more seriously, I never said they could go as far as programming people like computers, just that they could change some of people's beliefs and/or personality, beyond what mass media and the education system allows.
Their remote viewing was pretty promising too, per various documents. Nobody can fault the Cold War CIA with closedmindedness.
But if remote viewing is so great, why did they spend so much on the U2, satellites, SIGINT? If the US has unconventional propulsion, flying saucers, why would they need the F-35?
If MKUltra worked practically, there'd be more signs of its use. The CIA and associated goons wouldn't need to torture people at Guantanamo or Abu Ghraib, they could just brainwash them!
Western citizens aren't volunteering to die in Ukraine because the CIA did some trickery, they're doing this because their attitudes and beliefs have been shaped by the media and those around them, they think it's the right thing to do. Some people are easily suggestible and follower-type personalities. I think this website is full of contrarians and individualists who are highly resistant to consensus and passive manipulation, we naturally struggle to model the mindsets of the other end of the spectrum.
(One exception might be the chemicals and hormones we encounter all around in the modern world, which might act as epigenetic triggers making people more cowardly and less rebellious, though it's not clear that this is anyone's plan, per se. You can see the physiognomy of our fathers and grandfathers was totally different to today, some young men are growing breasts because of some chemical, presumably.)
Thanks, I think.
Lol. Okay, sometimes it’s a fig leaf.
But from a purely descriptive perspective I would bet that, say, 99% of Madoka Magica slash writers are not paedophiles.
What makes you think they will not just run away and not show up to their deportation? Saw off their monitor bracelets and go into hiding?
As I mentioned in another reply further down the chain, my ideal regime of policing would also be such that this just wouldn't be possible. There would always be a cop close enough that they can get notified as soon as a bracelet detects funny business, and zoom to its last recorded location before the alert.
In any event, you know, the ankle bracelets are only a shot in the dark. I don't claim they're the miracle cure-all. I only bring them up as an example of a middle-of-the-road policy that's neither maximally repressive nor maximally permissive with regards to what to do with illegals once detected. I just don't think "reliably expel illegal immigrants, without ruining their lives more than is necessary to do so" is an impossible ask for a well-run machinery of state in the modern world. There's gotta be a way, we just haven't found it yet, mostly for lack of looking (because the Left doesn't want the illegals expelled, and the Right wants to be cruel about it).
I'd suggest that all of the groups you listed (barring Japanese, who never existed in large enough numbers to matter) are at least of Christian denomination, and while cultural differences between Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant are large, they're nowhere near as large as the differences between any Christian denomination and Hindu or Islam.
Further, the culture in the U.S. in the 18th century was vastly different from even modern day U.S. culture. Integration and assimilation was both expected and enforced. Nowadays, not only is it not expected, but to suggest that some immigrant group should integrate is treated as racist. You say that nativist backlash against immigration was an integration problem, but I'd suggest that it's the exact opposite. Nativist backlash happens when immigrants do not integrate. Without any pressure from natives, why should immigrants integrate? You see this exact problem in Canada and Europe. Do Indians in Canada behave like Canadians? I don't even mean that they need to stop being Hindu, but do they stop throwing their religious idols into public waterways or stop shitting on public beaches? Do Muslims in Great Britain act British? I don't even mean that they need to convert to Christianity, but do they not stab you for burning the Quran or not harass women for not wearing a covering?
Appreciate the kind wishes
Just as a follow-up.
Obama's initial response was to say that "this kind of despicable violence has no place in our democracy", with 1.1 million likes that probably aren't all from Red Tribe Obama fans
Yeah, there's also bots and Indians. You don't find it odd that with so many likes all the replies are negative? Where are all the like-clicking blue-tribers voicing their agreement?
More like most of us don't have political brainrot.
I've heard that one before, but it makes no sense given the shape of the world we're in right now. Forget Kirk's murder, how do you explain the long stream of MeToo, BLM, lockdowns, TransWomenAreWomen (to the point of putting rapists in women's prisons). I'm sorry, but either the majority of the Blue Tribe wholeheartedly support it, don't care either way - which is political brainrot. The only way it's not is, like I said above, if you're just too terrified of going against your own side.
We don't post on social media
Are you posting from the 00's? The entire Boomer part of my family is online and on SocMeds, most of society is.
We touch grass, talk to our friends, coworkers, and communities and otherwise live out our lives not terminally online.
