bsbbtnh
1yr ago
Hopefully the province enforces all the fines, especially the ones against the union. It'd set a very bad precedent if people who aren't legally allowed to strike receive no punishment if they do.
Anyways, it's my personal opinion that public sector unions should not be able to strike. They have too much power.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out Wang and Ellison had orchestrated this whole thing, and SBF is simply a patsy. They are both admitting guilt, and that they knew at the time what they were doing was wrong. If SBF has a shred of evidence that they misled him, he'll probably get off, while Wang and Ellison get a slap on the wrist.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
It's also very unlikely that Russia is responsible in this light -- the pipelines were already not being used via their equivocations over the turbines with Canada. Throwing Germany's steering wheel out of the window for them is not likely to yield them any concessions in the gas standoff, or poke at any weak points to unravel European solidarity over sanctions.
Depends if they ever really planned on providing gas to Germany again.
Russia had made some rather large agreements with China on oil & gas prior to the Ukraine invasion. Russia has been ramping up construction of pipelines east.
If Russia had planned on cutting off these pipelines all along, it'd make no sense to cut off the flow on day 1. That would give a bit of pain to Germany (and the EU), but it would lead to an actual solution in short order, with spring/summer giving a decent buffer to prepare for winter. Also, if Russia cut gas day 1, then the EU (and particularly Germany) would have likely gone all in behind Ukraine. Maybe even boots on the ground. There surely wouldn't have been hemming and hawing about whether to send weapons, which ones, how many, etc.
A big sticking point for me is that I do not believe there was an actual issue with the turbines. I believe the particular compression station has 4 to 6 turbines typically installed, with 4 needed for operating easily at full capacity. There's another ~4 turbines that were spares, iirc. One was off for maintenance in Canada.
So how does Russia go from a full set of turbines, pumping at full capacity (I think they were actually pumping over capacity for much of the past few years), down to just 1 that's barely useable? It seems like a story they are telling. If the turbines were an issue, and they actually wanted them back up and running, Germany was willing to give them full support. But Russia refused, adding obstacles to it. And Russia was really only asking for a pretty narrow exception to the sanctions, not lifting of all sanctions. And from what I understand, Germany was happy to provide them.
So there's obviously more going on. Maybe Russia was leveraging the flow in order to prevent arms transfers? If Germany (or other EU states) were sending weapons, Russia throttles it. So Germany delays sending lethal/military aid to Ukraine.
But I think Russia is simply taking these turbines and tossing them on their eastern pipelines to accelerate construction, which is why they denied all offers to fix the things. Now this incident gives Russia the opportunity to begin peeling down the NS2 pipeline, and probably ripping whatever else they can get from NS1.
This will be the end (for awhile, at least) of cheap energy for the EU. But it will bring a ton of cheap energy to China.
I think Russia's actions are largely done at the behest of China. This is China's moment to make the multipolar world they've been talking about. Though I believe the multipolar world is simply a transition to a unipolar world with China at the top. And somehow we in the west continue to sit on our hands, and I fear we'll respond far too late.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
I think expediting the capture of criminals is a good thing
But randomly catching them by targeting people breaking minor laws isn't expediting it. Having police go and find someone when a warrant is issued would be the quickest. Instead, we've turned routine stops into inquisitions.
We could drop the pretext, and just empower police to stop and search/investigate anybody. That would catch even more criminals. At the end of the day, we are giving up more freedom for the masses in order to gain a tiny bit of security. COVID showed us just how far the government can push that, and the masses largely complied (or at least didn't publicly disagree). I doubt the government will reign in their powers; now every institution is going to want to leverage many of those things to apply to their area of expertise. If we can lockdown an entire nation, demand COVID testing and vaccinations to go out in public, why could we not do the same if a serial killer is on the loose? Lockdown a community, require DNA testing and an alibi to go to work.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
It's all part of a cycle. Black people blame white people for their oppression. And then one day they 'notice' that a good chunk of the white people in Hollywood, the media, running the big businesses, in academia, are Jews. Whites gentiles are under-represented, probably moreso than African-Americans.
And once they 'notice' that, then they start to wonder if they are oppressed at all. You get the idea that maybe it's just a 'mental prison'. They believe they can free themselves by simply believing they aren't oppressed. And from there they get to thinking that maybe it is the Jews that are the oppressors. This feeds into black nationalism, which feeds into blacks having their own country, which feeds into the idea that hey, maybe Israel is actually a black country. Maybe blacks are the real Jews.
