I enjoyed crypto when it was a decentralized asset that isn’t bound by monetary policy inherent in fiat shell games. Transfer fees were eh, but avoiding forex scalpers was dope.

Dumbasses who only see it as a financial instrument are what has ruined crypto. We literally had the potential for a new gold standard-esque inflationary hedge, and instead we got NFTs, rug pull scams, and a permanently bag-holding ‘investor’ class.

IAEA Director General’s Introductory Statement to the Board of Governors

…we must return to the negotiating table and for that allow IAEA inspectors… to go back to Iran’s nuclear sites and account for the stockpiles of uranium, including, most importantly, the 400kg enriched to 60%.

The Board should be aware of a letter sent to me by Foreign Minister Dr Abbas Araghchi on 13 June in which he mentions that Iran will “adopt special measures to protect our nuclear equipment and materials”.

So we went from Iran almost 100% cooperating with the JCPOA, to Trump throwing out the deal, permitting an Israeli first strike, to enriched material loose inside of a nation we just attacked…

I don’t ever, fucking ever, want to hear a Republican talking about any degree of Democrat foreign policy failures. Jfc, how does he bungle the crisis - the crisis he created - so completely?

Oh cmon, look at how hard Donny is trying to make a peace happen, he’s even saying mean things about Israel now. “No new wars”

I’m not saying you have to forget what they did or advocated for, directly or indirectly, but ffs if someone is genuinely struggling with a belief/ideology, would you rather offer them a soft landing into a much more normal and moderate position, or that they get burned publicly and are lost forever to the echo chambers?

Do we ostracize the people who may be on the boundary of genuine evolutionary self-discovery, and exploit their moment of public vulnerability for what - smug hubris for the in group who were always on the right side? Or do you accept the Klansman’s contrition and disarm that hate via genuine dialogue, and maybe potentially you too might understand their base motivations that got hijacked by political grifters. And maybe in the future their problems aren’t ignored and don’t grow to the point where it becomes a political wedge issue…?

Or y’know don’t; farm those internet karma points. Post that hot take, then shy away from the follow up dialogue and comments. Block the people you mildly disagree with, whilst chiding everyone else’s echo chamber. Pontificate without praxis in friendly spaces. Downvote the dissenter, instead of dissecting their ideas. I know I’m guilty too and it’s hard to keep yourself in check - but it’s essential to keeping both yourself intellectually honest, and your arguments firmly based in reality.

Stay classy, telling a reporter to “kill yourself” for factually reporting on Connolly publicly announcing his cancer diagnosis.

Why does the party value fealty and seniority so implicitly? There’s a place for the ‘elder statesman’ voice to share institutional wisdom and tribal knowledge, but this man cannot seriously have had more vigor and energy to pour into leadership than someone under half his age…

As soon as Winston had dealt with each of the messages, he clipped his speakwritten corrections to the appropriate copy of “The Times’ and pushed them into the pneumatic tube. Then, with a movement which was as nearly as possible unconscious, he crumpled up the original message and any notes that he himself had made, and dropped them into the memory hole to be devoured by the flames…

This process of continuous alteration was applied not only to newspapers, but to books, periodicals, pamphlets, posters, leaflets, films, sound-tracks, cartoons, photographs—to every kind of literature or documentation which might conceivably hold any political or ideological significance.

• 1984, George Orwell

Which is more disturbing; the fact that it’s increasingly hard to discern Kayfabe from grift? Or that the difference no longer matters?

Both. You can use both LiDAR and optical teaming, the technologies complement each other so you don’t fall for a Looney-Tunes ass painted wall, while the camera covers the one-dimensional recognition that LiDAR can’t.

[Tesla] removed radars from its vehicle lineup and even deactivated already installed radars in existing vehicles. This strategy has not yet been worth it since Tesla’s systems are still stuck at level 2 driver assist systems.

I love mine. Combined with adaptive cruise, it’s amazing for slowly rolling traffic, longer journeys, and stop-and-go traffic. I’m under no impression the car is ‘driving’ but having a machine take over the mental load is great and frees up that capacity for other driving tasks and/or awareness of the road.

Tesla calling that technology “Auto” anything without it being genuinely 100% autonomous should have landed someone a fat fine or jail time

Lmao they put lane-keeping assist behind a marketing-wank paywall for their already expensive EVs - something manufacturers like Subaru and Hyundai has made standard across their entire line for years now

What a sad joke this company has become, another example of failed leadership valuing yes-men and sycophancy

Dude. I can name from memory the list of war crimes and genocidal acts that Russia has done, they’re on a speed run in their aggressive war of conquest. Bucha, Mariupol, perferdy, executing PoWs, torture, the kidnapped children being raised as Russian, deliberate bombing of civilians, Russification of the Donbas, chemical weapons use, the list goes on.

But the severity is not the same. Gazans can’t seek safety in western Ukraine, they have no missile defenses, they’re being deliberately starved to death as collective punishment, and are being kept inside a war zone by complete military encirclement and occupation.

Genocide is the ultimate crime huh?

Fucking yes. I cannot believe we’re even having this argument. Nothing comes close.

Or the genocide starting in America of people with skin the same color as I have

I am absolutely not trying to downplay the barbarity and wanton cruelty of the Trump administration’s policies, but what we’ve seen so far doesn’t match the definition. Extrajudicial disappearances and zero due process for perceived or actual migrants is not the same thing as genocide. There’s no forced sterilization, rote murder, mass displacement, or deliberate attempt to destroy a collective people. CECOT is an overseas concentration camp, not a death camp - yet.