We have posters here recounting stories of their families, friends, and coworkers making fun of the murder.
Your algorithm isn't going to push our content because there isn't any.
Ok let's say it's my algorithm, link a mainstream left-wing forum, where the news broke, and everybody's aghast at what happened. Note: threads that happened days after the fact, when people had the chance to think about their messaging, don't count. Immediate reacts only.
Wasn't it Scott that said 90% of posts online are from insane people?
I see no reason to take Scott seriously, especially when he says something like this.
Mildly interesting court opinion:
In year 1988, a married couple purchases a shopping center and an adjacent vacant lot. The shopping center's "anchor tenant" is a grocery store whose below-market lease of 0.77 $/ft2 was signed in 1962 and can be extended all the way to 2012, but the other tenants pay rent at the market rate.
In year 1994 the municipal government declares the two properties blighted. In year 1999 the grocery store terminates its lease. And in year 2018 the municipal government starts condemnation proceedings for the two properties. The couple does not object to the condemnation, but engages in extensive litigation regarding how much money constitutes just compensation for the taking. The couple argues that the proper valuation date is year 1994, and the judge agrees. The parties submit the question of valuation to an arbitrator.
The municipal government argues that the grocery store's below-market rent of 0.77 $/ft2 results in valuation of 2.3 M$ for the two properties at issue. The couple argues that the market rent for the grocery store was 8.5 $/ft2 and on that basis the proper valuation of the two properties is 4.8 M$. The arbitrator finds that the grocery store was so "old", "in below average condition", and "grossly substandard in size" that the market rent for the grocery store was 4.0 $/ft2, and the valuation for the two properties is 2.9 M$.
The couple appeals, arguing that the grocery store's below-market lease was irrelevant and should not have been admitted as evidence. But the appeals panel rejects that argument. The existing lease was "a fact relevant to the determination of what a willing buyer would have paid for the property in 1994".
The municipal government also appeals, arguing that the proper valuation date is 2018 rather than 1994. But the appeals panel rejects that argument as well. The law specifically states that the proper valuation date of a condemned property is the earliest of (a) when the condemning government takes possession, (b) when the condemnation proceedings begin, (c) when the condemning government takes action to "substantially affect" the condemnee's use of the property, and (d) when the property is declared blighted. Obviously, item d, which occurred in year 1994, was the earliest of these four events. The municipal government has no one but itself to blame for failing to start the condemnation proceedings until a whopping 24 years after declaring the properties blighted.
Funny excerpt from an otherwise boring court opinion:
Crosspost from >>>/k/64289538:
This has really annoyed me ever since I noticed it.
The GM's beam spray gun kind of looks like a pistol, so I'm okay with seeing it fired with one hand.
The RX-78-2 Gundam's beam rifle looks more like a rifle, and probably should be fired with two hands, but it's not quite big enough to damage my suspension of disbelief.
The Zeta Gundam's beam rifle is as tall as the fucking mobile suit! For it to be fired with one hand just looks ridiculous.
And then we reach the Ex-S Gundam's beam smart gun, which isn't any longer than the Zeta Gundam's rifle, but has enough extra heft that it finally needs to be fired with two hands even in-universe.
[Yes, I am aware that a pistol can have a rifled barrel and a long arm can be smoothbore.]
Mildly funny excerpt from a lawsuit:
No PDF is provided because the plaintiff is my father. The complaint was filed in May 2023, but discovery has been repeatedly extended from November 2024 to December 2024, September 2025, and January 2026, so no end is in sight. I am not particularly close to my father (I stumbled across this lawsuit purely on accident by looking up my last name in my state's database of cases), so I have no personal knowledge of the merits of the case. But, as the kids say nowadays, big if true.
To clarify the importance of these missing PARs: The union contract specifies (p. 38) that every employee must be rated on a three-point scale (unsatisfactory, commendable, or exceptional) on an annual basis. Generally, if your rating is at least two, then you get an automatic "step" pay increase of around 4 percent within the "range" assigned to your job (p. 170), on top of any other "across-the-board" increase that may apply (3.5 percent per year in this contract—p. 28). The meaning of a blank PAR is not mentioned in the contract, but apparently it counts as a score of one (or maybe zero, since the complaint describes it as a four-point scale rather than a three-point scale). The plaintiff in this case alleges that his bosses were intentionally depriving him of these regular raises by failing to fill out his annual PARs.
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