M R 🇺🇸

The greatest good in a government is not to be democratic for its own sake. A tyranny brought on by propagandized/indoctrinated masses is still a tyranny. George Orwell is known for 1984, but I think he lays out tyranny more clearly in Animal Farm: There is a large portion of the population that is highly susceptible to propaganda. If you control the media and propagandize them, then you can maintain the appearance that your regime is popular and loved, and make dissenters believe that they are a minority, and that they should accept their oppression. In Animal Farm, George Orwell illustrated this with the sheep. They would be coached on what to say, and then they'd go and say it. This is the aim of propaganda. "Manufactured consent". You control the narrative heavily to make the sheep want what you want. Then your regime appears to be popular, which grants it the appearance of legitimacy. Democracy is not immune from this. If the media becomes controlled, they can frame things to control the narrative, and "manufacture" consent by presenting stories and facts in such a way that convinces viewers to take the belief or view they want them to have. "Those people across the globe are a threat to us. They're evil. Join the army because we want you go to kill them. We are the good guys. You should be happy to fight for us." "Iraq has WMDs." Now, Democracy. The idea in its modern incarnation was born out of an era of Feudalism. The royals would rule, the nobles would manage. It's true, there are different kinds of people, some better-suited for leadership than others, some better-equipped for managerial work than others. Peasants who did a great deed would be given a Title of Nobility as a reward, and allowed to delegate the authority of the Royals. Nobles who were unworthy or failed at their tasks were stripped of their title. So, by this process, it was hoped that the nobles would be all the "noble" people of society. The vestiges of the ideal even remain in our language in the descriptor "noble" to mean virtuous and high-minded. A virtuous managerial class, who were more educated and wise and could thus lead, manage, support, and even represent the interests of the peasantry. Indeed, the royals themselves would speak with a royal "we", speaking for the whole nation. And that's the crux of it. The ideal, even in Feudalism, was a government that would represent The People. Of course, I'm speaking broadly of an era that lasted a thousand years and spanned hundreds of countries and dozens of regions and languages and cultures - so things varied a lot, but generally speaking, in English tradition, the royalty was meant to represent the interests of the entire country, and the nobles would represent the interests of their appointed regions. However, clearly things did not go quite like that. In The Americas, without a local entrenched nobility, people were more free. They realized that they did not actually need the nobility. But at the same time, nobles were a means of representing that region - without many nobles having established themselves in the Americas - with them being colonies - they were left without someone to plea on their behalf in the court of the King. They were left without representation. Their voices were not being heard. They were being disregarded. Their rights were being trampled on and ignored. For example, travelling the Atlantic was a multi-month affair that was hugely expensive - and yet people were often transported to England to stand trial - even if they were completely innocent, this would take upwards of a year of their life in just the travel time - and most could not afford to go back home to America at all. That's just one example of many wrongs England did to the Americans. The Declaration lists them in greater detail: archives.gov/founding-docs/… Many people aren't aware of this, but the Declaration wasn't actually signed until the war had very much already broken out de facto. The battles of Lexington and Concord, Bunker Hill had already been fought, and a British occupation of Boston had already been repelled by the Continental Army before the document was written and signed. Clearly, they had not been represented. The King saw them as an enemy long before they declared Independence. So, their hope was to make a new government with an ancient system going back to ancient Rome and Greece - Democracy. Many writers of this time even used pseudonyms of ancient Roman names. On the back of our penny is a the Roman Parthenon and a latin phrase (obviously this wouldn't come about for a long time after the Revolution, but its design is very much a conscious and informed callback to our government's Roman inspiration). All this is to say, Democracy was not in and of itself a good thing. Many today treat the concept itself as sacred, but far from it. Democracy was an experiment in creating a system of government that would hopefully do better in securing the liberty and safeguarding against tyranny than England's royalty. Now, what am I all on about, here? Well, this is very much relevant to our present day. We again have an entrenched nobility as political elites. The Bushes, the Clintons - family dynasties with great power within their respective parties. See, there's a large problem that has arisen: Money wins elections. Candidates need campaign funds to run and to win. To advertise, and to make the connections within the party to legitimize themselves. But a lot of money is needed to win. More than most people could ever hope to afford. But it's not as though this is new - there were very rich and poor people even in the Americas at its founding. Washington himself owned a large estate. But he was willing to shell his own estate in the course of fighting for independence (when at one point it was occupied by British forces). The issue is when the interests of the wealthy are in direct conflict of the interests of The People. In present-day America, the interests of the average voter are extremely weak in contributing to political change. I hate to cite Vox of all things, but this study they talk about gets it right: vox.com/2014/4/18/5624… This is something the left actually understands. When I was young, I thought Occupy Wall Street was stupid and socialist. But now I understand just how right they were. Politicians need money to win elections. Corporations want favorable laws to be more profitable. So what happens when corporations want to devalue labor? It doesn't matter that it makes us citizens in the US poorer, corporations want cheaper labor, and they get it through mass immigration and open borders. What happens when Congressmen can invest in Raytheon and Lockheed, then send us to war? The war industries profit, and the Congressmen profit, too. And after they finish their terms, they get to land a cushy spot on the board of directors as a reward for them enriching the company. And thus we get sent to war. Not because we want it as