The only reason Biden gets some slack is when the reaction was needed to take place hard and fast was under trump. And we have had the knowledge of how to stop the spread of an epidemic/pandemic for centuries.

1. Stop interactions between people.
2. People showing signs or symptoms should quarantine.
3. If you can avoid contact with people - you do so. In the past this was the wealthy who could go out to the country side and largely avoid contact with masses of people. But there is documentation of towns shutting down interaction with outsiders to avoid risk of disease spreading either into, or out of the town.

But when every single country fails to take actions - it isn’t a single case of ONE bad leader. It’s a case of systemic issues - and that is the case throughout the west: The west is infected by economist bean counters who are insistent on “number go up”. That is Canada, the US, UK, France, Germany… the list goes on. And that attitude has gutted the western spirit, economy, and more. This idea that we need immigration - when immigration is a bandaid to a much deeper problem that starts in and around 1965, but really has it’s first signs in 1967 in the US, and that is spiraled out of control with the end of the gold standard.

Yes: That is where the problems stem from.

The fact is: Biden has been in politics, for basically the entire run of problems stemming and bubbling over. And he has been right smack dab in the middle voting basically for every measure that continued the problem forward. Making promises that were inevitably funded with printed money - printed money that created inflation, that required interest rates to go up, that drove people out of home. Economic conditions that enabled and even encouraged manufacturers to offshore US manufacturing to places like China - destroying US jobs in the process.

Who benefited?

If there is a politician to blame: It is Biden. He has been there practically every step of the way.

Proper like in 2016?

The more one looks into the DNC, the more questions exist. Is it really a wounder how much inflation took place over the Obama years? Under Biden? They push party people, they get party people, who have the same great money management skills. And people are fed up with it.

People are fed up with GOP folk just the same - for different reasons. Trump was the NOT GOP, not DNC nominee, it isn’t really a wounder why he found support. It’s really just a wounder how the leadership of the parties couldn’t figure out that serious reform is needed internally.

Why would you say that?

Harris didn’t lose because she was a woman - she lost because she was associated so heavily with the Biden administration as more, and more questions started being asked.

Hillary didn’t lose because she was a Woman, she lost because she was a Clinton and there are so many left overs - and by popular vote: She won, but the US isn’t about the popular vote. But when we look at the split - it is VERY interesting.

AOC is generally speaking - widely approachable, talks some sanity, is willing to talk both sides of the Aisle, and so on. I can’t actually readily find a reason to be flat out opposed to her: I mean sure, there are policies and such that I don’t always agree with - but generally speaking, it is rare to find someone you completely agree with, and someone you completely disagree with: And if you ALWAYS disagree with everything, and can’t have a discussion - often times it’s not the other person with the issue.

The reality is, there are plenty of Men and Woman that won’t or will vote one way or another for a wide number of reasons, and odds are - put into the mix, it all washes out.

Truth is, when Covid was raging on - I kinda thought that Republicans would basically screw themselves over with the way it was handled and the death counts etc. But what it turns out - is a lot of deaths were assigned to covid but related to Cancer, heart disease, and so on with Covid as a contributing factor: So while dangerous, it seems the numbers were conflated - and that, is a very dangerous thing to do as the truth will, sooner or later, win out. And here we are.

The thing is: AOC doesn’t strike me as mainstream Democrat. And that alone will mean the DNC is unlikely to back her as a candidate - they want a party person through and through, and that, is ultimately what lost them this election.

Lets, for a moment, presume Iran has Nuclear weapons - and uses them. Lets just remind that Israel is known to have at LEAST 90 nuclear warheads, and several of those missiles are likely prepped ready pointed at Iran.

To put it simply: That move DOES NOT end well. If anything, it ends strictly worse then simply accepting that Israel crippled Iran’s infrastructure. And any hope for normalization and opening trade up on the global market outside of China, Russia, and North Korea becomes basically zero until the regime is overthrown. Even worse - if Israel opts for nuclear strikes to follow up their conventional ones after being attacked with nuclear weapons,there is a good chance it’s not just several years of repair work, but decades of set back that could easily lead to mass scale discontentment and open revolt against the regime by several factions simultaneously.

The reality is: Israel is not a force capable of sustained occupation of an entity like Iran. But they are a force capable of a decapitating strike. And the entire reason is, Israel has VERY LIMITED force projection capabilities - and, because of a lack of land boarder with Iran, would need cooperation with other states that may not be thrilled with opening themselves up to direct conflict in the short to mid term. The only real reason Israel has room to do a strike is 1. It’s retaliatory, and 2. entities like Saudi Arabia are liable to be just fine with their regional rivals basically offing each other, as Saudi Arabia is in a MUCH better position to take advantage in the event of Iran’s regime collapsing.

Which brings us to: Just because you have nuclear weapons, does not mean you use them. The reality is, nuclear weapons are a weapon of last resort - unless you are France, and then it’s a nuclear warning shot… Because France is just different.

