do_i_punch_the_nazi
No bio...
User ID: 672
do_i_punch_the_nazi
5mo ago
Having noticed something similar, I'd suggest that there may be a third conclusion:
- Advertising to white men is not a good return on investment.
Advertisers have been very open about differences in spending behaviors between genders in the past.
Combine those differences with women's generally higher outgroup preferences, and "advertise to a woman's sensibilities until she nags a guy to buy the product" might be a winning move.
do_i_punch_the_nazi
5mo ago
What has it beat?
do_i_punch_the_nazi
5mo ago
I don't think there was any reasonably optimistic perspective that would have any of the progressive branch notice the various due process and vagueness concerns here, but having both Barret and Roberts agree to leave the regulation in place for what's likely to be years is... disappointing, if not necessarily surprising.
My unrealistic hope is that they're kicking the can down the road because there's a soon to be released decision about agency powers that might apply here, which would bypass the entire gun hornets' nest completely.
do_i_punch_the_nazi
5mo ago
A legal case involving what are known as "80%" receivers is working its way through the federal court system, under the title Vanderstok v Garland.
For those of you who are not aware of the terminology, an "80%" receiver is a chunk of metal or polymer that does not meet the federal definition of a "firearm" at the time of its initial manufacture and sale. After sale, these objects are generally modified by consumers to produce home-built, unserialized firearm receivers. You may have also heard of these resultant firearms described as "ghost guns".
While the origin and evolution of the term "ghost gun" is interesting, it's considerably less interesting than the most recent 5th circuit opinion re: Vanderstok. The opinion directly quotes and cites an article from slatestarcodex.com.
ATF essentially responded with variation of the motte-and-bailey argument. See Scott Alexander, All in All, Another Brick in the Motte, Slate Star Codex (Nov. 3,2014), https://perma.cc/PA2W-FKR9. The
This interests me for a few reasons. The first is that it's only the second time I've ever seen SSC referenced in "normie" spaces: the first being the NYT hit-piece from a few years back. The second is that the 5th circuit is broadly viewed as the most conservative-leaning of the US circuit courts, so it's interesting to see one of Scott's more noteworthy pieces showing up there.
do_i_punch_the_nazi
5mo ago
I did not enlist in the military when I was younger because I did not make the cut medically, even after carefully tailoring my statements to be not-exactly-lies as my recruiter instructed. As such, I have no firsthand information on this topic.
With that disclaimer out of the way, I do have some interesting secondhand information about this topic. I have quite a few friends and family who are active military, and every single one of them has told me that the higher-ups are pushing pretty much anyone who can string two words together into a sentence to move into recruiting. I have a few coworkers who did their time and got out who are receiving attractive offers to go back into the service, but specifically as recruiters.
While those facts could be coincidence, it does suggest there's a level of concern brewing in the upper ranks.
As @JTarrou mentioned below:
But there might be a kernel of truth that the sort of people who generally staff the pointy bits of the military are increasingly skeptical of their role as the enforcers of a world order that is explicitly hostile to them, their families, states, politics and demographics.
The gym where I lift has a pretty hard driving, ooh-rah, red-white-and-blue bloooded, America Fuck Yeah clientele. In the last three years, I've heard far more anti-government and anti-military sentiment than I had in the decade prior. A lot of it seems to stem from the fact that the COVID vaccine mandate, whether intentionally or not, was a de facto soft purge of that kind of person. I've heard the literal phrase "die for Israel" come out of more than one recent high-school graduate's mouth at as they hang around the squat rack.
do_i_punch_the_nazi
5mo ago
Disney/Marvel's current predicament is best expressed by describing their post-Endgame plan.
- Drop all of the well-known characters who are portrayed by popular actors.
- Ignore most of the established continuity that normal people will recognize and remember from other films.
- Replace the well-known characters with obscure, unlikable characters.
- Replace the popular actors with cheap actors that fill out the DEI bingo card.
- In an effort to lower the barrier to entry (and thus cost) for new writers, throw away existing continuity with something something multiverse something something.
- Create dozens of low-budget tie-in properties and make the entire edifice look like a massive effort to follow.
Suddenly, in 2023, Disney is surprised that people don't want to spend a ton of time and effort to watch movies:
- That may or may not jive with what they know
- Starring actors who acted in a soap opera and a cereal commercial once
- Are written by bargain-bin writers
- About characters who aren't interesting
- That probably won't make sense without watching 40+ hours of content on Disney+ for $14.99/month.
Is anyone surprised that sales are down?
