It would mean that whatever the US might hope to gain from invading Canada would be dwarfed by what the US would lose in the conflict.
The problem is this is already the case. Nuclear weapons may make it even more lopsided, but the country is already losing more than it stands to gain from an invasion purely on the economic results.
Something I’ve been thinking a lot lately is that democracy is a process. It is a means by which we attempt to ensure a just and fair government for all. It’s not an end in itself; we don’t want democracy because democracy, at least not once people really think about it.
Which leads me to a saying. “The ends do not justify the means.” This is a commonly held statement. However, it also works the other way:
The means do not justify the ends.
That means it doesn’t matter if something was done by the rules, using the process, it doesn’t matter if we voted for it, it doesn’t matter what process was used to achieve it. If the ends are wrong, going “well, it’s what was decided democratically” isn’t an excuse.
If one person or a few people have a definition wrong, that’s a thing that can be corrected.
If the majority of people think that’s the definition, and it’s been that way for decades, then you have the definition wrong.
To be fair, hasn’t made much difference cause one, he got caught, and two, nobody else has done it.
I don’t blame any particular person for it, of course. Hell, I share the blame myself. I haven’t killed any CEOs or politicians either.
But it’s not gonna work unless more of us gather up the courage Luigi had and take action.
Nationalize the companies involved in production and distribution and eliminate profit, making and selling everything at-cost also works.
I like this template so much better than the Spider-Man one that people constantly use backwards.
It’s sad that in a country of over 300 million people, only one of us is both marginally competent enough to take successful action against these people, and not a chicken shit coward unwilling to put themselves on the line. And yeah, at least for now, I too am among the chicken shit cowards.
It’s deeper than that. It’s about defense of the Status Quo. No superhero looks around at the parts of society that we just accept without thinking about and says this needs to change.
Primaries are only rigged in that yes, the rules and the entire framework is built to benefit those currently in power, but that is less rigged than the general is against a third party, which is to say, totally, absolutely, and unassailably rigged. Proclaiming it impossible because it’s rigged is silly when you’re advocating for instead competing in one that is far, far more rigged and has far more structure to prevent any upsets.
We have never actually won a primary and had them ignore it. They use their structural advantages as much as they can, but if we push hard enough to overcome those advantages, they don’t just nullify the election and go with their candidate. We do get people like Ocasio-Cortez in there from time to time, when people actually show up to the primaries enough to flip it to the more progressive candidate. If we got enough candidates like her in, not just in congress but state houses and such too, we’d actually start getting places.
Now the bribes and money on the corporate side, nothing we can do about that - we have to overcome it so that we can get officials in place that will do something about it.
Now lemme put it this way. I live in bumfuck Ohio where there’s no chance of a progressive candidate being elected. But I still vote in every primary. People who live in places where there is more of a chance of doing something need to be as diligent as I am, if not more, damnit.
No, a third party is non viable. But the right move would have been exactly what the crazy right wingers have done with the Republicans. Get organized and primary the fuck out of the people blocking things.
The “tea party” gave us the blueprint, but we’ve been too dumb and lazy to follow it. When they didn’t give us the public option with Obamacare, every primary since then should have been about cleaning house of the corporatist, establishment Democrats and replacing them with real progressives. But since we’re too lazy and dumb to vote in primaries in mass numbers, their establishment people keep sailing to victory.
That guy failed. It makes a big difference when they actually get killed.
The time to do this would’ve been immediately after it was discovered that Trump took classified documents and had them in his home during visits from foreign agents.
The Republicans would’ve howled about it, but I think it could have been done, at that moment. Like, have the first news about it not be talking about the documents, but simply that former President Trump has been detained and will not be allowed to communicate with anyone but his legal representation, because of suspicion of potential coded communication to enemy agents.
At the end of Obama’s term wouldn’t have made any difference because by then McConnell was committed to holding the seat open for the next Republican.
But people called for her to resign back during the middle of Obama’s presidency, when the Democrats controlled the Senate, and her hubristic old ass decided to fuck everyone else by hanging onto power and prestige and trying to be even more historically important.
Woman had a bigger ego than Trump and Musk, and I really hope that historical opinion of her fucking remembers that.
If I understand correctly they have some kind of explanation where the sun works like a spotlight or something. But it also requires light to curve in weird ways to make any damn sense, soooo…
If it was me in their place, I’d try giving up as little as possible then seek some sort of binding defense agreement, whether NATO or something else. And if necessary do it in secrecy so Russia doesn’t hear about it until the agreement is fully in force.
Honestly I just think the US is simply not reliable, and with Ukraine seemingly relying heavily on the US, they need to be looking for the quickest exit strategy they can come up with at a moment of strength.
Hopefully, if Republicans prevent continued US support, other countries will still provide enough…I just fear it may not be, and that seems like a worse outcome for Ukraine’s people.
I hope they do, but this is why I’ve always thought Ukraine needed to be a little less hard-line on not giving up any territory. Because I figured it was only a matter of time before the Republicans (and other similar parties/groups in other countries) ratfucked the support away from them.
I don’t know if Russia was ever open to negotiating, but if they were, Ukraine may find themselves wishing they had negotiated at a high point, instead of their support being pulled out from under them.
Sadly, the US is simply not a reliable ally or source of support right now, and probably won’t be until getting the internal insanity under control. Until there are two parties actually willing to govern instead of one party trying to govern and the other acting like a deranged shit-flinging baboon, the US will be unreliable.
That, if accurate, is some damning poll results. 75% of them support the attacks on October 7, and an additional 11% are fine enough with them to have no strong opinion. That’s 86% of the population.
If 75% of the population supports the attacks, and 86% at least had no problem with them, then I can’t agree when people say things like most of the Palestinians just want to live their lives in peace.
The administration will not endorse the widespread use of march-in rights, and is not expected to take action against any individual medicines, said the people familiar with the matter, who were granted anonymity to discuss internal decision making.
Important bit from that, lest anyone think they’re actually going to do something.
I would be delighted if they did, but I would also be very surprised if they actually assert these rights on medicines developed with public funds, which is what they should do - just all of the medicines developed with public funds, patents seized, end of story.
Highest ranks, yes. It’s actually reasonable for the Senate to pay attention to who is getting promoted to the highest ranks. Every rank, no. It is my understanding that we are talking about every officer rank in the military needing confirmation by the Senate, which is meaningless because the Senate simply cannot pay attention to every one of these. That is precisely why Tuberville is able to hold this up, because it is logistically impossible for the Senate to check on every one of these people.
Now show me where they’re paying attention to what they can’t do.
Like, how nobody can just access secure government systems without proper clearance, which the President can’t actually just give without procedure.
Or even more simply, the fact that Trump is not in fact currently eligible to be President in the first place due to his part in the events of Jan. 6.
I do not have confidence that they will be stopped by the fact that something is not permitted, because they aren’t being stopped by things that are not permitted, and if this continues for 4 years…there will be nothing left of the system that is supposed stop them.