Among the wealthy there will always be the search for the rare and exotic. I’m not surprised that this has become some kind of distorted 'destination"

I had hope that this would be a blip of an assault and a ceasefire would be brokered. Now, it feels almost certain that one of the most cursed regions in the world is going to be plunged into a civil war without a clear justification, and where everyone loses.

Fascinating. This is way more buttoned up and controlled than I thought it would be.

Great article. If Morocco’s claim is rejected, what’s stopping Algeria from trying to step into that power vacuum? Does Western Sahara have any sort of organized military that could resist against armed conflict over its resources?

I wouldn’t be surprised if we just saw the region become a capitalism pseudo-country, with US/China coming in to buy off the resources.

Hilariously, this fine is probably not even large enough for them to spin off a shell company and declare bankruptcy on the debts. They’ll just shrug and move on. Toothless.

That’s the best question. Clarence Thomas shouldn’t have been able to openly flaunt his corruption for decades, but he has. Is this just going to be more firm hand-wringing by the Dems with no enforcement mechanism whatsoever? At that point, it would be better to just recognize the court as illegitimate in the public eye as opposed to giving the false sense that it is in anyway ethical.

Any third party player is a negative to Biden right now, even if it is “just” Manchin.

The election is won and lost on the 10% of independents within purple states, and this ‘coalition’ would batter left-leaning independents with ads

Great article. Insightful and over a longer time horizon than I expected

I’m a fan of Connect. It goes a good job with the material you design language. Once the Sync for Lemmy is released, I’ll bounce over to that app. Overall, I’ve been very pleased with Lemmy. It doesn’t have the volume of content to the more niche fringes, but it scratches the itch all the same, and I don’t have to feel as gross doing it.

Smart on KIA, then.

Does this help qualify them for some of the Inflation Reduction Act credits, or is that tied specifically to where the battery materials are sourced from?

Pretty easy to see that this will lead to immediate short-term gains but long-term pain. I can’t tell you the amount of infinite loops I’ve found myself in with AI chat, even among the most simplistic questions.

I am pessimistic that he is “stuck”. Billions and billions and billions of dollars are rarely stuck. The demographics are changing, but not nearly enough so that a D win is inevitable. That, paired with some of the structural victories he already has achieved (redistricting, conservative supreme court) make me believe that we are going to see his legacy continue for decades on. Dark.

I would be absolutely shocked if this wasn’t just smoke and mirrors marketing.

I genuinely hope so. I know that not all hope is lost, but some days the relentless march of climate change articles – Vermont thousand year flood! Phoenix, 99 degree overnight low! is crushing.

Boring

Why do you have a pet dinosaur?

I support this. While the GOP base continues to shrink and die off, the Dems are doing no favors but continuing to make a vast swath of voters feel unrepresented. I was 18 when Obama came around in his first run and I felt represented then. I don’t think I’ve felt represented personally since then.

This is not an endorsement of the GOP. Just an echoing of the general feeling of invisibility.

No governor exemplifies “The cruelty is the point” more than DeSantis. Most GOP governors will provide all of the public talking points but still do what benefits some of their constituents when the window is open. Desantis is a different (worse) breed.

Progress is still progress, even if it’s just slow incremental work to move back to pre-Trump norms.