gAlienLifeform

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Handing out subsidies to petroleum companies counts as “manipulat[ing] the environment,” right?

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

We should be mad at whoever picked out the garbage attorney general running DOJ

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

You don’t actually want language that incredibly vague to have legal force

I don’t buy that, “The 8th amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment has no legal force because it can be construed to mean anything, someone could argue having to pay their taxes was cruel and unusual” makes about as much sense to me. Words mean things, especially when they’re in the context of the rest of the Constitution’s clauses that suggest certain things are or aren’t allowed, so I just don’t see how throwing General Welfare on to the table instantly greenlights a reign of terror.

Also, it’s not like the non-enforcement of General Welfare prevented eugenicist policies in the past

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Most people aren’t that way I think, it’s just that the ones that are amass a ton of resources and get followers and become difficult to deal with by the time normal folks get pushed pass their timidity

Like, Fortune 500 CEOs are 12 times as likely to be diagnosable psychopaths, but a world run by janitors with the right rules to vote by and a free press to keep them honest totally can work imo

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

I feel like there could be a funny (well, funnier) version of this,

Yeah, my first job was under a bridge and now millions of people are seeing me on social media every day

Jokes are funnier to people if you let them fill in a missing detail or two, actually saying “troll” makes it a bit too obvious

Also, he should be trying to flirt and she should look bored out of her mind, because magical creatures with mundane problems (like bad dates) has been funny since before Shrek

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

“Finally! We were worried something might not go in our favor for once and we were going to have to blow up the economy to punish you rubes.” - finance industry

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Yeah, the Ku Klux Klan smoked weed and it didn’t chill them out

On a somewhat related note - man, Jeff Sessions was and is an asshole

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Democracy outranks human rights.

I don’t recall any part of the bill of rights saying “this doesn’t apply in cases where it’s unpopular”

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

“You need to compromise on your requests for equal treatment and basic human dignity, and if you don’t you’re being the unreasonable one” /s

Amazing and heartbreaking how many people honestly expect trans people to live like that

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Except it’s going to discourage AMAB women from playing, so that excuse for this bigoted policy doesn’t hold water

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

There are reasons why the womens-only tournaments were formed in the first place, and some feel that letting trans women in would undermine those reasons. We can’t just pretend those reasons don’t exist.

Yeah, sadly transphobic bigotry is real and we can’t just pretend it doesn’t exist, we have to fight against it, but there’s no legitimate reason for this

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Good thing trans-women haven’t ever faced any historical or social oppression /s

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

The whole thing was put there via voting

I mean, a) no, a whole ass war’s worth of violence was a necessary element, b) we don’t let a simple majority vote change those fundamental human rights, we make amending our constitution very difficult and put important stuff in there that probably shouldn’t be changed for a reason

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

We really do need some better way to catch cis folks mis-registering in bad faith. It’d resolve some issues around the whole broader battle.

No we don’t and no it wouldn’t, bigots are just going to come up with the next excuse for their bigotry while we’re subjecting innocent people to things that are (as you aptly put it) invasive as all hell

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Hand waving away bigoted nonsense is exactly how you make it go away, it’s the only way it goes away. If you give these people an inch they’re just going to crow about how that proves they were right all along about everything and why we have to give in to their next set of demands.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

If that worked, bigoted nonsense would have gone away by now.

I genuinely have no idea what period in history you could be basing that on

People’s ability to create arguments that influence other, neutral parties is far more powerful

We already had that discussion and now the overwhelming majority of doctors and researchers understand trans people are people and gender affirming healthcare is good healthcare. If you’re neutral at this point you’re at best embarrassingly ignorant and most likely just a bigot.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago)

If they don’t believe in empirical evidence and the scientific method then there is less than nothing to be gained from debating them, it will set things back for people who aren’t engaged in this issue to see them being taken seriously like there is any real debate here.

I feel pretty strongly that you’re ignoring forgetting the Nazi element of this right now with this insistence on taking their bullshit arguments seriously

The fact of the matter is that it is not plausible and you reiterating that it is doesn’t make it so.

e; I’m still giving you the benefit of the doubt that you genuinely mean well here and are just mistaken, tried to adjust the language to better reflect that

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

So what’s their plan when someone accuses their opponent of being AMAB to try to get them DQ’d?

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago (edited 1 year ago)

Being an asshole isn’t cheating. Plus, if we’re gonna throw out every chess player who is an asshole we’re gonna be throwing out a lot of them.

e; And there’s no practical way to go after assholes here without harming a lot of innocent non-assholes in the process.

