My only concern about all of this is that Fallon’s Ben and Jerry’s ice cream flavor is the best one! I can also groove on Colbert’s but Fallon’s is the best. Don’t cancel Fallon’s ice cream please!
What about The Pimps who push the weak to do the dirty work for them
your military industrial complex has never had it this good, proxy wars without local push backs, no western blood shed so even the antiwar crowd has gone silent in the west.
Peace at all costs has a price that should not be paid
The sane part of the anti war crowd knows that there have been peace settlements with Russia but that they don’t last. Settling with Russia is just giving them time to re-arm
So, explain to me how Elon should not be considered a strategic target now? He is materially supporting the Ruzzians by killing innocent civilians. He cannot be ignored at this point.
It seems he should be considered an obvious target by anyone who wishes to support the Ukranian defense. Maybe someone close enough to him supports Ukraine and will see a moral obligation (and opportunity) to defend Ukraine.
Russia is a sanctioned nation with a public history of cyber attacks and false flag attacks on Americans. They also openly meddled in the 2016 and 2020 elections (thank fuck they didn’t pull 2020 successfully).
Providing aid and comfort to Russian military and political figures is explicitly treason.
I’m amazed US DOD hasn’t torn him a new asshole considering they’re now paying to use Starlink in Ukraine. Musks ability to decide how Starlink should be used is a clear security risk.
Agreed! At this point, the DoD would be ignorant to not prioritize their own development of an LEO network. Once in place, they could dislodge or remove any of Elon’s floating shitballs to prioritize the safe operation of their own, citing national security. Fuck Elon.
100% agreed, billionaires should not exist. It’s absolutely disgusting that they do. They’ll take and take and take and take some more. If you haven’t seen it yet, please check out this site visualizing Jeff Bezos’ wealth. These people believe that they owe nothing to a society that gave them the tools, infra, security, and workforce for their companies to succeed. The level of excess is really unfathomable, and this chart is like Power of Ten for helping you understand the difference in a few zeros.
Starlink is a great system. The problem is its idiot owner, Musk, who is more worried how the use of Starlink in the Ukraine is going to affect his company stock. You’re in the big leagues now, Elmo. You cant “sort of” commit to a war unless you’re a rich Saudi dilettante, who wants to try his hand at international shiat-stirring.
Musk didn’t allow it. Full stop. It’s not so,e government sanction thing.
Even quotes you reference are from Musk, himself, sharing why he decided so. Musk said he chose not to activate it because he’d be apart of escalating the war…
What against US policy? Escalating the war? We already are sending tons of military equipment, some used in counter offensives.
Post the link and full article you got that from, I’d like to read but many of the links are pay walled.
Here’s what I read from one of the links you referenced, I would think Musk would say it’s against US policy if that’s the reason he chose not to activate Starlink
“There was an emergency request from government authorities to activate Starlink all the way to Sevastopol,” Musk wrote on X, the platform previously known as Twitter.
“The obvious intent being to sink most of the Russian fleet at anchor. If I had agreed to their request, then SpaceX would be explicitly complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation,” Musk wrote.
An excerpt about the raid from American author and journalist Walter Isaacson’s upcoming biography on Musk, titled “Elon Musk,” was published by CNN. Ukrainian submarine drones loaded with explosives were approaching a Russian naval fleet in the Crimean city of Sevastopol when they lost connection and “washed ashore harmlessly,” according to Isaacson.
Musk was concerned about Russia responding to the naval attack with a nuclear weapon, Isaacson wrote in the book, according to CNN. Ukrainian officials
You can check the list of sanctions imposed on Ukraine/Russia, which regions, types of activity and subjects, along with the exceptions and licenses at:
You may notice that US citizens have been forbidden from providing telecommunications services, including via satellite, in the conflict areas since early 2022, requiring a special license to operate.
Starlink didn’t have such license, and only got a DoD agreement in mid 2023.
In late 2022, Musk would’ve had to break that policy in order to allow the drones to be controlled into the conflict zone.
As for him saying so… I don’t think he’s the type to paint himself as subservient to the government, even if he is; more like the megalomaniac type claiming to have stopped WW3 barehanded, even if he literally did nothing.
It is a little incredulous that somehow only you have figured out the real reason Musk didn’t activate Starlink.