a voterbase - but because there was profit to be had. Not from oil, but from lucrative government contracts. And so they manufacture the consent by telling us Iraq has WMDs, about how we need to go and fight there to keep us safe here. And this goes on with so much more than just war and immigration. It also happens with tariffs and trade agreements. With railway regulations and pharmaceuticals. And this is not without victims. For the first time in a century, this generation is set to be poorer than our parents. With our labor devalued and 90% of all job growth since COVID going to immigrants (actual stat) - we can't afford our own homes. We become serfs, renters. To an economy increasingly built around subscription services. To say nothing of the taxes. The income tax was first introduced by Lincoln for the Civil War, then it was repealed shortly after over. It was re-introduced in 1894 (in a form that would tax less than 10% of people) then found unconstitutional. It wasn't until the 16th Amendment that it was even legal for an income tax to exist in any practical form (#Early_federal_income_taxes" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_ta…). In other words, we built the Great White Fleet (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Whi…) and became a major world power with all the security we needed years before income taxes even existed. So... why is this not even up for debate? Maybe it's unpopular, but you don't see any candidates promising any real changes. It's to the point where many people believe politics doesn't really affect their lives, and they have no control over it. Without the option of a candidate who may do "radical" things, like defund/close entire agencies or fundamentally alter tax structure - we don't really have any representation. We can't even vote on it. A nobleman who wants to be popular with the crowds in his district and so fervently argues on behalf of what his district wants in the king's court would represent us better than a Democratic system where the only viable options on voting are people who will do nothing for you. Our representation is fake. They're actors who look nice and smile but don't promise very much, and actually do even less. Because the beaurocratic system pays them to keep itself alive, and they need its pay to campaign and win. This is the quagmire we were stuck in. Until 2016. A billionaire with his own business empire does not need to be supported by the strings of corporate donations. It's really as simple as that. I presume he probably wants to be renowned as a great world leader, loved by crowds. So he gives the crowds what they want. And so they vote for him. It really is that simple. I do not understand how someone can say they believe in Democracy and yet say "populist" as though it were a slur, attaching negative associations and connotations to it. Yes, dictators often appear to have a cult following, often from people who are consumed by propaganda or afraid for their lives. But being popular by giving The People what they want is called representation, which is the entire point of a Democracy - to create a system which better represents The People. The entire reason voting exists is so that we can peacefully change the government to better represent us and what we want. And yet - I'm supposed to believe the one serious presidential candidate (and President) in my voting lifetime to ever genuinely represent the will of The People instead of being a puppet to corporate interests, is a threat to democracy? And a disturbingly large number of people would celebrate my death because of this? What is he a tyrant for? For being an enemy of the elitist pseudo-nobility class that runs our government? For wanting to enact basic border control? Oh, oh, a certain German political party from the 1930's to 1940's wanted that, too - well you know their first act in power was to ban fox hunting. I suppose if a President would want to declare foxes an endangered species and illegal to hunt, that would also make them similar to a certain German political group from the 1930s. Color me ignorant, but I believe it's possible to have basic representation of what The People actually want, to fix their economy, and not have millions of immigrants every year, without committing genocide. In fact, I believe most countries throughout most of history have managed to not open themselves to mass migration, and also not commit genocide at the same time. But I'm concerned. A Democracy only works if everyone is willing to play by the rules. If the Left is willing to condone violence in such large numbers, not only against Trump himself - but against common people like me for supporting him, is it even possible to have a Democratic Republic with them? If they can't abide by the basic rules of the voting process - like basic security to ensure only citizens can vote - then they've quit democracy and would be removing my representation by subterfuge. And after - not just one trying to kill our candidate, our vote representative - but after such a huge number of them openly celebrate this attack on the most basic foundation of a Republic - I find it very difficult to trust that they will not cheat other fundamental democratic processes. Make up whatever excuses you will, they've shown their hand in celebrating what happened yesterday, or in wishing it had gone differently. Even if it's just 1% of them, that's enough fraud to rob me of my basic representation. At that point - if that's where we go - then "Democracy" will already be gone. If I'm not allowed to vote for my candidate of choice, or if said vote is rendered useless by others violating the rules of the process, then there is no democracy, only a pale illusion of one. What then, should I desire, to ensure my representation in government? Let us pray that we do not reach that point. "Democracy" - our Republic - is, indeed, under grave threat and danger here. The incredible mental gymnastics is in how the media has managed to convince so many people that the danger is someone who is seeking votes - and not in people who are willing to subvert the core of the democratic process itself. Imagine, if you will, someone who thinks they must violate the democratic process in order to preserve it. That's what we saw yesterday. And that's what we see in everyone who celebrates it. They only believe it's "democracy" when the other candidate is dead. All the while, they call us fascists. And yet, I'm still willing to abide by the rules of a democratic process, even after I believe it was violated last time. Are they? They call us violent for our talk, even while our candidate's face is splattered with his own blood by an attempt on his life. "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." - John F. Kennedy I still seek peaceful means to obtain representation. But when so many cheer a murderer and assassin and wish he had succeeded, I have to wonder - do they?

