Xinjiang human rights violations [against the Uyghur population], aggressive naval maneuvering [in South China Sea], corporate vulture capitalism

I’m glad you have mentioned some of the biggest of my gripes, because I didn’t get to it in my original comment to keep it succinct and cohesive. And we’ll see what happens, I agree it’s not inevitable but this is like China’s best shot at world dominance through soft power that its had yet. I think certain members in the CCP have some awareness that invading Taiwan is going to, maybe counterintuitively, blow up the opportunity and the soft power credibility they built through Belt and Road.

To clarify, I think you are talking about “US companies and their lobbyists” when you say “they” here. And I agree with you.

Seriously, both large American companies and American government have adopted the attitude of “Haha we’re fucking up everyone’s lives and the world for our own benefit, watcha gonna do about it?”. That leaves the space wide open and the bar so low, that China’s government and companies can clear it and appear like decent actors, even if some of my gripes with both remain.

The non-news is that the Trump family or Trump Mobile has lied about anything one can.

The bad news is that the information on every customer that did order is easily accessible on the open internet.

The good news is that Trump Org lied about the number of people who ordered it so about 20-60x fewer people are affected than expected.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/5/20/us-and-israel-planned-to-install-ahmadinejad-as-iranian-leader-nyt-says

It was reported by NYT that Trump, Hegseth and Netanyahu’s plan for regime change was to install former Iranian President Ahmadinejad, someone with views largely aligned with the group currently in power… so it follows to me that the US-Israeli-plant Shah that many Iranians were calling for was not even part of the US’ regime change playbook. The plan reportedly fell apart after the US-Israeli jailbreak plan was to blow up Ahmadinejad’s house, injuring him in the process.

Not to mention, bombing a school full of children surely saved many civilian lives?

At this point I’m surprised he didn’t talk about the Epstein ballroom in his economic affordability speech.

raise taxes and/or cut spending, and neither are politically feasible.

See, Democrats should call for a wealth tariff. Republicans hate taxes but love(?) tariffs apparently.

Will a McDonald’s employee get it if he dies from a stroke from high cholesterol?

The offramp is to put your own party on trial for how heinous you have let it become.

I think they will become like IBM, once dominant, not dead today but pretty much irrelevant compared to what they once were.

Who knew that voting in Peter Thiel’s Protegé would bring about a billionaire surveillance society and call for a draft in service of them (and for the rest of the Epstein class, of course).

I think producing Ukrainian drone tech in Canada would be an extremely effective and cost-efficient use of defence spending here.

Smith (Premier of Alberta) cribbing Doug Ford’s (fellow Conservative Premier of Ontario) notes when she needs a new wedge issue because her current wedge issues (energy, separatism) aren’t garnering the responses and division the Alberta United Conservative Party needs to stay in power.

The files are IN the computer!

Mhm. And despite their pledge to investigate, Microslop fired four of its employees pointing it out to them. https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/society-equity/microsoft-fires-four-workers-on-site-protests-over-companys-ties-israel-2025-08-29/

He should really be collecting more than $120M in royalties from Republicans using his trademark likeness in naming the Affordable Care Act.

HON stands for Hateful and Obstinate Narcissist. Trump’s entire cabinet is that.

You should enter and leave the country with the same passport (important if your country checks passports on exit), but you can switch it up en route. Generally if you need help with something in one of the countries of your nationality you go to that embassy, for example if a disaster hits and you need to be evacuated, whichever embassy would attempt at assisting you to get to that nation.

AI has its uses, but the feeling of “being left behind because of a mental model shift” is a fiction created by AI companies burning hundreds of billions on generating FOMO instead of developing their somewhat useful technology.

You don’t have to write off AI entirely, just don’t fall for the hype.

If a Democratic President makes it in, I’d want the White House to become the Rainbow House, and the East Wing to become the MAGA Wall of Shame- memorial.