I think we are on the same page as Immigration: Can be good, too much is generally bad, and the Immigrants unfortunately get flack when the problem is the government. And unfortunately - fixing the problem is going to suck for a wide number of prospective immigrants. What so many on the left don’t seem to get: It is not the American tax payers job to give a rats ass about people who WANT to move to the US. It is the US’s duty to ensure the people being allowed to come in WILL BE a NET BENEFIT to the society. And this means: They must end up being a net contributor. As it stands - we see government funds going to support migrants illegal or legal. We see growing crime rates - with information coming out that statistics were manipulated purposefully or accidentally to look better: But the truth wins out.

Smaller Government - not small government - I want to clarify this: I don’t think a small government works. I mean, if you are in a hamlet where everyone knows everyone, everyone comes together to solve issues as they crop up in a big town hall that encompasses everyone: Sure, small government works. But we are talking about an entity that has to deal with hundreds of millions, over a vast area, with various regional concerns and interests… it’s a NIGHTMARE. But Big government is also not the answer.

When I talk about reduced regulation - I’m not talking NO regulation. I mean: If you want to tax - flat rate it, have it low, get rid of as many deductions as you reasonably can. No longer do you have “I pay 35% income tax in my bracket but have 23000$ in deductions” - instead you have “I pay 20% tax rate on everything made over 30,000$”. And that can work - really damn well. You can do it for business as well - first, I dunno, 500,000$ in revenue isn’t taxed, at all - anything over 500k is taxed at 3%. I know - insanely low. But a company right now that makes 50 billion in revenue through tax games and loop holes can end up paying 0%… and that is more common then not when you get into large corporations. So: Simplify the tax code. People will be mad at first, until you state “This will help small business by reducing their tax burden, while ensuring large corperations like Google, Microsoft, Wallmart, and so on will pay their share for the benefits they reap for operating within this nations economy. We understand that some of them may feel the need to pass the costs on - but we strongly feel the market can, and will be better able to compete with these entities as a result - which will, in time get you better paying jobs, better prices on your products, and more option in where you shop”. And for once - the argument that corperations are greedy assholes might have some merit.

Why I like Medium Sized Governments

Maybe I should define what I mean.

If small Government is one that does basically nothing, and Big Government is one that expands itself whenever it wants to do more - then Medium Government is a government that looks at it’s current activity list and decides: Is any of this non-critical? Can we simplify and attain the objective?

to me: That is what government should be constantly doing - If it has staff pushing paper around for all intent and purpose, and that paper needs 5 signatures, and it needs 8 audits before it’s approved: Why? Can you do it with 2 audits, and 2 sign offs? Well: Probably. And considering the sheer amount of errors and mistakes that make it through the overly bloated systems we have today - my guess is less is actually more, and the entire reason? Because with less - people are forced to take ownership: They can’t just pass on the buck, they are accountable to what they sign off on, what they do.

And so we get to the core of it: Big Government is accountable to no one and no one person is accountable to anyone. Small Government does so little it doesn’t worry about accountability. And so, we get to another reason why medium sized governments are better: They are, by their nature, far more accountable to the people.

Why would people that benefit from forced labour want to end it? Cheap labour benefits the wealthy - more money to make money with. And to those who think criminals should face actual punishment and pay back society - well: Why would they have a problem with forced labour. And, we have the political spectrum nicely tied up there - at least a majority of it.

If you want to get reform in: You need to address two groups - the “tough on crime” crowd, and the “abuse of prisoners is unacceptable” crowd - and that CAN be done. We need some core changes:

1. Restrict Solitary Confinement to violent outburst - and restrict it’s use. After all, our goal is to encourage people to participate not drive people into nonfunctional insanity.
2. Create base rate pay that is tied to minimum wage (like 2/3’s of it) with 1/3 going towards a savings fund, and 1/3 for the individual to use on whatever is allowed for them to buy. In effect: There should be a reason to work.
3. Increase base rate of repeat offences BUT tie in a labour + rehabilitation program participation as a way to reduce that sentence across the board.

Those three things - increase penalty for uncooperative individuals; It creates an environment of owning responsibility for actions; and it means that prisoners aren’t being paid a fraction of the minimum pay rate of the 1960’s. We can go even further with this:

1. The 2/3 of minimum wage is for low security prisoners.
2. Medium security prisoners have a lower rate of pay - say 1/2 of minimum wage, with the difference going directly towards restitution costs.
3. Violent criminals and high security prisoners gain no rate of pay for 10 years or until restitution is fully paid - whichever comes sooner, and their pay rate is 1/3 of minimum wage with the difference going to restitution costs.

In this way: There is a STRONG incentive to take actions, and efforts that will get you transferred to a lower security prison. We can also do things with half-way houses - and support training programs, and perhaps even voluntary association with a case worker post conviction for individuals that FEEL like they need extra support avoiding re-offending. This is not about reducing, or removing the existing system - but expanding it.

In effect: This entire set of changes is not about reducing the punishment on crime, nor straight up reducing the incarcerated population. Instead: It’s all about PERSONAL responsibility. And maybe, you could actually get THAT kind of reform through.