Also, if your goal is just to avoid any controversies and arguments, wait until someone accuses their opponent of being trans to try to get them thrown out.

It’s a stupid rule that solves a non-issue while creating a lot more problems.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Those Uyghurs had and have rights whether the Chinese government knows it or not. Bad things happening doesn’t make those things suddenly not-bad.

Point being, they’re only intrinsic because we say so.

The sky is only blue because we decided on the word “blue” for that frequency of light, and there’s plenty of other things that are the way they are just because we say so.

And if this isn’t just a “I just don’t think ‘rights’ are the correct word” semantic argument for you here, please refer back to the first two sentences.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

I don’t think I did. Forgive some paraphrasing, but this was our exchange as I understand it,

Me: This is a dumb rule.

You: It will prevent cheating.

Me: No it won’t.

You: It will prevent a specific kind of asshole behavior.

Me: That kind of asshole behavior doesn’t constitute cheating, it’s just being an asshole and trying to prevent that causes more harm than good.

And speaking of more harm than good, blood draws for everyone that wants to participate in women’s chess is inconvenient and unpleasant enough to defeat the whole point of this league in the first place. Like, “So we wanted to be more inclusive and get more women involved in chess, yahta yahta, now let me stick you with a needle and take some of your blood. Oh, no, you wouldn’t have to do this in an open tournament, just some special hassles for your tournaments is all.” is not going to go over well is all.

So, yeah, I still think this is a stupid rule that “solves” something that’s not a problem and creates a couple of new ones.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

I don’t see a big difference between trans people in chess vs swimming or basketball

I mean, there clearly are big differences between chess and basketball.

it’s this argument they put forward to justify banning trans people.

Right, I think I get what you’re saying on this level, the bigots out there have gotten more traction with dumbass centrist types when they attack trans people participating in sports than they have had with other things and it would be good to have an effective rejoinder to that whole line of attack.

But that’s exactly what I’m doing here. I’m not ignoring their arguments, I’m saying they’re fucking stupid, they’re made only as a pretext to hurt trans people, and they’re going to lead to policies that make women’s chess worse for everyone. You don’t need to know the first thing about gender affirming healthcare or to have ever met a trans person to understand that, but the moment we start needlessly saying untrue stuff like “the people making these arguments make some good points” or “the people making these arguments aren’t just hateful scum” we start making this issue more complicated and confusing than it should be for the persuadable ones, and the bigots are just going to say “See, we were right about that, and we’re also right about [more transphobia] and we need to [more repressive policies targeting trans people].”

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Not everywhere, on August 2 2023 it was reported that “North Face sales grew 12% year-over-year to $538.2 million in the first quarter”

(Quick aside, when I went looking for their second quarter 2023 report I ended up getting something with a date in October 2022, so I think they’re using a different calendar than Target)

The reason why that’s significant is

Just before the official start to Pride Month, The North Face announced it had teamed up with drag performer Pattie Gonia for its second annual Summer of Pride tour.

“Hi, it’s me, Pattie Gonia, a real-life homosexual,” the performer introduced herself in a video promoting the outdoor clothing and gear company’s campaign.

Criticism from conservatives came quickly, among them U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, who took to Twitter to criticize the company and call for a boycott.

But The North Face didn’t back down, and Pattie Gonia will kick off the campaign in Salt Lake City in July as scheduled at the sold-out event.

The North Face has always believed the outdoors should be a “welcoming, equitable and safe place for all,” the company said in a statement to NPR.

[Bolding added]

Looks like apeasing fascists is bad for business

e; forgot to mention the bolding wasn’t in the original article

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

They couldn’t pick one side

Classic Target, really

“While I firmly believe that a business climate conducive to growth is critical to our future, I realize our decision affected many of you in a way I did not anticipate, and for that I am genuinely sorry,” Steinhafel wrote.

He added, “The diversity of our team is an important aspect of our unique culture and our success as a company, and we did not mean to disappoint you, our team or our valued guests.”

Gay rights activists and loyal Target shoppers were furious with the company after it contributed $150,000 to MN Forward , a political group that has endorsed and is paying for ads for the Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Emmer.

Emmer, who will face the winner of the Democratic gubernatorial primary and an independent candidate in the general election this November.

I’m gonna skip over Emmer’s endorsement of a Christian rock band that basically called for gay people to be executed because this quote has already gotten kind of long, but there’s one other bit that jumped out at me here,

Large corporations have only recently been legally allowed to contribute to campaign advertising, after the Supreme Court in January reversed a century of campaign finance reform that had limited the money that could be spent by private companies and unions.

