pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
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User ID: 278
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
19d ago
Isn't the reason that if you wait until puberty is nearly complete, it becomes much harder to pass in the future?
pusher_robot
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1mo ago
The year is 2050. Mass unemployment has been forestalled by government revenue per employee maximums. Practically speaking, this means the vast majority of jobs are sinecures, but the social prestige of being sinecured to a particular firm or brand has skyrocketed in value, and likewise the PR cost of sinecured associates can potentially be Bud-Light-level apocalyptic. As a result, sinecures at highly-desirable firms often take on substantial relations efforts on behalf of the firm for free, both to maintain their sinecure, acquire additional sinecures, and potentially rake in social media influencer consulting fees), but also to increase the social prestige of the firm overall, and by proxy, themselves. Having multiple sinecures is possible for people who are motivated to do things that increase brand value or mindshare, and people with exceptional social desirability may acquire many more. Income supplementation via gig work will still be possible for things that can't be done as well by computers and robots or require the human touch, though naturally the returns will be low since the supply is huge. Of course, anyone with valuable sinecures must be on good behavior in public, for bringing disrepute or negative reaction to the firm will mean instant termination, and potential blackballing.
Those who have been blackballed or otherwise unable to merit a sinecure on the basis of their social worthiness must provide by going and doing actual labor, probably many hours of grinding gig work, or finding a valuable contracting niche. Most actual work below executive level done at the firms is performed by independent contractors, who supplement their sinecures (if they have one) with hourly contracting fees. And of course, there's always welfare, but which only provides at sustenance levels.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
2mo ago
Given that he was an El Salvadoran national, where else could he be removed to? Are there other countries stepping up to accept deportees on El Salvador's behalf? If the answer is a legal catch-22 where he gets to stay despite being eligible for deportation, then I have no choice but to reject the legitimacy of the process that produces that outcome.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
2mo ago
It seems that you are leaving off the very first paragraph of Section 1505, which precedes the one you posted. It reads:
Whoever, with intent to avoid, evade, prevent, or obstruct compliance, in whole or in part, with any civil investigative demand duly and properly made under the Antitrust Civil Process Act, willfully withholds, misrepresents, removes from any place, conceals, covers up, destroys, mutilates, alters, or by other means falsifies any documentary material, answers to written interrogatories, or oral testimony, which is the subject of such demand; or attempts to do so or solicits another to do so; or
It would seem to me that if they can establish the alleged facts, it clearly fits under "removes from any place, conceals, covers up". It does not contain the required element of corruption which you wrote about, just "intent to avoid, evade, prevent, or obstruct compliance".
pusher_robot
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30d ago
I don’t get the hate over boomer consumption because it is, generally, much lower than the consumption of working people who criticize them on the basis that their resources should be reallocated. Cruises are, on the scale of vacations, pretty cheap. Retirees aren’t DoorDashing much. And boomer housing wealth isn’t actually something they can do much about.
Their health care counts as consumption as much as those other items do.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
2mo ago
Don't know how it is 'round your parts, but I found out firsthand that there is approximately one full-time mechanical clock repairer/restorer in my metroplex, who is also well past retirement and cannot meet demand.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
2mo ago
Not quite an exact quote. Trump did not call Justice Ginsburg an "amazing man."
pusher_robot
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2mo ago
The motte version of CICO, which could be described as "any caloric input that isn't output is necessarily stored"
No, the motte is "it would violate the laws of thermodynamics to gain weight without consuming an energy-equivalent number of calories." CICO people don't deny that some people have metabolisms that permit them to consume excess calories without gaining weight. They only claim that someone who claims to have gained fat while restricting calories below that threshold is lying.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1mo ago
A noteworthy exception, but a Crown possession in living memory, and possibly not scalable past city-state.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
3mo ago
Couldn't resist just dwelling on this for a second too. Now, obviously no-one has to buy into avant-garde views of gender/sex, but to be simply unable to entertain the plausibility of a scheme of gender which includes trans women among women betrays a quite remarkable lack of intellectual imagination, and, frankly, intelligence.
This is completely missing the point. Most people who are not academics do not live in a world of intellectual imagination, they live in a world full of practical concerns, and these questions need to be boiled down into yes/no policies, procedures, and judgment calls. When a teenager with a penis demands to use the girls locker room, you cannot handwave the issue and appeal to imagination! Do Democrats understand that they are running for control of the government, and not the English studies department?
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
25d ago
First car was a 1994 Integra which I purchased in 2003 for $4300. Prior to that, I had ridden mopeds, motorcycles, and occasionally busses to get around, and borrowed my parent's car in the summer. I still remember this car fondly, as it had a wonderful ride and a crisp, genuinely enjoyable manual gearbox. Sadly, in 2006 it developed a head gasket leak and I deemed it not worth fixing. The Honda dealer I had working on it gave me a reasonable trade-in offer on it and I bought a black 2006 Civic with manual gearbox off the showroom floor. After trade in, the price was something like $22K.