As this process has played out, time and time again, over the past century, it was largely countered or overshadowed by a larger civil rights movement. But the current civil rights movement isn't asking for equality; it's asking for equity. And to get that equity, it's going to have to come from the Jews, at least partly. Otherwise gentile whites are going to be essentially pushed out of society, and that will almost certainly lead to the Holocaust 2.0.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
Wouldn't phonics eventually wipe out regional dialects?
AAVE seems like it wouldn't survive long under phonics.
And if more liberal areas tend to go with whole word learning, and presumably conservative areas with phonics, could this be why (it seems) that southern dialects are disappearing?
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
In an ideal world, the police would be focusing their resources on catching those criminals, rather than hoping a random broken tail light will lead to a major bust. And major criminals wouldn't feel the need to run (or kill) in order to evade a minor ticket.
If we are simply using minor laws to capture criminals, then why not make more minor laws to catch criminals? I'd prefer to live in a society where laws are meant to keep people on track, rather than to undermine people in order for cops to hold broader investigations. So having wider enforcement, but smaller punishments, for minor crimes and civil violations seems more important, overall.
Police have no incentive in actually reducing minor crime if their purpose is to simply use minor crime as a pretext to find people with warrants, guns, drugs, etc.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
I may be misremembering, but I believe a lot of ghettos originally grew out of the Contraband Camps set up by the Union. After Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, slaves were 'seized' as contraband and put in camps. This became a humanitarian crisis, as disease ravaged these camps and there were shortages of food. I believe some hundred thousand+ black people died. Many former slaves returned to the south, or travelled north, after the war ended, but many stayed in these camps. It'd be interesting to overlay the historic locations of those camps with various post-war maps and see if any of them are still ghettos and/or predominantly African-American.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
I think it's just generally bad policy to use minor crimes like that as a pretext for finding people with active warrants. It is detrimental to society as a whole.
First, you're mostly just going to catch the stupidest criminals this way. The smarter criminals will be able to evade capture for much longer. So we're only catching people who would have eventually been caught, anyways.
Second, stupid criminals will make stupid choices. They'll make the decision to run/fight more often than not. This means cops could get injured, or some dumb criminal (and many criminals are legitimately mentally retarded) will get hurt/killed. And today that could lead to city-wide protests that cause hundreds of millions in damages (from looting, vandalism, and just lost economic opportunity from businesses being closed and consumers staying away).
Third, as a political consequence, we end up with police pulling back, and stupid policies saying not to enforce quality of life crimes, and even some non-violent crimes (primarily drug and property crimes). And that's just going to make life worse for everyone.
Here's what a better system would be. We get a bunch of lowly paid people who issue small tickets to people who violate simple laws. Traffic and parking violations, fare evasion, jay walking, littering, etc. We put these people in stupid, non-threatening uniforms. They are instructed not to chase people, not to look for warrants, not to arrest people. If something goes wrong, they run. If a citizen ever lays hands on these individuals, we send in the real police to do a summary execution. Otherwise cops aren't involved in anything to do with those stops or enforcement of those laws.
We take cops, and instead of paying them $100k+/year to hopefully catch people with warrants and guns while enforcing petty crimes and civil violations, we send them to catch people with warrants by actually looking for the people who have warrants. And they can do things like respond to burglaries, stolen property complaints, things like that.
And this way, if cops end up killing someone, it likely won't be over some petty shit. And if riots do break out over that, politicians and citizens won't be targeting the quality of life enforcers. They can still operate and continue a constant level of enforcement, so that cities don't fall to shit.
It's absurd to pay police officers to be stopping people for broken traffic lights, or for littering, or for evading fares. Because then everybody becomes guarded in their interactions with police. You'll always worry that a stop is about something more. It's unhealthy to have a populace that is constantly worried when police are around, especially if crime is high and you want police around more.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
Other options;
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purchase a gun and a bullet
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purchase a small tank of helium from Walmart or Amazon
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try and meet a serial killer online
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
Zionism (right) vs Bolshevism (left).
Also, Jewish space lasers are as true as turning the frogs gay.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
Car-dependent sprawl and single-family-only zoning means nobody walks or bikes, which causes obesity.
I've found single-family zones to be much more active. It only seems like dense areas are more active because of the higher population. But people feel less and less safe in high density urban environments.
- It also makes children less independent and capable, both physically and emotionally/psychologically.