The more I think about this, the more it seems like Citizens United and the floodgates of campaign and general politicking cash that it dumped on all of us and the way it basically forced corporations into these donations as a way to maintain the kind of political access their competitors get (no corp wants to be the only one not donating when they need a favor) really explains so much of the political and cultural insanity we’ve seen since 2010

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Special effects studio Alterian Inc., which is based in Los Angeles, designed and created the costume in 2015 for a traffic safety video about the perils of driving high on cannabis.

The suit never saw the light of day after the campaign was scrapped.

“We didn’t have the money for both War’s Low Rider and Pearl Jam’s Last Kiss, and our vision just didn’t work without those elements.”

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

These reports almost never become public.

For more than three years, the federal government — under both the Trump and Biden administrations — fought NPR’s efforts to obtain those records. That opposition continued despite a Biden campaign promise to “demand transparency in and independent oversight over ICE.”

I mean, I can see why. They make both administrations look awful.

“These reports are chilling. They are damning,” said Eunice Cho, senior staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Prison Project and an expert on ICE detention, when NPR shared the reports’ findings. “They really show how the government’s own inspectors can see the abuses and the level of abuses that are happening in ICE detention.”

The government, whether it was under Trump or Biden, knew all about the abuses going on in these camps, and their response wasn’t to arrest and prosecute these guards or to shut down these facilities, they just tried to cover them up. It’s incredibly disappointing to say the least.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

I must have missed the part of our constitution that says a regular old citizen who once held a government office is forever entitled to special treatment under the law. Seems like a pretty dumb way to run a society.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Every single use of the government’s criminal law powers should be done thoroughly and carefully because all citizens are entitled to due process of law. A former or current president should not get preferential treatment. Beyond the basic morality of it, if we don’t push back on this crap hard we’re going to get a lot more George Santos-es and other two bit con artists who use our political system as cover for their fraud, and that kind of kakistocracy would be way more catastrophic than making Republicans upset will be.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Sitting on your hands and hoping it will all just go away for a year is not avoiding a half-ass rush job, it gave criminals time to attempt to destroy evidence and intimidate witnesses

In the weeks before Jan. 6, Trump supporters boasted publicly that they had submitted fake electors on his behalf, but the Justice Department declined to investigate the matter in February 2021, The Post found. The department did not actively probe the effort for nearly a year, and the FBI did not open an investigation of the electors scheme until April 2022, about 15 months after the attack.

The Justice Department’s painstaking approach to investigating Trump can be traced to Garland’s desire to turn the page from missteps, bruising attacks and allegations of partisanship in the department’s recent investigations of both Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election and Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server.

Inside Justice, however, some lawyers have complained that the attorney general’s determination to steer clear of any claims of political motive has chilled efforts to investigate the former president. “You couldn’t use the T word,” said one former Justice official briefed on prosecutors’ discussions.

[Bolding added throughout]

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

I like the spirit, but that seems like it’d just fracture the country further and keep Alabama high school students trapped in Alabama, which is exactly what the old assholes making these decisions want

Instead, there should be a criminal charges and a civil lawsuit from the federal government for violating these kids civil rights to a real education, and the offenders should be deemed likely witness intimidators and jailed pre-trial.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Oh ffs, what is the secret service’s issue? He would be in federal prison, and if that’s a safe enough place for everyone else it’s safe enough for him. It’s not like they’d have to worry about snipers. And if they don’t like the idea of working in a prison as glorified DOC employees every day they can quit/get fired, I’m sure they’ll be able to find some other security work that lets them have periodic scandals with drunken driving and sex workers somewhere.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Who is we?

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Which language is that in?

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

♫ You do 16 POSTs, whaddya GET? ♫

♫ Status code 200, pride and accomplishment ♫

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

DOJ needs to bring a civil rights lawsuit and get an injunction to stop this immediately, among other things it’s blatant sex discrimination by the state of Texas

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

What, the decade of Newt Gingrich and telecom deregulation? No, this country ran out of gas in the 1960s when giving black people civil rights made a whole bunch of racist assholes lose their minds and rich assholes said “ah ha, those people’s votes are how we’ll finally kill this social safety net nonsense that Delano Roosevelt bastard started”

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

The issue is that federal agencies like ICE and CBP under the direction of the Biden administration are violently persecuting people fleeing the effects of climate change and the Biden administration is going to court to ensure they can continue doing so

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

“No train bot. Not now.”

