first one in a while without a demi video

2021's was very grand, but I think 2019 is still my favorite :)

Half of Congress made it a platform to not pass any laws. I'd rather Congress worked but failing that, the only other option to executive orders is accepting that literally nothing will get done. And I'd rather Biden do what he can, especially since the Republicans will abuse orders anyways precedent be damned and have the supreme court backing them up

I've heard that selling the Saudis nuclear secrets might be how Jared Kushner got his $2B "investment"

so surely then, in the midterms, you will vote for the party aiming to codify those libertarian rights to freedom and bodily autonomy into law

on Reddit, I think that comments that are already on top tend to get way more upvotes. So just picking whatever's there is a likely win. And if everyone knows everyone's doing that then it gets stuck in a loop where winning karma is easy but it's not related to the actual content

but maybe it could work! I really think quality is mostly down to how cool the active people are moreso than comment ordering anyways.

One of these lists is how I found this place!

And aww, sad to see how bad so many of them are. Finding nice places on the internet is really hard. Luv u all hubski <3.

I mean, that's pretty much how I felt until a few weeks ago. It is fun to think about justices in terms of exponential growth and carrying capacity :p

Legit though, it seems like the two alternatives are:

Illegitimate partisan court that ping pongs every time a new party takes control

or Illegitimate partisan court that is extremely republican forever

imo it was already on shaky ground in 2000 when they just up & decided who would be the president. and when Obama was completely denied any pick at all was the beginning of the end but omg

Just this month, they've decided which gerrymandered maps are allowed on purely partisan grounds. They've ruled in ways against the 4th and 1st amendments several times in ways that no possible reading of the constitution could justify. Overturned almost a century of precedent that was upheld just 2 years ago wrt Native American sovereignty.

Maybe impeach + replace is better than packing? Keeps the numbers down at least.

And vaguely related to the house of representative thing, oh man, it's never going to happen but I did see a proposal for expanding the house to somewhere around 10,000. Every town or village would have at least one, people would vote online from the comfort of their homes, you could legitimately know your representative personally and they could still live locally instead of uprooting everything to move to DC,

Happened again 🙄

https://www.vox.com/23187117/supreme-court-louisiana-racial-gerrymander-ardoin-robinson-congressional-maps

But ofc maps that favor Democrats are completely unconstitutional since this case that I somehow missed was completely struck down

https://www.vox.com/2022/3/23/22993107/supreme-court-wisconsin-race-gerrymander-voting-rights-act-legislature-elections-commission

this is some of the most blatant partisan hackery since the election was stolen in 2000

pack the courts, who gives a shit at this point

I agree a lot with this take. There's really no line you can draw to get rid of the Republicans because they're everywhere.

Hadn't considered how remote work would affect things, hopefully you're right.

How would you split it?

Northeast + Midwest / Cascadia + Colorado / Everything Else?

Ok maybe just West?

Whatever North Dakota is. Their 800k population is sure worth a lot more than Cali's 40,000k

I mean honestly I agree. Feel like adding states is more politically feasible though.

And once there's a more equitable split of senators we won't have to pander to the Midwest as much

With a majority in the Senate willing to do something, we could:

- Add additional states or split states. In all fairness California should be at least 4. Texas, Florida, and New York at least 2. DC and Puerto Rico deserve states.

- Add additional voting rights laws, declare holidays, etc. Prevent the sort of disenfrisement happening in Texas & elsewhere

- Add additional seats in the house! Saw a really cute proposal saying we should have like 10,000 to match the same ratio of representatives to population we had when the country was founded. This doesn't need an amendment it could just happen. And then gerrymandering and bribery is basically impossible

- Interstate compact for Popular Vote (could happen)

- Pack the courts. Controversial but possible?

none of this stuff is going to happen unless we really really make it happen. So I'm not holding my breath. But it isn't totally impossible

nah man, gay stuff is next

here's the commentary I was sent and vibe with most

maybe because it's the least optimistic

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/07/04/we-are-not-going-back-to-the-time-before-roe-we-are-going-somewhere-worse

things are real bad

I do on rare occasions when I have to, but it's not that comfy and I worry about the volume damaging my ears. Found a really good mix of white & pink noise, easily my favorite thing to play.

Trying to make a decision, if y'all had any advice I'd appreciate it

My friend/old roommate who just got a Google job is moving to Austin next week and offered to split a 2/2 if I joined him there. Got super mixed feelings about it. Have to decide, like, immediately.

Context is: living with my parents in boring Florida suburbs for $0/mo rent. Working remote. There's still like 2 people I know from high school still around. Really not happy with my life but in ways that are hard (for me at least) to pin to any specific thing that should be different.

Pros:

- Austin is a cool place that has things to do

- Friend is a cool guy

- Maybe a change of scenery will happen to help

Cons:

- Expensive. Goes from saving ~90% of my paycheck to maybe 20%. Don't have any particular thing to be saving towards tho. House maybe? idk -_-

- Feels pointless to move from a Red state to another Red state.

- Feels pointless to move anywhere in America

- Not excited about the cool stuff in Austin but that will hopefully change once there

- Need a new job, which may or may not be Remote or in Austin

- If I was to open a Boardgame Cafe it probably wouldn't be in Austin

So that's basically it. Do I upset my life at the drop of a hat now that there's a reason to be in Austin? Gotta figure this one out ASAP

Other life updates:

Have the weirdest feelings about my friend's Google job. On one hand, I'm very happy for him, he clearly deserves it and this has been his dream job. On the other hand, I hate Google passionately and kinda always have. Hell, I was as that annoying guy shilling for Firefox back in high school and also in college and also right now (you gotta use Firefox!!). My other roommate just started at Amazon, another company I deeply hate. And I'm happy for them and wow they pay well and objectively what they're doing probably isn't any worse for the world than I'm doing. And logically, I probably should be working there too. But so much of my identity is tied up in hating those companies that seeing two of by besties being excited to work there is just gut wrenching.

& a sincere thank you to everyone who offered advice last week! Been having a blast with QGIS fiddling with everything. The simple fact that OpenStreetMaps exists is inspiring. So far got points for every Makerspace MakeCo knows about, every existing boardgame cafe, and a random pile of Census data. Tons to do here and being able to just pan and zoom and fiddle with colors is incredibly cute. Got the trial for LivePlan and have been having fun fiddling with that too. Then read a bunch of articles about how most coffee shops are opened by amateurs who hate office life and 90% of them fail in the first year, which was less fun.

<3

Congrats! That's so exciting :)

What sort of business are you starting?

Completely agreed, it just sucks that, like everything else in the world, this is only gonna hurt poorer people who can't afford to live closer to work, won't be getting work-from-home, can't buy a newer more efficient car, and who definitely won't be getting any sort of raise to match the increased costs