Notices by John (johnzajac@dice.camp)

@zephyrleifrenner @sidereal

BTW, an uncounted number of people didn't show up for Biden because his policies murdered their loved ones or disabled them. But it was significant.

The washing of public opinion and shaping of subjective reality is a full-time effort by our media and its owners the ruling class.

Sidereal is 100% correct when he says Biden would have won if he'd actually stopped COVID rather than buried it.

@sidereal

Sometimes people stare and I do the "primate who dares you to say something so they can let off some steam" stare-back and they turn away quickly.

I will say that I can't imagine being visibly disabled or genderqueer-presenting or a person of color wearing a mask in most of the US. Anti-maskers are universally bullies, and bullies are drawn to vulnerability like flies are to carrion.

Pro-mask is anti-Trump is something I need to see more of from liberal orgs leading these protests.

@zephyrleifrenner @sidereal

A key tenet of pragmatism is predicting an outcome is impossible and then doing everything possible to make sure your prediction comes true.

Public health experts committed this grievous logical error early on in COVID, encouraged by capitalists who saw people released from suffering and knew they'd get a taste for it.

"We didn't recommend [these highly effective and cheap countermeasures] because we *KNEW* nobody would do them!" was a common refrain.

@zephyrleifrenner @sidereal

That fully 70% of Americans, according to Pew, supported universal masking in public offices, healthcare facilities, and schools until 2023 is memory holed. That 1 out of 5 Americans still practice high levels of caution and masking in everyday life isn't worth reporting, apparently.

The entire idea that "people won't do it" was an op designed to convince people that people wouldn't do it. It was a manipulation, not data about people. IN service to capital.

@zephyrleifrenner @sidereal

We know this because when Omicron hit in late 2021 and the vaccines didn't prevent it, corpos flexed their control of Biden and his admin started making extremely self-defeating and population-damaging anti-science decisions, while simultaneously suborning and corrupting the data we had from key sources like hospitals and schools.

Never in my life has the corruption of US policy been so obvious as when Biden started to bury the ongoing pandemic for his owners.

@sidereal

Well, the Roaring 20s, if I recall, was actually characterized by high unemployment and misery for most coupled with a burst of profitability for middle and upper class people (the US was the only non-destroyed fully-industrialized Western nation).

The Poors (e.g. labor, veterans, flu-disabled) were a large majority, had no rights, and were often killed or injured at work, and under constant military assault for their efforts to unionize.

Honestly sounds ~ like the 2010s to me.

SCOTUS deciding that due process rights don't exist should lay to rest any establishment centrists' fantasies that they aren't just a cabal of fascists there to provide cover for Trump's depredations.

Also remember a Democratic President took power and didn't do fuck all to find them or prevent it from happening again?

Democrats and Republicans are equally complicit in this shit; both support a police state; both are against political speech they disagree with, which always happens to be leftist; both use the State to suppress that speech.

Our problem isn't any one party, it's a political class unused to having to listen to anyone but their donors.

They need to be *reeducated*.

The wildest part is that a group of people could literally just buy an unmarked van, wear all black, have some handcuffs and tasers, and kidnap literally whoever they want while screaming "ICE!"

Nobody would know the difference. TBH, I don't think ICE would know the difference, because I don't think they're keeping track of the people they're kidnapping.

Remember how they kidnapped like 10,000 kids but "forgot" to keep records of where they put them?

The Trump lawyers in the deportation hearing covering their blatant disregard for US court orders are doing the whole "here's an argument that makes no sense; let's see how funny it is to confuse and enrage this silly judge from the old regime" game.

Judges need to start issuing contempt rulings when arguments are so absurd as to beggar belief. They need to imprison a Justice Dept lawyer every day until they show up and act like professionals.

That they don't understand this is ridiculous.

@inthehands @jhlibby

This could be an ideological difference, though I don't know where yours lie: I think private education at all levels should be outlawed, and all education should be free.

I strongly believe that the civic state is like herd immunity: if people are allowed to opt out, it will fail. To me, public education is one of the beating hearts of a modern equitable society, and so my criticism comes from that.

@inthehands @jhlibby

Absent proven academic fraud, I don't honestly believe it's possible for a university to "revoke" a degree without opening themselves up to a huge civil lawsuit. And, hopefully, those civil lawsuits will manifest.

Aside from that, it's obvious that Ivy League schools are no longer rigorous institutions or capable of fulfilling their missions. I suspect that more and more of the *actually* talented people will choose lib arts alternatives, leaving the Ivy to the legacies.

@inthehands @jhlibby

I'm ambivalent about the destruction of these institutions. Higher education in general has been on an unsustainable trajectory for decades, and imo this is just the "cannot be sustained" part of that manifesting.

Also, there's nothing *particularly* special about Ivies that isn't entirely caught up in their faculty and the students they attract. Once the good faculty go somewhere else, the students will follow, and other unis will take their place.

@aral

This is legit classical comedy.

@anildash

I think absent unlimited clean energy, "AI" is probably always going to stink like the planet-killer it is.

I suppose it's possible some unforeseen utility is worth the energy expenditure, social and economic disruption, and widespread larceny needed to "train" it, but I'm highly skeptical.

But it seems clear that "being normal" about energy intensive technology with highly suss value during the accelerating climate catastrophe is to see it as evil AF.

You know, the whole "Trump could eliminate the Post Office!" thing is the epitome of media compliance with fascism.

The US Constitution *guarantees* a functional Post Office serving all Americans. In plain language.

I know, I know, "laws don't actually exist". But it's important to *point out* that Trump is legitimately a *traitor* who is *violating his oath of office*.

IF your goal is to move the passive supporters and passive resisters over to passive resisters and active resisters.

@Qybat

If you ignore the profoundly problematic immorality of what you wrote, and just focus on the merits: Biden literally broke the law a *half-dozen times* shoveling munitions and other military equipment into Bibi's mouth so he could liquidate Gaza.

So when you write "by-the-book" I assume you mean using the binding of the book to beat the law until it dies in the street? Biden was doing tricks for a year to step around congressional approval and appropriation.

@HeavenlyPossum

@inthehands @datum

From a brand perspective, they had an "Apple Effect" going on for about a decade, which is where most of their stock price came from.

Basically, people thought that owning a Tesla conveyed social status, so they ignored or reasoned away all the flaws in the technology (especially the software).

Apple's brand moment lasted for 25 years on the strength of their tech and software. It still props up their company, despite recent stagnation.

But Tesla doesn't have that.

Super curious how Germany feels about their citizen being held without due process in an ICE concentration camp.

The video of Trump and Vance trying to bully Zelensky, and Zelensky just making them look more and more shrill as it goes on, then Vance realizing the optics are ~*not great*~ and trying to prepare the way to blame Zelensky once this hits,

will play *over and over and over* again in capitols all over the world.

They will watch Trump and Vance do this to Zelensky - a VERY popular head of state - and imagine it was them. Also, Zelensky's approvals just shot in to the 90s.