Trust isn’t the issue. Probability is. Even without deception, there’s a chance someone can have an STD without knowing it. And there’s a chance that std won’t show up on testing due to incubation times, dormancy phases, and false negatives.

Imagine there is a 1% chance of your partner having an STD without knowing it. 1% doesn’t sound too bad an odds. But if you have 50 partners in an extended polycule, then the chance that at least one of them unknowingly has one is 1-(.99)^50, or 39%. Probabilities compound.

I’m like, “fuck it. We’ll do it live. I’ll learn how to make my own damned wooden furniture!”

The problem with this is that anywhere you can store a file or place a backup then becomes a legal target for an ICE raid. They get a warrant to steal all your stuff, regardless of where it may be. When they steal your computers, they’ll find records of your system sending files off to an offsite backup somewhere. They can then use that as legal justification to go raid your friend’s house, and they’ll steal not only your backup drive, but all your friend’s computers as well.

The only way this doesn’t work is if the files are stored on the servers of a giant multinational or an offshore cloud provider. ICE isn’t going to be breaking into data centers and physically carting off hard drives. They instead would simply request a copy of the data, and the cloud provider would share it with them.

If they can get a warrant to steal your shit, they can steal shit from your friends and family if they can show that you have files on their property as well. All this will result in is your family members having all their computers stolen as well.

People should claim to be ICE agents and go rob the homes of actual ICE agents. Accuse them of being illegal immigrants and disappear them off to fates unknown. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. Give them a taste of their own medicine.

You’re misunderstanding that you don’t need to declare an actual war to use wartime emergency powers. At any given time there are dozens of official federal emergencies, some of which have been in place for decades, allowing the White House to claim emergency powers.

People need to start breaking down the doors of the homes of rich white Republicans, accusing them of being illegal aliens, and claiming to be ICE. That’s when this will actually stop.

What country are you in, and what have you done to make it easier for people to claim asylum there?

They need to be dissolved. In acid.

Yup. Really easy to stuff some cash in the till and declare it as income with a car wash. Actually clean 100 cars a day? Buy enough cleaning supplies for 130 cars. Report on your records that you sold 130 washes. Dump the excess chemicals down the drain or just use them abundantly during washes. Sure, if you claim to wash a thousand cars when you only washed 100, then that could get you caught quickly. But if you’re not greedy, you could keep such a setup going for a very long time.

Could it be a landlord situation? It’s pretty cheap to open an LLC. Sometimes landlords will open many of them, an LLC for every rental property they own. It protects them from liability. If something goes really wrong and a tenant sues them for big $$$, the most they risk losing is the single rental house the tenant is renting.

“I know I support the murder of you and your people. But I’m still going to need you to vote for me, so that I can preserve democracy and the economy. You may not live to see it, but the rest of us will really appreciate it.”

I for one could never vote for a man to be president. Men are just too emotional to serve as leaders. Do you really want some roid-rage dude with his hands on the nuclear button? Please. Men are just too pigheaded, irrational, and obsessed with petty dominance issues to be trusted with real power. They’re like selfish little children. Can you imagine it, a male president? The very idea is laughable! Only someone who knows just how hard it is to birth and raise a child should be trusted with the power to direct the military to take lives. Only women can really grasp the real stakes involved. /s

Better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven.

They could work to remove the destitution and desperation of working people. But if their workers weren’t in such dire straits, then they wouldn’t have so much power over them. Workers with good pay and a healthy work-life balance also have more time to pursue unionization and other political activities. Even if improving the lives of the people would objectively increase the wealth of the ultra-rich, it would still decrease their power. And ultimately, the only reason people ever obtain that level of wealth is because they desire power more than anything else. People who aren’t power-hungry monsters cash out and retire early long before they reach billionaire status.

I wish for another wishing well.

That’s the policy at most schools. Actually enforcing that in the face of a classroom of kids who don’t respect the rule? That’s a much bigger problem. They’re a lot more clever at sneaking them out than you would think. Moreover, if the phones are just feet from them, their presence is never out of mind. They’re a constant distraction even in a bag. Phone apps are literally designed to be addictive. Imagine if we had a rule that said “crack pipes are fine in your bag. As long as you don’t take them out and smoke in class, you’re fine.” Even if we lived in a world where crack somehow was legal for minors to have, how effective to you think that rule could be enforced?

First, that is an extremely bad-faith interpretation of my words, and you know it.

Second, historically, when countries face autocratic moments like ours, often the only way they out the autocrat is by completely abandoning the corrupt center-left party that allowed and enabled the far right authoritarians. Voters often spend several election cycles fruitlessly trying to get the center-left party to make the necessary changes to challenge the autocrat. In the end, the center left party loses more and more popularity, until it collapses completely. Their credibility is mud with the general populace; they simply have no viable path to winning an election. The party needs to collapse into nothing. Only then is there enough room for a new party that can actually challenge the autocrat to rise. They try several cycles of dutifully voting for the center-left corporate party, but it just doesn’t work. In the end they just have to let it burn.

Centrist Dems are not going to be able to defeat Trumpism. And this inability also makes them incredibly weak candidates to win elections against Trumpism. If the DNC is going to just keep forcing useless ineffectual centrists on the party, really, the quickest way to defeat MAGA will be for as many Democrats to abandon the Democratic Party and vow to never vote for them again. Centrist dems will just keep losing election after election after election. They’re losers. Weak, ineffectual losers. They can’t win elections against Trump. Biden only managed to eek out a win in 2020 due to Covid.

If Dems are going to keep forcing corporate centrists through, you are actually delaying the defeat of Trumpism by voting for them. As corporate Dems can’t win a general election against Trumpism, voting for them is as completely pointless as voting for third party candidates in 2024. Centrist Dems just aren’t serious presidential contenders anymore; you shouldn’t take them seriously. A vote for a centrist Dem is a vote for another MAGA term. Even if a corporate Dem gets the nomination, a vote for them is still a vote for a longer MAGA reign.

If they force another corporate centrist through in 2028, the 2028 election is already lost. At that point, the goal should be to make sure that the corporate candidate loses spectacularly. The corporate Dem is never going to win, but they might eek out a 45-55 loss that lets the DNC keep pretending that corporate Dems have a chance at winning the general election. At that point, with the election already lost, the goal should be to make sure the centrist Dem loses by an overwhelming, comically large 30-70 margin or similar. You need to take so much credibility from the Dems that the party collapses completely.

We’re in a fight that is going to take more than one election cycle. Accept that now. You need to think more strategically than just one election cycle in the future. Because “vote blue no matter who” can actually extend the reign of the MAGA movement.

Hopefully we won’t get stuck with a shithead corporate centrist in 2028. But if we do, I’ll be boycotting the presidential general election, only voting in the Congressional elections. I do this because I care about the country, and I want to see MAGA defeated as quickly as possible. If a corporate Dem is the nominee in 2028, then Dems have already lost the election. At that point, your thoughts should immediately move to 2032, as that will be the next chance Dems have at ousting MAGA.

The concentration camps for Japanese Americans were concentration camps in the 19th century sense of the word - simply a place to hold a group of civilians during a conflict. CECOT is a concentration camp in the Nazi sense of the word - an extermination camp.

I can confirm. I was there standing in the corner watching. But in a strictly nonsexual way.