@Mini_Lolise_2 That's it! They've always evoked a quick, very small feeling from me whenever I step on them, and I think I know what it is now - it's relief/triumph that I overcame my childhood fear of them and now know they're pretty safe and harmless.

I actually used to be afraid of escalators when I was little. Especially the ones that turned into steps

@haruame0204 Human psychology was meant to live in a family with children so you actually live with this kind of cute experience. I feel it. A paternal yearning.

けもみみっこと暮らしたい、、、

@doughimself Idea! On the menu, in text under the burger's listing, you could add an option "Take Airplane Pick Home + ¥1,500" or something. Also is there a clear place for returning the picks?

僕のハンバーガーのトレードマークと言っても過言ではない飛行機のピック。これが驚くほどの勢いでなくなっていく。こだわっているので原価一本1300円。なくなる（盗まれる）度に心も懐も痛い。これ、普通に見て「持って帰っていいもの」と思うのか。「常識」とは何かがわからなくなってきている。

@panyaten @doughimself YES! This! This is exactly what I was thinking.

@doughimself 販売用として2000円等メニューに載せると、持ち帰ってはいけないと伝わると思います。 またテーブルに串入れのような筒を置いて、ピック入れとして設置すれば更に持ち帰りは減ると思います。

@grandabbotmeteo @the_creature107 @nise_yoshimi He did flee to America, though. That's how he wound up in Paperclip. He nearly died in a harrowing escape near the end of the war. Broke his arm His V2 ultimately progressed spaceflight but hindered Germany. He designed a science machine the Nazis used ineffectively as a weapon

@the_creature107 @nise_yoshimi Tons of Germans fled the country to America. He might have died trying, but that is better than being extremely complicit in war crimes and slave labor.

How it feels to get away with it

Ultimately his work was a hindrance to the Warmacht and more people survived the holocaust as a result of it requiring them alive for labor. And I doubt it bothered him that he set back the war effort. His goal since childhood was developing spaceflight technology, and at that he succeeded. He was aiming for the stars, not London. And I have yet to see any evidence he had ANY control over labor practices. Even as it was, he was once arrested by the Nazis and imprisoned for suspicion of disloyalty. He knew he was dead and all his work for taking man to the stars would be burned if he opposed the regime openly. So he fooled them into working on spaceflight instead of war, instead.