I wouldn't ever consider someone who grew up in a city to be more independent or capable. My experience has been the opposite; people in cities are highly dependent on others, and far less capable. They have to rely on others, because they have less experience having to depend on themselves. They only feel independent because of systems that the government has built. I'm sure some people feel independent hopping on the subway to go get groceries. But those living with yards can be independent by growing their own food. Hell, I've noticed that most city folks don't seem to understand how to do this. Cities aren't even great places to grow gardens, since the fluoridated water absolutely ruins the yield. So you have to use a rainwater system, which needs a bit more space. Composting in dense cities? Nope. Can you keep a bunch of random crap to reuse at some point in your life? Doubt it. It all goes in the trash.
Dense cities suck. You're more dependent on the government. You only feel independent because you don't know your neighbours. And that's another major downside of cities. In a zombie apocalypse, I know my neighbour isn't going to rob me blind, they are going to help me build the barricades.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
Male appearance in the mug shot and the surveillance photo. I'm guessing they dress male unless its for a public event or fetish.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
Elon didn't actually lose money. If I created a company with a billion shares, sold one for $1, I'd be a billionaire. If that company folds the next day, my net worth would plummet. But there was no actual value lost.
With Ukraine, actual cash, goods, services, missiles, are being used up. The economic impact is people actually losing money, not making productive use of their labour, or that labour being diverted elsewhere. Infrastructure and lives are being destroyed. Time is being lost.
This will be a setback for Europe. Though it'll probably be a net benefit for America.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
I was being a bit hyperbolic. I simply mean we use the full power of the state to punish them, and that could of course include shooting them if the circumstances required it.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
that specific parents, who he named by name,
Pretty sure he only named like one or two.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
I've always wondered if the special interest group that Pete Dominick said you have to hand an envelope of cash to in order to win an election is the Israel lobby (AIPAC?).
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
In physics, there are a fuckton of 'constants'. Many of these are unexplained. It's some random number you push into an equation and makes it work. But we haven't explained why that constant exists, or why it has the value it has. Even the speed of light, we have no idea why it is that speed. And it's typically viewed as a maximum, but there's no reason to assume the speed of light is some universal speedcap. We don't think like that for the speed of sound.
Even when it comes to constants, many of them seem to be variable. It's just that their variance is so small, and the level of our tech so primitive, that it's handwaved away, since it is of no consequence to us. It's a bit like how we tell high school students that water is incompressible. Because there's really no need to go into the minutiae at that level.
So physics is full of holes that we've bandaged over, but that could radically change our understanding of the universe if we discovered what is truly behind it.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
If killing Russian soldiers in this situation is right and necessary, then anything that contributes to their killing is also right and necessary.
Which means that Finland deploying to Ukraine is right and necessary.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
As far as I can tell, James Trusty is a competent attorney with the requisite experience to litigate issues at this level but he just fell flat on his face hard. No amount of legal acumen can compensate for having a client who insists on unreasonable demands and tactics.
Seems most likely that this was a (seemingly successful) delay tactic.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
I don't think back-to-work legislation would be constitutional anymore. In 2015, Canada's Supreme Court ruled that striking is a constitutional right, a component of collective bargaining which is protected in the charter under the freedom to associate. And Ontario courts struck down the 2012 back-to-work legislation as infringing on the collective bargaining rights of school employees.
So using the notwithstanding clause seems like the only way to actually do this, since I doubt the courts will see janitors as essential as police or w/e (and I never read the full Supreme Court case, so who knows, maybe police and doctors are allowed to strike?).
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
I'd always assumed Jim Crow laws grew out of the same sentiments held in South Africa around that time; that black and white people would thrive better if separated.
bsbbtnh
1yr ago
we’re talking about the greatest rock song, not the most average
What's the most average, in your opinion?
Russia tried to join NATO. They were rebuked. That's when it was cemented that Russia would never be welcomed into the west, and their policy shifted towards self-sufficiency. And that's why sanctions haven't destroyed Russia.
It's amazing how the west has become solely reactive, and worse, they spend all their time telegraphing their next move. They spend weeks talking about sanctions to hit Russia with, giving Russia weeks to plan for them. And when those sanctions hit, it turns out our leaders never thought about how it would affect us. Absolutely amazing.
And our leaders have basically pretended that Russia can't hurt us. Make us pay in rubles or they'll cut us off? Surely Russia wouldn't shoot themselves in the foot like that. Oh, they did, and they are actually making more money now. Well they'd never cut off the Nord Stream. Oh they did that to? And they are making record profits again? Hmm..
Now we're seeing our leaders try and force a price cap on Russia. I think I know exactly how this works out. China and India get cheap gas, Russia cuts off the EU completely, gas prices skyrocket, and Russia somehow makes even more money.
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