On a related note - where was that movie even marketed? I'm not the most "hip" or "plugged in" person, but even I knew that movies like "Avengers" or "Iron Man" were being released. When a friend of mine first told me about "The Marvels", I thought that it was a soon to be released streaming TV show. That's probably a sign of an absolute marketing meltdown.
do_i_punch_the_nazi
9mo ago
The pressure of public opinion can do in the town what the law cannot accomplish. There is no lane so vile that the scream of a tortured child, or the thud of a drunkard’s blow, does not beget sympathy and indignation among the neighbours
This is a lovely theory that was thoroughly disproved by the murder of Kitty Genovese.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Kitty_Genovese
In my experience, not one person in an urban area ever attempted to stop my abuser. At least out in the countryside they called the cops a few times.
do_i_punch_the_nazi
10mo ago
It was not a school trash can, but a trash can within 1,000 feet of a school zone. That is a felony under the GFCZA if Hunter Biden does not have a Delaware carry permit.
Do we have any evidence on that in either direction?
do_i_punch_the_nazi
10mo ago
which is what he is getting anyway.
As a small nitpick, the firearm charge is being put through a pretrial diversion program.
The probation is for the tax charges.
I am not licensed to practice law, but my discussions with a few lawyers seem to suggest that pretrial diversion for a federal firearms charge is fairly rare, compared to probation or other penalties.
do_i_punch_the_nazi
10mo ago
I've personally had a similar view. This seems like a way to head off any serious implications by claiming that "he's done his time". With that established, any other investigations can be considered "hounding", or a "witch hunt".
do_i_punch_the_nazi
10mo ago
In an interesting development in US politics, Hunter Biden has apparently reached an agreement with the Justice Department that will allow him to avoid felony firearms and tax charges in exchange for pleading guilty to two misdemeanors.
Hunter Biden Reaches Deal to Plead Guilty to Misdemeanor Tax Charges
Hunter Biden agreed with the Justice Department on Tuesday to plead guilty to two misdemeanor tax charges and accept terms that would allow him to avoid prosecution on a separate gun charge, a big step toward ending a long-running and politically explosive investigation into the finances, drug use and international business dealings of President Biden’s troubled son.
Under a deal hashed out with a federal prosecutor who was appointed by President Donald J. Trump, Mr. Biden agreed to plead guilty to misdemeanor counts of failing to pay his 2017 and 2018 taxes on time and be sentenced to probation.
The Justice Department also charged Mr. Biden but, under what is known as a pretrial diversion agreement, said it would not prosecute him in connection with his purchase of a handgun in 2018 during a period when he was using drugs. The deal is contingent on Mr. Biden remaining drug-free for 24 months and agreeing never to own a firearm again
Right-wing political factions are upset with this agreement. I believe the core argument is best exemplified by Andrew McCarthy at the National Review
The Intentionally Provocative Hunter Biden Plea Deal
Under Justice Department policy, even with a plea agreement, the government is supposed to seek a plea to the “most serious,” readily provable “offense that is consistent with the nature and full extent of the defendant’s conduct.” Hunter Biden committed tax offenses that could have been charged as evasion, which is punishable by up to five years’ imprisonment for each count. Furthermore, he made a false statement that enabled him to obtain a firearm; that’s a ten-year felony under legislation pushed through by then-senator Joe Biden to show how very serious Democrats are about gun crime.
Biden apologists have tried to minimize that transaction as a “lie and try” case, which they say is often not prosecuted. But such non-prosecution (though it shouldn’t happen) occurs because of what you’d infer from the “try” part — i.e., the liar got caught and failed to obtain the gun. Hunter’s case, to the contrary, is a lie and succeed case. He got the gun. What’s more, he was then seen playing with it while cavorting with an “escort” (see the New York Post’s pictorial, if you’ve got the stomach for it). Shortly afterwards, he and his then-paramour — Hallie Biden, the widow of his older brother — managed to lose the gun near a school (it was later found by someone else).
Those are the kinds of gun cases that get charged by the Justice Department even if the suspect hasn’t, in addition, committed tax felonies by dodging taxes on the millions of dollars he was paid, apparently for being named Biden.
I have seen arguments and counter-arguments flying around the internet about the appropriateness of this legal action. Those in favor argue that any non-violent offender would be offered a lenient deal. Those arguing against reference past cases for tax crimes and paperwork-related firearms offenses that resulted in far more grievous punishments. In both cases, the other side argues that since the facts of the cases do not map 100% perfectly to this one, they cannot be used as precedent for deciding the fairness of this action.
What do you think? Was this action fair, in an ethical sense? Was this action within precedent, and if so, what other historical actions are you using as your guideposts? Do you think the choice to offer pretrial diversion was politically motivated? I'm interested to hear your opinions.
Sometimes it's even the exact same people.
I have, in my life, a mainstream progressive democrat, who occasionally complains that the GOP won't run someone who she disagrees with but can respect, "like Mitt Romney". She gets quite upset when I point out that I have screenshots of her saying that she would "never vote for a dog murderer" and never quite squares that circle.
It doesn't matter, though, because she develops amnesia again a month or two later and says the same thing.
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