What did he actually DO, though? People seem to love to hate rally but like, he wasted a huge amount of the Wermacht's resources on what was expensive and ineffective as a weapon but was invaluable to humanity reaching for the stars and got prisoners moved out of death camps to work on it. The work conditions were horrid but A. did he, personally, have any control over that? And B. were they worse than the death camps they got moved out of to work there? Or did many of those prisoners survive only because they were moved out of the camps? The most hardline Nazis hated him postwar because he willingly fled his post to go bring the technology to America (and flee the murderous rampage of the Soviets). He also opposed segregation, I hear. But so many self-proclaimed anti-Nazis seem to wish he died as much as the postwar Nazis did. His own writing before, during, and after the war point to someone who was inspired/motivated to take man to the stars, who was very depressed that he could only pursue that line of technology under the guise of a weapon. But given Germany lost and the V2 was an ineffective waste of resources as a weapon but a pivotal milestone for man reaching space, it seems he was right that its legacy towards freeing man from gravity's bonds would far transcend its legacy as a weapon. I'm very glad he got to live to see his childhood dreams fulfilled of putting man in space and sending man to another world (our moon).

So? Did he actually have any control over that? You'd might as well blame the slave laborers who were forced to work on the weapons or die for the damage the weapons caused. And the laborers were moved out of death camps to work on V2s iirc. The V2 program saved them from the death camps. Inasmuch as you can even blame him for the labor practices you should laud him for getting prisoners out of camps, countless doubtless only survived because of the labor assignment. The V2 was ineffective and extremely expensive as a weapon, to boot. But postwar they provided invaluable science as sounding rockets at White Sands in exploring the environment of space for the first time. His childhood dream was sending man to the stars, and that's what he accomplished with his life. He was instrumental to Apollo, but was ultimately a hindrance to both the Warmacht and the Holocaust.

@charlesmayne69 @Memphissippi6 @nise_yoshimi Just auto-translate this. The V-2s he designed and oversaw production of were built by slave-workers of the work-camp Mittelbau-Dora, his production site was within 5km of that camp. dlr.de/de/ar/download…

@PunishedNM @nise_yoshimi He was a better person than you and did more to advance humanity reaching the stars than you ever will. His program even actively got Jews moved out of death camps, meaning he also did more to save innocent people from execution than you will ever care to think of trying.

@nise_yoshimi Notice how he went to the deep south specifically post-paperclip? For all those saying that the scientists of the Reich 'werent n*zis' lmfao

A lotta people saying "I'd open the door then shoot him". I'm no lawyer so I could be wrong, but I think that would be like the worst thing to do, because a judge or jury is gonna ask you why you opened a strong, locked door if you were legitimately in fear of your life, and opening the door is sort of granting permission for someone to enter, at which point it's not as clear if they're "breaking and entering" if you allowed them in, and with that, many if not most self-defense laws would get thrown into question of if they apply. They try not to make self-defense laws that legalize murdering house guests. You not granting them permission to enter is a huge part of most of them. I think. Not a lawyer of course. Could be wrong. But that's what I think.

What would you have done the moment he asked about your daughter?

This is Judge Tracey Lloyd-Clarke, she has sentenced an ex-soldier with PTSD, Daffron Williams, to two and a half years in prison for Facebook comments. She also sentenced someone for posting a video on social media to 12 months. But that exact same judge let off a child rapist called Reese Newman because she said the prisons were overcrowded This is British Justice.

@MediaSOI Violently revolting continues to be the greatest thing my ancestors ever did, right up there along with leaving Europe.

Compare: T-72 and T-90 autoloader with ammo stored such that a penetration will often vaporize the entire crew and toss the turret Vs The Abrams, with blow-out panels to save the crew even if the tank is lost. The US has far more wealth than manpower, so our tank crew is more important than the tank. With China and the USSR, this was inverted. They could conscript endless millions that we could not. As such, getting a replacement crew was much easier for them, even easier than a replacement tank. We rely on a volunteer army since conscription is political death to our leaders (unless WW3, but 90% of wars are not WW3 - and even then...). So we have far less manpower, but a much higher per capita GDP to spend much more training them to the highest standards and giving them the best gear. And it works wonders. Just compare the Gulf War to Ukraine. One was on the opposite side of the planet. The other literally borders Russia.