With so many articles coming out, no officials making a statement, hell even a biographer shadowing Musk at the time. Even Musk gives alternate reasons and doesn’t say it, even if it would save him from a lot of bad press.
Great example of people downvoting the truth away. The spectacle of American politics can no longer address material truths, outside of merely referencing good or bad actors.
Elon’s negative image is proof because he used to be widely considered as someone solving the climate crisis through free market capitalism, but the truth is he never changed and has always been this way, and the system he operates in where people need cars is the problem.
It’s also a given that Americans are blind or refuse to acknowledge the effects of their government’s sanctions on the world, the private business interests that benefit, and the way they exploit people like themselves in other countries and use them as pawns.
All this is going to do is waste money on lawsuits that could be used to benefit the people.
When in reality this won’t do anything to slow down crime in Albuquerque. The most murders done in Albuquerque is by the police. Targeting legal gun owners won’t stop criminals from carrying firearms. Weaponizing the health system to deny constitutional rights really worked out well in the past.
I’m so glad I moved in 2020 from a city/county that is fine with police burning kids alive in their homes because they think a criminal is inside.
Targeting legal gun owners won’t stop criminals from carrying firearms.
I hate this talking point. You could say that about practically any law. “Targeting legal car owners won’t stop criminals from drunk driving” or even “targeting factories won’t stop some of them from criminally polluting.” That’s not the point. The point is to add charges once they’re caught to maximize their sentence.
It’s already illegal to carry a firearm and commit a crime…you wanting to make it double illegal? No this talking point is exactly that, a spot on assessment that laws like this only attack the law abiding gun owners. That’s exactly what they’re designed for, to create more criminals.
This is great if you assume all gun carriers are going to commit a crime with their gun.
The problem is this order can be used to attack people who are otherwise doing nothing wrong, who might be caring explicitly because they want to protect themselves from the crime wave this order is trying to address.
Things like: Universal health care, stronger worker protections, better welfare support, better maternal/paternal assistance.
People making enough money to support themselves, aren’t in constant danger of layoffs just to boost profits, can access physical and mental healthcare cheaply, aren’t financially ruined because they have a baby and new a few months off work, and aren’t in danger of losing everything over an emergency room visit aren’t out committing violent crimes.
Focusing on “gun” violence ignores the root cause of violent crimes regardless of the weapon of choice.
I didn’t say those were problems to distract from gun violence. I said those things are a solution to violence more broadly. And as a bonus, those social nets help everyone while not violating this country’s fundamental rights.
And I’ve pointed to strong solutions to help being us in line with other nations. Adding more violations to our constitutional rights is not something I support.
Why do you think there are laws prohibiting the possession of certain items or substances at all? I mean, why should a law abiding citizen owning a bomb, a sample of smallpox virus or a few pounds of heroin be a problem? Crimnals will get them anyhow and if they use them, it`s already illegal. Why is driving while intoxicated illegal? Wouldn’t it be sufficient if only causing an accident while drunk driving would be illegal? That would certainly be way easier and cheaper to police. Why do we have building codes? Unless the house collapses or blows up, nothing bad has happemed yet.
But the additional laws take away rights from the law abiding only. The simple solution is to enforce the laws already on the books to the full extent.
These laws only harm the lawful exercising their constitutional rights! Prosecutors will add these on but not to maximize a sentence rather to make it easier to get the bad guy to plead at the cost of not filing on some of the additional charges. Just fully enforce the laws on the books already.
I don’t know about every states gun laws or which laws you might be referring to but I feel it’s a safe bet to say that laws that pertain to crimes committed while using a firearm have not been weakened in very many places.
What may have been weakened are laws that restrict law abiding citizens from using firearms lawfully.
The laws are not “weakened” so much as pleaded down to less time or lesser charges. Prosecutors do this to get an easy “win” and clear cases from their dockets. There are a lot of gun laws that I agree with but more that I disagree that they solve any of the current problems. Again, enforce what is already law and leave the good people alone.
Don’t get me wrong, violence is horrible and should be stopped but as a realist I promise that it never will.
Targeting legal gun owners won’t stop criminals from carrying firearms.