I literally cannot find anything about “forum sliding” that isn’t re-re-re-reposts of the same text - and they’re almost universally tinfoil hat or ‘freethinker’ faux intellectual dross. If you’re that paranoid go read my comment history, it’s all public lol

If you want to live in a hugboxed information bubble where your ideas never get challenged, you can do that. But reality will come crashing through eventually.

You and everyone who repeats the “I hope you’re happy now” really are not helping. You’re mad, I’m mad, but please please get your fill of catharsis/smug self righteousness elsewhere please, blaming non/voters isn’t going to rebuild the Obama coalition that delivered a supermajority in Congress. The Democrats lost the youth turnout, Palestine (Russian/astroturf bots or no) were not the sole factor but a sharp tipping point that laid out reality bare.

Im not at all surprised that young voters who became politically aware during the Obama era or later were gradually disenchanted and sat this round out; when you look at it from their timeline they did all the right democracy things and got shit on over and over

• Organic enthusiasm for Bernie in the primary, sabotaged by superdelegates - your vote doesn’t matter, we pick not you plebs and in their mind that action brought Trump 2016
• George Floyd’s livestreamed murder and BLM protests - no structural change or even federal police reform passed
• The kids yet again come out and do the right thing by voting Biden in 2020, and watch more politicking and focus-tested soft liberalism rule the day. Rail strike busted. East Palestine spill without serious investigation or reform. Debt ceiling negotiations and kowtowing - everything will stay the same
• Oct 7 happens, then the Israeli bombing campaign begins and Biden openly castigates activists and doubles down on supplying the IDF - how dare you plebs question your leader
• Protests persist, organize and clearly make their demands known, even send a warning shot in the primary… receiving only empty words from leadership - they are not going to do what you want
• The DNC platforms two Jewish parents of a Hamas hostage at the convention, but refuses to allow a Dem Rep to speak with pre-vetted remarks - we don’t even want to hear from you

And nothing substantial happened that might change their mind. Kamala rode that same trajectory through her campaign, even as VP she had a harder stance on Israel that suddenly evaporated once she was appointed the nominee.

Its genocide - the crime of all crimes - and the Democratic Party refused to seriously discuss the topic in public. I cannot seriously blame them for giving up on a party that refused to listen to them in good faith, and disappointed them time after time. That’s on the DNC for throwing that demographic away, and we need to recognize that. They’re not voting for Republicans ffs but they’ve received the message that they and their vote, isn’t important to the Democrats.

It’s a shit spot to be in, as basically all of them work cases in federal court. If your lawyers are physically prevented entry to federal property because some orange buffoon bans the entire firm by the stroke of a pen, that law firm is completely impotent and unable to argue in federal cases, even those that don’t end up in a courtroom. Judges chambers, pre-trial motions, informal meetings, etc all are impossible or vastly more difficult.

It was a very targeted and deliberate move to put these firms in a lose:lose scenario - give an absurd amount of pro-bono work to your abuser, or wither and die as your clients are forced to move to another firm:

The orders threatened to bar attorneys from where they work, courthouses and federal agencies and cancel the contracts of law firm clients. For example, an aerospace company could lose its federal contracts if it stayed with the firm. A senior partner at one firm told us the president’s orders were, quote, “diabolical.” “Intended to bankrupt [us].”

I have worked professionally with Chinese vendors and suppliers for years, both pre and post COVID. China offers the whole range of manufacturing, not just cheap labor but high tech and precision devices too. You want cheap injection molded toys for Happy Meals? Done. Precision machine tools for CNC? Can do. Medical imaging devices? No problem. Mass assembly of automotive cable looms? Easy. If a business wants quality product from China they can do it.

And much like the classic European model where a textile or steel industry would collect in a valley for logistic/resource reasons and organically form an industrial ‘core’ the same is true in China, but with a centralized planned economy. Vocational schools feed local industry with skilled workers like engineers or tool and die makers, so that region experiences further and further specialization and conglomeration.

There’s no coherent or comparable manufacturing:educational alliance in the US, closest we have is ‘feeder schools’ that partner with individual industrial/scientific giants on an ad-hoc basis.

Why patch out a bug that’s working in our favor?

In any other presidential term, that can be a fair assessment only a few months in. The economy can be compared to a Panamax oil tanker - it moves with huge momentum and can’t be steered quickly.

But this tariffs nonsense detonated a bomb below the waterline. You may not be able to steer the ship quickly, but deliberate sabotage can absolutely cripple it and spread damage everywhere. Quarterly 401(k) statements are being sent out, plus it’s tax season, so people are very in touch with how this is impacting them and their money

Marco Rubio suicide watch has been sooo cathartic during this administration. The Zelenskyy blowup especially - after decades of waiting and maneuvering, deal brokering and sycophancy, he finally has the job where he can ‘outshine’ Kissinger… and the wave he’s riding is with these idiotic blowhards.

Commit to renewables. I’d advocate for a nuclear powered off-ramp from fossils whilst renewable capacity and infrastructure is built, but I get that each nation has its own history with fission.

Energy security is fundamental for a robust society and economy - otherwise you’re subject to pipeline shutoffs/attacks, oil embargoes/quotas, or another angle for outside nations to influence or control you. For example, if you’re chill with the French and build your economic strategy around buying their surplus energy, that strategy predicated on the French having a surplus to sell you.

That’s American, Jewish voters surveyed last fall. 68% support land swaps, an independent Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders, Palestinian return from the diaspora, and financial/population restitution.

A lot of regular people get swept up into the default of supporting the concept of Israel and protecting the lives of the 6-7 million Jews living there, but the topic has so many land mines and risks of misunderstanding that people don’t delve into the topic openly. But if you look for it, there’s a lot of silence from folks who are uneasy about the direction Israel is headed.