Thanks, yes, that’s the 3 second summary. Lots of foreign aid never does anything for the intended recipients and can actually prolong their suffering and deprive them of meaningful work while keeping the POS small coalition ruling class in power. It basically provides a free pass for the shitheads to keep them in power and is a way to buy loyalty to policies beneficial for the lending nation, but not for the recipient nation.

I didn’t…sorry. I’ll delete my comments.

Not really. It’s easy enough to find at the library, Libby, or PDF via Google search. Probably even archive.org has it. My question was intended for the author, anyway. I still recommend everyone find and read that book, though.

Edit: sorry for being snippy. I haven’t eaten in 42 hours and I was about to be sedated for a medical procedure and my blood sugar is low and the book itself is really worth a read and I was worried I wouldn’t do it justice with a brief rushed summary.

Curious to hear your thoughts about Chapter 7 of The Dictator’s Handbook by Bueno de Mesquita and Smith.

Puppetrump

I like to think of it as Canadish.

You have lucky kids :)

Sorry, but unless you REALLY want to be a parent, parenthood can be its own special kind of hell. Subtract social support, or even exacerbate it with a society unafraid to be hostile or cold toward children, or, more likely, parents, in public spaces, and it’s a recipe for childlessness. While the children can, and do, offer special and genuine comfort and joy, they also bring a relentless onslaught of tedium and obligations. Some people live for it and can’t imagine a life without it, and good for them, but others, especially the reluctant parent to an enthusiastic, or perhaps just momentarily naive, partner, have trouble living with it. It’s hard for me to fathom what a single reluctant or resentful parent must feel.

If a society wants net positive reproduction, it really needs to step up its incentive and support structures, otherwise the responsibility of producing for the most naturally self-centered beings in existence within a selfishly competitive society just isn’t worth it. Just my own cynical opinion as a reluctant, and probably pootly suited, parent. And I don’t at all intend to sound judgy toward children for being self-centered; I recognize it’s a normal stage of development, which does help take some of the edge off of it as a recipient.

I have next-to-zero basis to judge a sinocentric view of reproduction or child rearing, as I’m in a completely different part of the world and whose time in China is better counted in hours than days or weeks.

Honest question - are Canadians generally fine with normal US citizens with no untoward agenda still coming to visit and shop in Canada? I love partaking in the cuisine, a museum, and a library in a relatively nearby border town. Especially the more ethnically-diverse cuisine, because shitty generic Americana fare gets tiresome. Canadian Tire is fun, too, although I do secretly wonder why it’s not Canadian Tyre. Curious to know if US plates on a car in Canada generate a negative response nowadays.

Also, I’m sorry about the reality for which I felt the need to ask this question.

Rubio told Sikorski: “No one has made any threats about cutting Ukraine off from Starlink. And say thank you because without Starlink, Ukraine would have lost this war long ago and Russians would be on the border with Poland right now.”

In fact, Russians are already on the border with Poland because the Russian region of Kaliningrad lies on Poland’s northern border.

“Say thank you” - Marco

What is it with MAGAsites demanding thanks from everyone?

He meant a concept of a plan.

Possibly related…

Source

Tim Urban put his established “accessible intellectual blogger” credibility behind some truly convincing pro-Musk propaganda pieces on Wait But Why back in ~2015 or so, which at the time were inspiring and felt very believable for people searching for signs of an improving future. For me, Musk fell hard from that grace during the Thailand cave rescue when he attacked that British caver in the most absolutely childish way. I really resent that Urban hasn’t gone back to readdress those old blog posts, but maybe he’s just another paid shill.

Consolidation of power to a tiny coalition of privileged cronies with conditional impunity as long as they backed the leader. That’s not “conservative” or “liberal” or “right” or “left.” It’s just…autocratic. Have you read The Dictator’s Handbook by Bueno de Mesquita and Smith? It’s a very illuminating reference and eschews the entire argument of “left vs right” in favor of a ruling-coalition size relative to the ruled population model and it appears to be quite accurate in predicting and explaining the behavior of politicians and rulers, Hitler included.