Please compare the percentage of crimes commited with a firearm versus all crimes commited for the US and countries that have functioning laws limiting private gun ownership. In Germany (population about 80.000.000) in 2022 there were about 200,000 “crimes against personal freedoms” (this number is probably too low because I only added the numbers for the two main types of these crimes). In about 4500 cases (of all crimes) a gun was used to threaten somebody and in about 4000 cases (of all crimes) a shot was fired. So in the overwhelming majority of violent crimes (about 96%) no guns were used.
I agree with you, but for different reasons. I also think it’s an overreach to target everyone carrying guns, whether they are legal or not.
It’s the legal equivalent of calling “Time Out”. But it has to be enforceable, and I don’t see how this can possibly be enforceable, even if the local authorities wanted to enforce it. People who want to do dumb things with their firearms aren’t going to be deterred by this temporary measure. So it can only be enforced after someone does something irresponsible, and won’t do anything at all to prevent things and solve the problem the Governor is trying to solve. But you can be sure that the “Demoncrats want to take away your guns!!!” crowd will be citing this for the next 20 years. I bet they can use the Governor’s statements on this directly in campaign ads, just like the Biden campaign did with that MTG speech.
The only saving grace here is that this emergency measure is temporary, but we’ve seen this movie before…
Can’t we just agree that religions that teach women are subservient to men should be opposed? A concept of religious freedom that gives parents/fathers the right to compel observance on their children under threat of beatings or death is a fucked up sense of freedom. I don’t blame France for trying to protect their secular society by banning religiously-derived garb in public schools - removing the power of parents to dictate such garb gives kids a chance early on to make up their own mind - do they like the freedom from family-mandated othering they experience at school, or do they like displaying that they are subserviant to men when compelled by their family?
People keep saying this edgy take but that’s impossible. As long as strong beliefs are held true by many individuals, there will always be a religion. Pastafarianism is a great example of an “anti-religion” that promotes the positive morals without the need for a deity (or the flying spaghetti monster as a joke), but in doing so, it ironically became a religion in itself.
Your take is edgy and divisive, despite intent. Even religions accept deity independent good depending on interpretation (God commands good because he or she observes it is good, the good isn’t arbitrarily good because he or she commands it). But I agree, folks don’t like to acknowledge the good religion has historically done in equal measure with the bad. Nuance matters. History is not black and white. So let’s not be black and white on religion generally being good or bad.
Yea, I’m an atheist myself, but I only choose to be this way after learning about the world and other religions. I’m not about to shatter my grandma’s reality that there’s no God. It’s all about respect at the end of the day.
Exactly. At the end of the day do we care why someone agrees to do something or that something should be permissible, or just that they agree to do something or that something is permissible. I don’t care whether or not someone thinks rape or murder is wrong because God commands it or because they have a different moral basis. It’s important that we agree that behavior is wrong.
Do they do it BECAUSE they lack religion? Or is that an irrelevant detail you’re cherrypicking because it suits your argument?
People commit terrible acts because of their belief in sky fairies. Do people commit terrible acts because they don’t believe in sky fairies? (Hint: no)
A concept of religious freedom that gives parents/fathers the right to compel observance on their children under threat of beatings or death is a fucked up sense of freedom. I don’t blame France for trying to protect their secular society by banning religiously-derived garb in public schools
Parents telling their daughters what to wear is wrong, so the state must intervene and tell the daughters to wear something that I personally find more agreeable.
How about we all just stop telling women what they can and can’t wear?
Because school children are not adults, religious parents that believe females are subservient to men will continue to compel their children to comply. Then, suddenly, instead of the Catholic Church impinging on all aspects of society, you have islamic groups impinging on all aspects of society - same game, different religion. France is a secular society and fought hard to get that way.
So what about the grown adult women that want to wear a hijab? You take away their agency with laws ‘to protect the children’ (where have I heard that excuse to control people before?)
I actually went to school with girls that wore the hijab. I asked them why they wore it, some said because their dad made them and others said it kept grown adult men from trying to hit on them on the bus.
If you want to help the girls who’s fathers or husbands are forcing them to wear a hijab, then you should create a society where women don’t have to be dependent on financial support from family members and they can make the decision themselves, rather then forcing them to dress like you personally want.
Grown adult women aren’t allowed to wear a hijab in public school either. Girls and women are perfectly free to wear whatever they want/are forced to wear by the men in their lives, outside of public schools.
