I understand what you were going for with this comment but I think you wildly missed the mark.

I don’t expect presidents to be knowledgeable on all subjects either. I expect leaders to surround themselves with experts as well, but Trump has a long history of disagreeing with and firing his advisors and staff whenever he is wrong. This isn’t because he was in real estate, it’s because he is a narcissist and treats learning as a bruise to the ego.

I expect heads of state to take the time to know why they are visiting a place or attending an event. For all the planning and preparation for the tour and the ridiculous travel time to get to Hawaii from the east coast, you expect me to believe that the President couldn’t be bothered to at least look it up on Wikipedia? Not even considering that the president doesn’t just show up randomly at places.

Didn’t look it up, didn’t ask before hand, didn’t listen to any briefing, didn’t pay attention to where he was going. This isn’t because his background is in real estate, it’s because he is a selfish, inconsiderate, ignorant fool.

And for the record, I’d expect the president of the Union to at least understand the importance of Gettysburg.

I think strategically used tariffs (i.e. used in trade negotiations for specific sectors or items, not unilateral tariffs) can convince a country to export items at a price that benefits one country more than the other, usually in tandem with an agreement to reciprocate. Basically, countries agree to trade at certain rates or exclusively sell. Tariffs are the “bad cop” of trade negotiations.

The tariff isn’t what lowers the price, it’s the threat of the tariff that lowers the price or keeps it stable.

Imagine Canada exports maple widgets at $10 a piece to reflect the true cost of manufacture. The US says that is too high, our people can’t afford that price once it’s on the shelves, so how about you export them for $8? To sweeten the deal, we’ll export freedom widgets to you at reduced cost.

Canada responds saying $8 for maple widgets is too low, $10 is firm and we’ll deal with the current cost of freedom widgets. The US threatens a targeted tariff on maple widgets at 25% which doesn’t affect the price of maple widgets in Canada or their sale price to importers in the US, but importers in the US have to pay $2.50 in tax on top of the purchase cost for maple widgets which drives up the cost for US consumers.

This results in the price of the item increasing in the US $4.50 over the price determined to be “affordable” which will result in reduced imports and reduced purchases of maple widgets by consumers. Canada now has to find somewhere else to sell their maple widgets since the US isn’t buying at the same rate which drives down the value of maple widgets in Canada.

And if the US was feeling particularly vengeful at being denied their cheap steady supply of maple widgets, they could convince other countries to not buy Canadian widgets at all or impose a blanket ban on all Canadian goods (see: how the US obliterated the economy of Cuba because of “communism” which was really just Cuba not wanting to be the US’s sugar plantation anymore).

Canada will evaluate this and determine that selling maple widgets is essential to their economy and less profit for their maple widget industry is an agreeable trade compared to the US not buying at all.

but surely him rising again is more important than his death?

Depends on how fixated a faith is on the “sacrifice of the Lamb.” There’s one interpretation that Jesus’ suffering and death is what appeased God and fulfilled the prophecy and ended the law of Moses. If you’re the kind of person that buys into God being the sort of deity that wants to kill himself in order to satisfy his own bloodlust, then yeah, I could see Christ’s death being the more important part.

Surely the resurrection should be emphasized as the result, but the death is what God demanded to atone for the sins of the world. The resurrection was just proof that he held up his end of the bargain.

I think that the Christ story suffers from the audience knowing details about the story that the characters don’t to the point that the big miracle at the end falls flat. Everyone just ends up focusing on the mechanics of Christs death rather than its purpose.

I like your perspective and wish Christianity aligned more with your post than whatever it’s doing now.

I’m not Christian, but I have observed that the worship of the cross and Christ’s death is directly tied to the theological idea of salvation, especially with evangelicals. If his death is the single most important part of your faith, then the cross becomes a symbol and reminder that you’re saved and not going to hell. It was primed to become a symbol and eventually an idol.

I also think historically the cross as a symbol for Christianity comes from the Greek letter chi (x) in the spelling of Christ. “X-tians” was a shorthand form way before the “taking Christ out of Christmas” nonsense.

But to the original point of the Klan burning the cross: I’ve read that they argue that cross burning is a medieval European affirmation of faith, something that is doing double duty of arguing that it’s an expression of their faith and connecting them to their “racial” roots.

I know this. You know this. The judges know this. The jury knows this.

This does damage by subjecting the teachers to suspensions, trials, legal fees, etc. to the point that they take a plea bargain or resign. It makes the schools hyper-sensitive.

If the courts don’t throw these cases out immediately, then the tactic worked.

The New Colossus was released during Trump’s first term and it was really cathartic to play during the shit storm. The game even pissed off the “alt-right.” The New Order and The Old Blood are much better at “endless destruction of Nazis” though.

Might be time to reinstall and play through them again.

How many people comply without being physically forced is what determines how much power he truly has.

That’s why the reduction of protections for federal employees was so important to implementing this phase. A lot of people have already been fired or reassigned which makes it really difficult for them to “do” anything.

Right on. I was just outlining how they’d probably make it personal against the teachers.

