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Post by Geo 🇺🇦 🌻 on Jun 29, 2022 8:51:40 GMT -5
Been keeping up with the January 6th commission hearings…. Can my country please impose consequences on the former president please? We were that close to losing our democracy. Had Secret Service allowed him to march on the capitol and participate in an insurrection, the violent mob might have succeeded. A wannabe dictator with their supporters is one that is more likely to succeed. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/06/hutchinson-testimony-deranged-seditious-president/661424/He lunged at his driver and tried to grab the steering wheel when they told him he was going back to the Oval Office and not the Capitol. He threw his lunch (including a porcelain plate) against the wall when then AG Bill Barr told him there was no widespread voter fraud. These are not the actions of someone fit for office.
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Post by Celestial on Jul 12, 2022 9:02:06 GMT -5
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/07/ukraine-russia-war-hate/661458/A really good article about the hatred so many Ukrainians feel for Russians during this war. It sums up very well how I feel as well. I am not a hateful person, and never have been, but this deep, festering hatred has taken root in my soul. I flinch when I hear Russian and glare at people who speak it unless I know them and I know where they stand. Russian is my first language too. I don't like it. But I cannot stop it either, and I think most people would understand why.
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Post by Ian Wolf-Park on Sept 8, 2022 16:55:55 GMT -5
I'm not sure where to put this, but
"The Queen is dead, long live the King!"
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Post by Breakingchains on Mar 30, 2023 18:01:58 GMT -5
Welp!
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Post by Gelquie on Jul 5, 2023 4:30:08 GMT -5
Every time I hear more about the Titan submersible incident (that resulted in 5 deaths), the worse it gets.
I mean, even when I first heard about it and got interested in hearing more, I took one look at the details and went "what are you doing."
Cue every article that gives more details that again makes me go "what are you doing???".
The egoism from Stockton Rush is so giant and willful regardless of the safety of everyone else (which he was so offended by safety complaints that he took them as personal insults and removed 'safety' from his vocabulary unless he was decrying it), that it's hard to believe that he's not a stock cartoon capitalist villain character in a one-off mediocre movie.
The victims were Rush himself, two billionaires, the son of a billionaire who didn't even want to go but wanted to impress his dad, and... a submariner and deep sea explorer, Nargeolet. That last one perplexed me the most. Then I read a New Yorker article from July 1st that went more into depth, which I can't link because it has swears (from quotes). And... the guy recently lost his wife. His quotes sounded like he was low-key suicidal. He denied it, going "No, no, but I figure that, maybe if I’m out there, I can help them avoid a tragedy." ...So that's super depressing.
There's a story and a moral here. But it's kind of so obvious that I can't help but wonder if we're in some extremely run-of-the-mill mediocre movie where the moral is obvious from the start but the writing insists you need it hammered into your skull in case you miss it, and the Rush character isn't even interesting enough to justify that. Maybe at least CEO people who shout "innovation over safety" will take safety more seriously. ...Eh, probably not.
And yes, there is also the issue of migrant vessels sinking to the bottom of the Mediterranean because migrant laws have been tightened so severely against people in trouble that hundred of people are dying from it, to sadly less media attention. That is the bigger disaster, and you can consider yourself morally correct to focus more on that.
...For me, I'm inherently interested in the physics and earth sciences, and there's a lot to take apart here in those regards, so that's why my focus is there.
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Post by Stephanie (swordlilly) on Jul 7, 2023 19:18:45 GMT -5
I'll be honest, I don't have a lot of sympathy for the people who died in the Titan submersible incident. Except maybe the nineteen-year-old son.
To me, the incident just feels like a more dramatic version of the many cases of rich people feeling like they're above the rules and ignoring safety warnings when skiing, climbing etc. Lots of people die every year in those kinds of incidents but I guess they don't get as much media attention because they didn't spur such an expensive and drawn-out search operation.
Also... the tickets of the father and son combined cost 500,000 USD. That amount could've helped launch ten mid-sized businesses. Or built six tiny houses for homeless people. It's just... such a waste of half a million dollars.
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Post by Breakingchains on Oct 3, 2023 19:47:19 GMT -5
Those of you in the USA should be aware that the updated covid boosters are out, free, and available to all again. Got mine at Walgreens yesterday along with a free flu shot.
Feels good to get mah stabby health juice.
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Post by Breakingchains on Nov 21, 2023 18:51:05 GMT -5
So in the United states, if you are disabled and on SSI income, you are limited to a maximum of $2000 in assets, total, at any one time. That's not 2k from your SSI. That's 2k total, ever. You can't have it in the bank, you can't receive it as a gift, you can't earn it through part time work or anything else. If you do, they are watching and you WILL start getting phone calls and getting your SSI taken away. As far as I can tell, this number has not shifted since the 1980s or possibly earlier. Yeah. It's barbaric. Anyway, the SSI Savings Penalty Elimination Act is hitting the senate. This bill would increase the amount to $20,000 and also index it to inflation, allowing it to increase automatically over time. This link will give you quick handy information about who to contact and how.
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Post by Breakingchains on Dec 13, 2023 15:37:38 GMT -5
The Biden administration has approved 8.2 billion dollars to create and restore American railways! Why this is so cool, for non-USAnians: The U.S. is, famously, pretty big ( imperialism will do that) while having increasingly poor infrastructure and poor urban planning, which makes it very hard for your average citizen to travel compared to many other places in the world. A real life example: seeing my boyfriend is typically a five-hour drive each way, and we're both generally considered "Southerners". We live in adjacent states. The U.S. really, really needs good, fast, long distance travel and trains fit the bill. Historically, we knew that, but we've mostly let the railway system decay and allowed the focus to move overwhelmingly to car and bus travel, with planes for longer distances. The costs for the individual traveler can get eye-popping fast, not to mention the environmental effects and driving being way more dangerous than a modern train system would be. And if I had to guess, this is also going to mean lots of government jobs in the trades opening up. This is going to take a LOT of skilled labor over a period of years. On a personal level, this helps me cement my decision to go into welding school...
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