Great fight.

there is zero reason for anyone to believe Epstein killed himself

Except that this would be completely normal for a prisoner.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/08/thirty-two-stories-jeffrey-epstein-prison-death/596029/

To be clear, that was in 2008 when he was serving time in Florida. The situation in 2019 in NYC was very different.

You don’t need an apostrophe to make something plural.

See also: “rolling coal” is manly. Riding a bike using your own manly body to propel you is weak and “gay”.

It’s been like that for decades now, going back at least to George W. Bush saying that Al Qaeda “hates us for our freedoms”.

If someone else had started a third party, it might have pulled support from both parties. But, I think there aren’t many democrats who will join his party after he did so much to get Trump elected, then worked for his government for a while.

I hope he throws billions at this project, because IMO the only thing it might do is fracture the GOP base.

It’s not pseudo-science. The science behind it is solid. But, weather is very chaotic. It’s known to work to a certain extent, but it has relatively minor effects, it’s very unpredictable, has unpredictable side effects, and is fairly expensive. All you’re really doing is slightly boosting the formation of ice crystals in the clouds by adding a material that will hopefully produce more nucleation sites. It works in a lab, but how well it works up in the atmosphere is unknown. It probably does something, but it’s very hard to get an estimate of your “bang for the buck”.

For example, Beijing tried it during the 2008 Olympics to reduce the chances of rain during the Olympic opening and closing ceremonies. There was a moderate chance of rain predicted to happen during the opening ceremony. The government launched more than 1000 rain dispersal rockets, and it didn’t rain during the opening ceremony. Did the rockets disperse the rain? Or did it simply not rain because that’s not how the clouds developed. Who can say?

I am seriously wondering when the moon landing denialists and the flat earth morons and the HIV-denialists will get their day of representation, too.

What is it about this current admin, and the secretary of HHS that makes you think that today isn’t already that day?

She’ll be re-elected because her district is very white, very rural, and very disinformed by sources like Fox News, Newsmax, and conservative AM talk radio. On the rare occasions that the democrats bother to run someone in her district they tend to get less than 30% of the vote. And, if there were ever a danger that the seat might be close, the borders would be adjusted to ensure it stays safely Republican.

The problem goes much deeper than voting or not voting.

This logic does no justice to the objective financial harm being done to the creators/owners of valuable data/content/media.

“Financial harm” is a loaded term. People expected to make money and then didn’t, but is that a bad thing?

What if the US president declared that it is now a legal requirement that every American subscribe to a new paid tier of Facebook, and that declaration was rubber stamped by the lawmakers. Anybody who didn’t capitulate would be doing “financial harm” to Meta, but is that really a fair way to frame that? If a bully wants your lunch money and you resist, are you doing “financial harm” to the bully?

The way I see things, the initial copyright laws were a relatively fair trade: a 14 year monopoly on something, that could be renewed for another 14 years if the author was still alive. In exchange, everything after that term became part of the public domain. So, it would encourage people to produce writing, and the public would benefit because a reasonable amount of time later what was produced would be available to everybody at no cost. Modern copyright terms are a massive give-away to Hollywood, the record labels, etc. So, while it’s true that infringing copyright does reduce the potential amount of money a copyright holder might hope to receive, morally it’s closer to fighting off a bully than it is to theft.

The 1950s economy was the result of:

1. The New Deal
2. A world war which destroyed the infrastructure of every developed economy except for the US.

The New Deal was only possible because of the Great Depression. Only that level of chaos was enough so that left-wing politicians could push through radical reforms that moved power from the elite to the workers. The reforms of the New Deal remained in place after the war, at least for a while.

The second world war saw the destruction of the industrial capacity of the UK, Germany, France and the USSR. Meanwhile the only attack on the US was an attack on military targets at a Navy base in a distant territory.

So, if you want an economy similar to the 1950s, arrange for a world war which somehow leaves the US unscathed but destroys every other similarly developed economy, then arrange for a great depression which destroys the economy to such an extent that radical reforms can be enacted to hand power to the average worker.

Yes, of course nothing bad would happen if we switched to a 20 hour work week. But, the people with the power aren’t going to just allow that to happen. The 40 hour work week only happened with a massive series of strikes that were brutally put down by the cops. The change to a 20 hour week isn’t just going to happen because some workers think it would be cool.

That’s absolute bullshit. When the 40 hour workweek was “invented”, men were working 12 hour days in factories and their wives also worked. The wives sometimes worked in factories, often worked as domestic servants for richer people, or did home-based work. Home based work was often laundry or cooking for other people, not just their family. They’d sometimes also finish goods that were produced in a factory. Both partners were working 12+ days. And, while women did most of the home cooking and cleaning, it wasn’t as though that’s all they did.

This system ended because the workers used their power and went on strike. The result was the Haymarket Affair and is the reason that most countries, other than the US, celebrate a worker’s day on May 1st. The striking workers were attacked and beaten by the cops, and then because a bomb was thrown at a cop, the leaders of an anarchist group were rounded up and hanged after show trials.

Eventually the striking workers got what they were working for: an 8 hour day. But, it took decades after the Haymarket Affair for it to happen, and it wasn’t something that happened because everyone agreed it made sense. It was a long and bloody fight where that was the compromise that reduced the bloodshed.

If you want a 20 hour work week, join a union, prepare to go on strike and prepare to be beaten by the cops.

The first who joined that Safe Place for Science program. I’m sure there have been others who didn’t know about that, or didn’t want the publicity, but just left quietly when they realized how bad things were getting.

it is people, indeed

deleted by creator

The alternative to birthright is blood right or inheritance right.

Which is a right based on your conditions of birth, and therefore a form of birthright citizenship. Both Jus Sanguinis and Jus Solis are forms of birthright citizenship.

For some of them it’s “if you don’t want to risk your life in the armed forces, but really, really want other people to go and murder children and steal land so you can benefit, go study the Talmud”.

It’s about as narrowly targeted a chant as you can get.

It’s not about jews. It’s not about israelis. It’s specifically the army of israel. If that’s not narrowly targeted enough, what’s acceptable? “Down with the members of the IDF who intentionally target civilians but not those members of the IDF who are willing to risk a court martial to make sure that they only attack valid military targets?” Doesn’t make a very good chant.

AFAIK you can also not join the IDF by simply being extremely religious.