@hellznobro @Skellerific @Ken_LoveTW "whereas US subs were slower but prioritized sailor safety" 😂🤣 Goodness, this sort of slop! You could say the 2 made different strategic choices, each with its disadvantages, but to pretend the US choice is safer is pure brain-rotting NATO kool aid!

China just ran a military drill simulating a decapitation strike on Taiwan’s president, reportedly modeled on the U.S. operation that captured Maduro. The message Beijing wants to send is simple: “We can do what America does.” But here’s the problem. The U.S. accounts for more than half of global military spending. Its weapons systems are built on a doctrine that prioritizes human life over material cost. This military model is uniquely suited to the United States and not easily replicable by others. Any country that blindly imitates the U.S. military model risks becoming a caricature , a poor imitation without substance. Turning back to China, Beijing’s military thinking once followed Mao Zedong’s doctrine of “people’s war,” which emphasized mass mobilization and indifference to casualties. During the Korean War, Chinese “volunteer forces” relied on human-wave tactics to counter America’s mechanized firepower. Today, however, Beijing’s leadership has abandoned Mao’s military philosophy and instead imitates U.S. weapons design and operational styles — stealth fighters, electromagnetic-catapult carriers, and advanced missile systems — all replicas of American equipment. The problem is that China’s technological level has not reached U.S. standards. As a result, these American-style weapons often perform far worse and are largely superficial. For instance, compared with the U.S. F-35, China’s J-20 still lags significantly in stealth performance and electronic systems. The Fujian carrier’s electromagnetic catapult may be touted as advanced, but it suffers from poor reliability and high costs, and it remains unclear whether it is suitable for real combat operations within China’s naval strategy. That’s a strategic mismatch. The Soviets didn’t do this. They built weapons that fit their reality: cheap, rugged, mass-produced. AK-47s. T-72s. China today has no coherent military philosophy — only imitation. And imitation without alignment produces a paper dragon with expensive toys.

We prioritized stealth, the Russians prioritized speed because they recognized that they couldn't win at the stealth game, so they tried to outrun the torpedoes (or reduce the closure rate such that the torpedo runs out of power before it reaches the sub). But yes, we put much higher standards on radiation shielding and have never lost a sub with all hands since SUBSAFE was passed with the loss of the Thresher, and afaik, I think Scorpion and Thresher are the only two nuclear subs we've ever lost. Compared to that, Russia's sub history... is not so great with safety.

Bro, you're way out of your depth on this one. 😅 An example of this during the Soviet era: Soviets had very minimal lead shielding on their nuclear reactors in their nuclear subs so that they could save weight using less lead & be faster, whereas US subs were slower but prioritized sailor safety.

@Liet4649 Oh, whoops, sorry to comment 3 times but forgot to say - nice work! Came out very nice.

My main. In fact I pretty much play her exclusively. Cute, fun to play, very satisfying AoE attacks. Almost makes me wish she had more characterization. But I suppose being a game character just means her personality is mostly however you play her, perhaps? Always fun to hear her giggle when you land a solid attack as her, though, lol. Fwoosh.

Another Li really enjoyed doing this one

To add to this - in 1964 minimum wage was $1.25, equivalent to 5x 90%-silver quarters. That same amount of silver today is worth $39. In other words, minimum wage in 1964 was $39.11. So employers are asking for the same labor while only offering less than a quarter of the pay.

you wont believe what happens next

@SargonDinkha1 @Moudens_ @allvibesnoskill @basicprompts That is one of the coolest (hah) things I've ever heard and seen. I legit thought this was some screencap from The Matrix or something until I finished reading the text and realized it's real.

@Moudens_ @allvibesnoskill @basicprompts Modern data centers use closed-loop immersion systems. Meaning dielectric liquids cool heated GPUs. The liquid evaporates as a result, due to elevated temperature from the GPU load. As the overall temperature drops, the gas condenses and changes state to liquid again.