Blaming religion is not the answer. In fact Islam came to erase the practice of killing girls that was prominent in the region. Additionally, both Quran and Islamic teaching makes it very clear that killing any soul is a no no except for war or crimes.
So where this killing came from ? I am not sure but considering it exists in many countries and between religious and non-religious groups sugget it is something else. I would assume it is the tribal culture and poor living conditions.
I’m sorry, but this is incredibly misleading. Islam’s definition of crimes that are punnishable by death includes things like apostasy. We shouldn’t pretend that changing one’s mind or disagreeing with a religion that was chosen for you is a crime.
I dated a non-observant Muslim girl who in college who kept my existence a secret because she was terrified of her father finding out she was dating a non-Muslim. Her father was “traditional” basically went to mosque on big holidays. But she was still absolutely madly panicked about him finding out about me.
Things I learned: a lot of ex-Muslims keep calling themselves Muslims because they’re afraid; a lot of “cultural Muslims” exist that are sort of like cultural Catholics — all the guilt, none of the belief; and that there isn’t really “progressive Islam” the way there is “progressive Christianity”—all flavors of modern islam that have enough adherents to matter are fundamentalist, it’s just a matter of degree. There’s no group of consequence that thinks the Koran is just a revered book or thinks that their way is but one of many to connect with the divine, etc.
I’ve known many tolerant Muslims. I’ve also known how afraid they have been of their families finding out how there tolerance informs their behavior, and how badly it works out for them when their families do find out.
Oppose behaviors and actions. Religion is messy. There are so many different interpretations with differences of denomination and sect. Don’t oppose religion. Oppose the concrete human actions and the people that support and promote those actions. If those people are religious leaders, so be it.
…in an effort to force the Biden administration’s defense department to rescind a policy of leave and expense reimbursement for service members and their dependents traveling for abortions.
I can only assume this is for bases that don’t have the means to just do it themselves. I was a surgical tech in the Air Force, and every hospital I was stationed at provided abortion services.
The VA does, too.
Cuz abortion services ARE FUCKING HEALTHCARE. You want to destroy a service member’s mission readiness? Give them a kid they can’t support.
You don’t want to pay service members to travel for abortions? Fine. Fine. Equip and staff every single military base with an OBGYN clinic w/ surgical capabilities. Don’t want to give them med leave to recover from an abortion? Fucking FINE. Schedule a uteroscopy and biopsy along with it so we can throw in a cancer screen, nab any polyps, ablate any endometriosis, etc; and give them extra leave for those, cuz damn was that one a bleeder! She’ll need extra time to recover for sure!!
Then declare a state of emergency in the Y’all Qaeda infested regions of the US on the basis of denied healthcare leading to the current and worsening humanitarian crisis; and in doing so, enabling the VA to provide abortion services to non-veterans under section §1784 of title 38, United States Code.
This dystopian GOP shit is maddening. We need to stop trying to argue with it, and start finding ways to just work around it. Fuck em.
The problem with that is that it may have been legal at the place it was done, but states would absolutely place police next door to wait for those women to come out. They already have laws that criminalize women who go out of state
How is that legal? I thought states can only enforce laws that are broken in their own jurisdiction? Interstate would make it a federal matter, no? (In regards to women going out of state)
It’s almost certainly unconstitutional, but there’s not specific case law so it has to be litigated to know for sure. So there needs to be people charged who have the means and willingness to go through several years of trials and appeals. And they have to maintain that motivation for a long time - some cases drag on for a decade or longer.
The point isn’t to make it illegal forever, it’s to scare people and organizations without the resources to engage in a legal fight to stop supporting interstate care for the next three or five or ten years.
Then we need to do the short term solution while we work on the long term solution. I’m kind of sick of one side trying to keep it a fair fight. GOP politicians have all shown they don’t care about that and will employ any means necessary to get their policies enacted while doing everything they can to disrupt the policies on the other side
The bill would also require school boards to approve instructional materials that include accurate depictions of LGBTQ+ people and their contributions. It would ban school boards from rejecting textbooks because they mention the contributions of people with a particular racial background or sexual orientation.
For all the failures of my state (see 30% of all unhoused in the US without tearing our teeth out to solve it (that’s a movie reference)), this is about as anti-Florida as one could get. I’m proud of this.
news
Active
This magazine is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.