Notices by Texty the Bard (textualdeviance@retro.pizza)

@GottaLaff So many people don't get what's about to happen. All three major superpowers are now being run by wannabe emperors. China is going to try to annex all of Asia, Russia, Europe and Trump wants all of the Americas. And unlike the last time a couple of monsters wanted to take over an entire continent, there won't be a big dog waiting to jump in to stop them.

The people raging on about globalism/one-world gov't just got played and they don't even know it.

Seeing far too many people clinging to the belief that there's some sort of magical legal loophole Democrats in Congress can use to keep Trump out of office.

1. There isn't.

2. This is the same sort of bullshit logic his own crew used to try to fuck with the previous certification. Knock it tf off.

@TonyStark I feel like I've failed to give my kids a better world than the one I grew up in. I look at my toddler sleeping in her crib, trusting that her Papa and I will keep her safe and help her grow and become strong and confident. And yet I have no idea if the world she'll inherit as an adult will even be functional. I'm scared of what might happen to me. But even more scared of what the world may look like when I'm gone in 20 more years.

@dalias @alexf24 @kralcttam @GottaLaff I think a fair number aren't trying to choose between candidates, but whether to bother voting. This may have been the fire they needed lit under them.

Hey, cishet dudes: Remember that your ballot is private. If you're Harris-curious, but worried about how the guys around you might react to you voting for a woman, they don't ever have to know.

Ideally, you could be open about it and maybe bring a few more guys over. But if you're not in a place where it's safe to do that, you can still at least vote your conscience when it's just you and your ballot.

Re: last boost: If you're unaware, the reason Catholic hospitals don't do most emergency abortions is because of their belief that all pregnancies are directly created by God, and only God has the right to decide how they begin or end. (This is also why they oppose contraception.) Some believe that even a dead embryo/fetus or imminent death of the person carrying it isn't enough. The church has even canonized women who died in pregnancy rather than choosing abortion.

The only people who don't want to ban mass-casualty weapons are ones who have themselves imagined killing large numbers of people.

They may not all fantasize about it in the classic sense, but they've sure as shit at least imagined themselves as ad-hoc soldiers, using high-cap weapons to hold back masses of invaders, looters, or government agents.

Semi-regular PSA: If your accessibility planning begins and ends with ramps and transit, you need to think again.

1. Not all disabled people use wheelchairs (and some can't.)
2. Motorized wheelchairs are massively fucking expensive, and very few people qualify for subsidies.
3. Transit doesn't work for everyone, wheels or no, because there's usually a lot of distance between a transit stop and most destinations. Inclement weather, hilly or rough terrain = not accessible.

@inquiline Acknowledging reality isn't cynicism. Inaction in the face of grave danger isn't honor. It's cowardice. But I bet that moral superiority will be a comfort when Trump paves over Gaza and turns it into a resort.

Reality rarely gives perfect options, especially in politics. One either grows up and works within those limitations, or gets (rightly) labeled as an armchair activist.

Initial ballot dump from the #WA primary looks pretty good so far! We have a blanket primary system, so it's often a preview of the general. And though there are still a lot of ballots to count, it looks like Democrats are cleaning up in the statewide offices and Cantwell's Senate race. The House seats currently held by Democrats look pretty good, too, with the exception of WA-03, which was a squeaker (and a flip!) last time.
https://results.vote.wa.gov/results/20240806/default.htm

#USPol #WAPol

@TonyStark I hope the campaign keeps hammering on this. Because it's the truth: they're fringe doomsday preppers in suits. They're that creepy uncle who has a basement full of cans of creamed corn and threw out his microwave because he thinks the government bugged it. They're the ones who believe in the Illuminati, and warehouses of alien corpses, and the New World Order. They see Jesus in toast and believe in chemtrails and snake-oil cures. They think UPC codes are the Mark of the Beast.

@noondlyt If only. I tried for 30 years to get my family to consider my basic human rights when voting and never got anywhere. I've now divested myself from almost all of them. It's a cult, and you can't fight blind faith with reason.

The couple of people I think I can reach, though, are the left-leaning ones who don't understand how our government is structured and think Democrats are to blame for the shit we're in, despite our being outnumbered in elected offices.

@darnell Manchin isn't a Democrat anymore. No one likes him.

@timo21 @GottaLaff That said, I DO respond when I can, because I love messing with their demographic assumptions (married with kids, white, middle aged, suburban homeowner with a high household income. I should be a raging Republican, but nope!)

@timo21 @GottaLaff Polls only count people who have enough free time and trust of strangers to answer a bunch of questions, whether that's phone or online. Therefore, they're unlikely to reach people working long hours, caring for kids or ill loved ones, or who have long commutes or speak little English. Even if they weight the results based on electorate demographics, it's unlikely that the people they do talk to are representative of everyone else they share race or age with.

@evan @augieray Let me guess: You're a cishet guy. Probably white. Yes? Because if you don't think loading up SCOTUS with a bunch of theocrats and laying waste to the legal principle of the right to privacy is dire, then it's clearly because you don't think you've lost anything, nor stand to lose more.

Wonder if you'll still feel the same when they ban porn.

@evan @Amoshias @augieray There is still a Russia under Putin. Doesn't mean it's not a fucked-up mess with sham elections and violent oppression.

@evan @Amoshias @augieray I have extended family who had to evacuate *Israel* because of shit going down. The majority of Israelis don't want Bibi in office, much less doing what he's doing (have you seen the scale of the protests?) But they also don't want to be targets for Hamas, Iran or any of the other hostile entities in the region. The whole area is an absolute mess, all because assholes are fighting over who's entitled to own all of it. And Biden can't change that. No one can.

@evan @Amoshias @augieray "We" survived? And the million-plus COVID deaths due to completely fucked up handling of the pandemic are meaningless, I guess?

Also, I'll remind you that had Democrats not taken the House in 2018, things would have been much, much worse. He won't make that mistake again. Believe him when he tells you he wants to go full dictator.

@evan @augieray @Amoshias Generic anti-interventionism doesn't stop war. It just lets monsters like Putin do whatever they feel like doing.