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

About two years ago the White House was signing off on proposals from the city of Memphis to spend tens of millions of dollars of COVID money on police officers, which is one of the ways federal taxpayer money got put into the pockets of the people who beat Tyre Nichols to death

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Always have been, they were started by Nixon administration veterans who wanted to make sure the next time a Watergate happened they got away with it (which they pretty much did with both Iran Contra and the 2003 Iraq War)

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

“Whiny elitism doing performance activism” is a very apt summary of Brooks’ whole career, he’s an asshole and idiot with a thesaurus, a graduate degree, and friends in high places who gets misrepresented as a thoughtful person because of those three things.

If you have time for an hour long podcast, “If Books Could Kill” had a fantastic episode calling out all of his garbage

podcastaddict.com/…/148580542

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/…/id1651876897?i=10…

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Celebrating powerful people (who are trying to get more power and will leverage your celebrations towards that end) for doing the bare minimum is a big part of why this country keeps getting worse.

The bare minimum is nothing to celebrate, it’s literally the least we deserve as Americans.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Yeah, according to a Federal Reserve survey from earlier this year “only 63% of adults surveyed said they would cover an unexpected $400 expense using cash or its equivalent, down from 68% the year before. Many noted they would lean on credit cards or family members to manage such a bill. About 13% said they wouldn’t be able to cover such an expense by any means.”

Upper middle class and above households have been doing great, but everyone else is in a bad way and getting worse.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Two things worth noting,

1. Burkina Faso underwent a military coup in February of 2022 that the Russian government likely had a big role in
2. The United States blindly throwing weapons at that military in the name of fighting terrorism played a big part in creating the social unrest and overpowered military that created an opening for point 1) to happen.

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

We wouldn’t be the first to put some kind of sanctions on them

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

1. That’s Apollo the private equity firm, not the app
2. There’s a lot of finance jargon in this story to get through, but tl;dr the staggeringly corrupt Trump administration ripped us all off to help out their rich assholes friends and there’s no plan to hold them accountable for it

The Trump administration, which lobbied for and approved the loan [from the federal government], had ties to Apollo. One of its founders, Josh Harris, was an advisor to the White House on infrastructure policy. Apollo also lent Jared Kushner’s real estate company $184 million to refinance a Chicago office tower it owned. Harris and Kushner met multiple times.

The pretext for Yellow acquiring the loan was that the company allegedly represented almost 70 percent of the Defense Department’s small-freight shipping and services to the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Those numbers proved to be loaded, according to a congressional oversight report from Rep. French Hill (R-AR) published at the end of June. It found that Yellow accounted for only 20 to 40 percent of the Defense Department’s small-freight shipping. For this reason, career Defense Department staff recommended that the loan be denied, but a June 2020 call between Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Defense Secretary Mark Esper led to Esper certifying the company as “critical to national security.”

While the government’s equity stake, which led Boeing to decline the option, was seen as a way to capture profits if Yellow thrived, the government loan was actually junior to Apollo’s term loan, something Hill told The Wall Street Journal and the Prospect separately confirmed. It was also junior to the revolving line of credit.

So if the business collapsed, Apollo and other creditors would be able to take the proceeds from liquidation before the government. As Adam Levitin, a law professor at Georgetown University, told the Prospect, “the 30 percent equity stake gave Treasury upside if things went well. It just wasn’t well protected for the downside.”

To date, Yellow has made $68 million in interest payments to Treasury on the loan, but has only made one payment of principal for the whopping amount of $230.

The Treasury loan, at LIBOR plus 350 basis points, was cheaper than Apollo’s. But instead of Yellow using it to get out of the arrangement with Apollo, it spent more than half of it, the second tranche of $400 million, on a new vehicle fleet, a curious proposition for a company mired in debt. (It also rebranded from YRC to Yellow in the middle of all this.) As Levitin wrote at his blog Credit Slips, “That’s not payroll protection or national security. That’s just subsidization of a favored company … For $400M, Treasury could have financed the purchase of a sizable freight fleet solely for military use, rather than subsidized a privately owned company that provides some of its services to the military.”

Those actions by yellow and the Treasury department are stupid to a highly suspicious degree, I’d love to see what a couple of subpoenas from the DOJ could shake out

gAlienLifeform , 1 year ago

Ugh, I believe it, something really similar happened with Jeffery Dahmer. It’s terrifying and infuriating how marginalized people can die so quietly and their deaths get forgotten so easily.