It works like this:

• Teach at a public school
• That school receives funding directly or indirectly from federal programs under the executive branch, including the Department of Education
• DEI support disqualifies institutions from receiving Federal funds
• Supporting DEI and trans rights while receiving Federal funds counts as defrauding the US government
• DOJ takes up the case

While EOs are not laws, they have the potential to do massive amounts of damage because most of the government runs on agencies under control of the Executive. And while universities and public schools are not federal, they receive shit tons of funds through grants, contracts, and subsidies from a wide array of federal agencies (see: academic panic at the NSF and NIH halting grant review and funding as a result of Trump’s recent orders).

Is this enshittification or the convergence of objects into the same design due to regulation/demand/function/etc. (I’m sure there’s a name for this but I can’t recall it)?

Cell phones are certainly enshittified with planned obsolescence or incompatible text messaging protocols or ‘walled gardens’, but what else should a cell phone be besides a cellular networked pocket computer with a camera?

What features (besides a dedicated headphone jack) is missing from a modern cell phone that your old one had?

Baudrillard’s notion of hyperreality comes to mind.

Hyperreality is the inability of consciousness to distinguish reality from a simulation of reality.

However, after thinking up some doom and gloom shit about the future, I reversed course: Why speculate about future kids when most of us grew up with a manipulative media diet? Saturday morning cartoons were wildly manipulative, the emergence of social media damaged a lot of people’s expectation of reality, and the last three election cycles in the US were heavily impacted by the ability of certain populists to generate memes.

AI will speed up the content generation process and introduce some absurd elements like six-fingered watch models, but I don’t think it will be more manipulative than media already is, just weirder and faster.

My ultimately positive forecast: the kids of the future will create their own networked spaces outside of the mainstream internet and just continue on with their lives ignoring what doesn’t interest them and seeking out what does. Regardless, we’ll never understand it anyway.

Wow, what a terrible design. My experience with QMK- powered keyboards didn’t let my mind entertain the thought of that being controlled externally from the board. I knew people shit on Razer and other “gamer” products but I always chalked it up to aesthetics and advertising gimmicks.

True, but I’d take a bluish/purplish white over ever having to desolder a through-switch led ever again.

Even a RGB board should have controls for color, brightness, and pattern. Shouldn’t be too difficult to turn it off or adjust the color to something more natural.

That said, none of the keyboards I currently own and use have anything more than an indicator LED.

The movie juxtaposes the ideal against the dysfunctional and highlights pressures of playing a social and familial role through comedy.

The main character is inherently flawed and is trying to give his family an ideal Christmas. He’s caught up in petty neighborly disputes, things go awry, and he’s an asshole. He wants to provide and be a good father and husband but his expectations are set too high and naturally he fails. He is morally weak and is easily distracted by lust or rivalry.

He just wants things to go as planned for once and not to be burdened by unwanted and embarrassing family members. He just wants things to be “normal” and for people to recognize his hard work and dedication.

People in this thread have pointed out that it’s difficult to empathize with the character because of his perceived wealth and the plot point of needing the Christmas bonus to cover money he over spent on a down payment for a pool.

However, for all of his toxic behaviors, his disproportionate reactions, his un-relatable lifestyle, his pettiness, his stress, his inability to let things go, he is familiar; he’s us. He wants to be happy but has no idea how to make that happen for himself. His heart is in the right place but that’s not enough.

There’s catharsis in watching him experience exaggerated depictions of what a lot of people experience around the holidays: you can’t choose your family and the world is typically against you. His final stress-fueled blowup and monologue at the end is a summary of the dumb shit the audience has always wanted to say but never been able to.

At least, that’s what I think the post is about.

And the ‘it’s just a flu!’ people pissed me the fuck off.

I think many people haven’t actually had the flu or have had it after a vaccination or a during mild year.

That shit is awful, and it can and has killed. Hell, 100 years before COVID there was the 1918 Flu Epidemic which killed nearly three times as many people as COVID. So when some chucklefuck prattles on about “it’s just the flu,” my response is always, “that doesn’t make it safer.”

This take is infuriating because it completely ignores the unobvious homeless (or unhoused). If homeless equates to “drug zombie,” then you can say shit like “this person chose to be homeless so they could do drugs” or “they deserve what they get because of drugs” or some other awful sentiment I can’t articulate. It completely erases homelessness because of bigotry, domestic abuse, low wages, lack of opportunity, etc.

And to top it off, Musk can literally afford to never go to the places where you’d most likely see his version of the homeless.

I’ve experienced the language skills of Nederlanders first hand! What I found to be most striking was hearing people having trilingual conversations especially in restaurants where the waitstaff were actively communicating individually with dozens of people in two to three languages.

I’ve tried to keep up with language skills but starting a language in high school or college just didn’t work for me. Especially since the application of those skills prioritizes written communication. I always end up with an understanding of pronunciation, some grammar, and a handful of vocabulary that I can’t actively use.

I don’t think any Americans are judging you too harshly for UK spellings. I think keeping track of all the slang and colloquialisms would be the greater challenge. I was taught “grey” and “colour” as a kid and the only problem I have is with spellcheck. 😂

That’s one way to do it!

I had problems with TSA before because my real ID confused them and they didn’t believe it was a valid US ID. Granted, this was at a regional airport, but it’s literally the ID that complies with requirements set by Homeland Security for the specific purpose of use in airports by TSA.

Edit: and my ID isn’t even from New Mexico!