I lived downtown at the time and this car was largely ideal for getting around the city, though I grew to sometimes resent the manual when stuck in creeping traffic. Eventually, I ruined the decent handling it had with some atrocious cheap all-season tires, and shortly afterwards, I was T-boned by a hit-and-run driver in a bad part of the city which totaled the car. I got the plate and gave it to the police, and subrogated my claim to the insurance company, but I never did get my deductible back.
After test driving a couple cars I replaced it with a 2012 Fusion automatic for about $27K, which is still my daily driver. There's nothing wonderful about it, but it runs fine and doesn't cost much to maintain. It doesn't have an LCD screen or any driver aids beyond cruise control and automatic headlights, but it does have Bluetooth and a decent sound system, and I try to keep it clean. I know I will probably want to replace it before it gets unreliable, but have a hard time getting excited about most cars out there. If I had to replace it today, I'd probably go with a hybrid Accord or hybrid Maverick. I'd like to test drive a Model Y.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
2mo ago
Just to add perspective since I was alive and watching the news during the Clinton drama, there were a variety of objections in increasing importance:
- He cheated on his wife
- He cheated on his wife with an intern over whom he was the clear superior
- He did the above in the Oval Office which is a government workplace
- He did all of the above, and then lied about to the public and Congress
- He did all of the above, and then lied about it in a sworn deposition
Characterizing the reaction to Clinton as being primarily about the sanctity of marriage is, I think, not remotely reasonable.
pusher_robot
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3mo ago
Charitably, Walsh must be communicating something other than the plain meaning of his words. In this case, he must mean "I don't think the media is covering this enough", or "the media isn't being adequately sympathetic to Tesla".
They are "covering" it in the sense of reporting that it is happening , but not in the same way they would cover it if there was an opposite political valence, e.g. haranguing political leaders to demand accountability or issue groveling condemnatiions, and heavily insinuating wider responsibility to political fellow travelers.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1mo ago
Under Article I, legislation must be passed by Congress. The President only has the power to veto or not.
pusher_robot
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3mo ago
If eating the seed corn causes starvation, why is my belly full?
pusher_robot
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3mo ago
Well now they have the option of becoming women.
pusher_robot
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27d ago
75-80. I want to be a bit slower than the faster traffic, so that they will draw the attention of speed enforcement. Also, much beyond that and the engine is noisier, and I'm consciously aware of the fact that thanks to the square power law I'm wasting a lot of fuel on creating wind without saving much time.
pusher_robot
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3mo ago
Again, we can do any of these things.
This is the part that is wrong. We actually can't do any of these things, at least not to any degree of scale and competence. There are too many veto points, too many interest groups, and too many fief-building bureaucrats for anything that requires coordination beyond an executive order. And, there is insufficient faith in competent government execution and trust in expertise even if these things were not true, such that it would probably fail from lack of good-faith cooperation anyways.
That doesn't mean that tariffs are better than nothing. I appreciate Althouse's dictum that better than nothing is a high bar. But for all the people who cry that we have to do something, well, this is something and it can be done.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
4mo ago
Of course, there are some on the American right who would be only too happy to dismantle the post-WW2 alliance system in favour of a more narrowly transactional approach, even at the cost of global influence and leadership.
What "influence and leadership" does the U.S. have that is not transactional already? EU seems to believe U.S. "leadership" consists of them making decisions and us paying for it. Our "influence" in most other countries consists mainly of bribery in the form of foreign aid and trade concessions. This is all transactional already! What soft power we do have comes from cultural output completely independent of and irrelevant to our foreign policy establishment, and that has all gone to absolute shit anyways.
From my perspective it seems like we're the Sugar Daddy who is promised that we're really, truly, loved and fun to be with, so long as the wallet comes out. They'll say nice(ish) things about us exactly as long the checks keep flowing. One second later, we're monsters who are killing the entire world.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
3mo ago
They seem to be coming around though!
https://x.com/tracewoodgrains/status/1906727995307381025
Summary: TracingWoodgrains ran a poll for both left and right respondents, asking if they'd rather have their opposite running the world vs. China.
For left respondents, China won handily, opposite for right-responders. Obvious selection bias and all, but troubling. The days of substantial fifth-columnism may be returning.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
2mo ago
That in itself would be a pretty grave intrusion into the President's authority to conduct foreign diplomacy. If that is permissible, it would be a short distance to e.g., court-ordered economic sanctions or court-ordered economic aid.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
29d ago
Beer garden
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
4mo ago
You're just dealing with a catastrophic loss of trust, driven by I think mostly Covid and woke ideological excess. That puts this stuff in the same category as public restrooms and park benches: it sure was nice when we lived in a society where we could have these things without them being abused and ruined for everyone.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1mo ago
Maybe you're thinking of Biden? https://youtube.com/watch?v=ciwyYnwYFaQ?si=nEANKgR7xGw6h2Vk
Obviously, but I think the TRA would argue that this is exceptionally unusual and outweighed by the QoL improvements of early transition.
I strenuously disagree, but I do think that's the actual crux.
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