MonkeMischief

Agh, nice catch, you're right. I confused the concept because I was thinking it runs "on top / in front of the underlying OS" lol

Thanks!

You're not wrong about how they operate.

But there's absolutely far reaching consequences to major decisions by leaders in power. Don't fool yourself thinking "It hasn't burned down yet" just because it's not a Hollywood societal-collapse movie before your eyes.

Work sucks more than ever for us now. Know why? Long-dead Reagan absolutely destroyed workers' rights and established precedents that put bosses much higher on society's totem pole. Recessions happened. People get desperate and forget that they even HAD rights as workers. Clawing this back is the battle of our time at home.

Before that? FDR's New Deal actually secured quite a bit of prosperity for people amidst a complete disaster. People still benefit from Social Security to this day, even if only a little.

Teddy Roosevelt established the National Park system. Now we're happy we don't have luxury apartments in the middle of Yosemite or Yellowstone, or fast food chains all along the Grand Canyon. (Or it hasn't been used as a landfill or something because the hole was already dug so it saves costs!)

Citizen's United is why we have trillions of dollars in shadow-money funding "both sides" of a broken system. (Although that wasn't put up to vote, the people in charge were sworn in by people that were elected.)

TL;DR: I get it. It's all stupid, we're all constantly lied to. That's super lame. We know and we hate it.

BUT:

Votes. Have. Consequences.

Oo! Or had the supreme court declare it's okay to commit any crime you want as long as you're president. That's new!

I'm also sick of the hyperbole from campaigners too but you're right. A LOT has changed that can undermine a lot of fundamental freedoms we take for granted.

Everyone knows capital-first politicians don't actually care about us. We get it.

I'm all 'bout that fancy praxis and mutual aid and all those lofty but pure concepts we definitely need to be working on. But we live in a society here.

Not voting right now is giving an out-and-out fascist a ridiculous amount of power to start crushing and punishing anybody with a different opinion.

We're doing what we can with what we have to soften the blow, so we can actually have the chance to work on the higher concepts like "changing the people involved in it."

I'd much rather be on the ground convincing people to form unions to safely backtalk their bosses, rather than rallying up guerilla units amidst a "boogaloo" because a bunch of hateful and uneducated people put a screeching orange baby on a throne who refused to leave and became "holy immortal emperor."

Lmao hyperbole aside. Seriously. Standing on the sidelines and going "hmph" is basically a vote for things that are likely Very Bad For You(TM).

"More now than EVER"

– Every political ad til the end of time.

"Walked back at the threat of trump", can you explain what you mean by this a little more? Sorry I'm just not sure what it means.

A gentle reminder that the Socialist Rifle Association is a thing! No personal experience with them, but I like that they're an underdog foil to your typical "American gun culture" stereotypes.

I should really be more active about this. I don't have the money to dump a ton of brass on the regular but I enjoy the freedom to do it while keeping my ideals!

Ha!

— Former Okie, now Nevadan, proud 50-somethingth in education for many years running

(Are we not aware of how many states there are or are we counting outlying U.S territories? Anybody's guess! 😉)

That's so much "fun" with all those tiny local offices. "Okay who is this person?"

Zero public web presence about them at all.

It'd be nice if there was something like Ballotpedia but public owned. "You want to run for an office? You need to fill out this profile."

I imagine lots of people are just like "Eh, this name sounds pretty." Lol

I thought RK bowed out, but he's still on the ballot? Odd.

"The light won't turn off! Now to hunt down the ONE SWITCH in the house that's flipped...hnngg...."

Troll electricianship would be hilarious entertainment.

Guys am I autistic?

Haha might be? But I'm the same way and I'm pretty sure I'm not autistic...(ADHD though)

I think when you fill that spot between (("knowledgable") AND ("good-natured")), you just like to share what you know if the poster's sarcasm isn't painfully apparent.

Never hurts to be kindly helpful. It reminds me of something my sister told me she tells her kids:

"Try to learn something new every day, and even if you don't, teach something." :)