At risk of being downvoted into oblivion: People are hyper polarized and unable to have nuanced discussions as a broad generalization any longer. And that, is the core of the problem.

But where does it stem from? Misdirection - it might not seem relevant, but, I assure you: It is. We have to talk - as a recent video reminded me, and taught me something very important, Beoing. And maybe Intel - but mostly Boeing.

Back in the Early 60’s - Boeing was Successful, very successful, it was THE MOST SUCCESSFUL airplane company - and it was, surprise surprise: ran by engineers. Then we have Douglas - ran by Finance bean counters. In 67, Douglas was facing bankruptcy, and - as a defence contractor, the US government in it’s infinite wisdom forced Boeing to merge with it, and - to put the cream on the top followed by the crowning toxic jewel on top: The executives that caused the problems at Douglas were put in charge, and - Boeing has gone downhill since. At one point an executive at the new Boeing said something along the lines of: “I don’t want to be distracted by the details of building airplanes” - like, I’m sorry: THAT IS WHAT YOUR COMPANY DOES, those aren’t the distractions - that is your core needed responsibility to make sure it’s done right.

We good with why the above is a problem?

So lets look at Covid: Finance people want the economy to keep going - so drag their feet on doing what is necessary. Finance people don’t want to be inconvienienced, so… push for changes that are beneficial to them IN THE SHORT TERM. And finally, we see the idea that a Stage 4 Cancer Patient who passes away being labeled as a Covid Death… Why? I think it serves 2 reasons: 1, it makes the hospital numbers look more paletable for awhile - Covid death is “new scary virus” not, “Something we have been dealing with for forever” and 2. It justifies massive inflationary spend by the government - enabling them to effecitvely pick winners (big business), and losers (small business).

The thing is: This shift - this Financiers over Engineers and people in their field running the show, is both the Republicans AND Democrats. That is: Democrat Social Justice types use inflationary spending to shove money at the cost of EVERYONE at whatever group they are “fighting for” and, Republican types love to shove tax benefits in the hands of their prefered businesses. And what are the fixes? It’s really simple: End Inflationary Monetary Policy.

Thing is: Sick people masking? Makes sense. Properly cleaning high contact often terribly dirty things like debit pin pads - makes sense. More frequent cleaning of public bathrooms: Makes sense. This isn’t exactly rocket science. But forcing an untested thing onto people, after hiding the details from the public is disgusting. And the fact that people don’t get it - that is a huge problem.

Ok: PeerTube is interesting. But: in terms of replacement? No. non-viable.

The problem you have is multifold - and one of them is constant content availability, and total bandwidth. The value of Youtube is on demand streaming - you click a video, it plays, basically anywhere in the world. The other value is… copyright: Because of the way youtube is set up, you don’t have the same kind of copyright problems as you would without the back end negotiating and systems youtube as put in place. You can think copyright as it stands is oppresive and sucks -and I agree; but with the law the way it is - youtube is the best work around that is feasibly possible.

Mirroring all of youtube needs piles of terrabytes of new storage DAILY. and it’s in the hundreds of thousands as a low end estimate. You need the computational power to do the transcoding. You need the distribution of servers to load balance and avoid over saturating and d-dossing any given server cluster.

The reality is the Torrent protocol has been around forever - and there is a reason it never really took off, despite live watching while streaming was feasible: It has too many pitfalls.

And then, there is the content creator side: If you want to make money - youutube is kind of the place to put your content up with youtube premium sharing, ad revenue sharing and so on once you can monetize your channel. And while there are all kinds of BS in regards to what can and can’t be monetized - there really isn’t a replacement, not for the average person just getting started - and not if you are trying to build your following.

I don’t think you understand the capabilities difference - Israel has the nuclear option if they are threatened existentially. But lets take that off the table a moment.

Iran’s capabilities are their missiles, manufacturing capabilities. Their Refineries, and strategic energy reserves are in known locations and are the lynch pin of Iran’s economy. And finally, the Nuclear R&D facilities are in known places. All of those are the targets - and Israel absolutely has the capacity to take it out- just not the strong justification.

If Iran continues striking Israel, Israel is going to feel the pressure to decapitate Iran as a threat to them.

The fall out of this is more interesting:

1. China loses access to Iranian Oil for the short to mid term - it will take time to restore capabilities.

2. Russia loses access to Iranian missiles - without production capabilities, and depleted stocks, Iran will not be able to sell missiles to Russia let alone drones.

3. Iran’s economy will be in shambles - that could very well open the door to coup or revolt.

4. Iran would unload as many missiles as it possibly could - which could be devastating. But that would come down to just how many interceptor missiles Israel would have available, along with other air defence options.

If you want a “Why would trump support this” - there you have it. It reaffirms US obligation to support it’s allies, It puts economic pressure on china, and denies Russia access to weapons - which should help push them to the negotiating table.

In reality, I would more expect Iran to back off. Then again - With Israel obliterating Iran proxies, Iran may feel the pressure to complete a nuclear deterrent and Israel may end up wanting to decapitate Iran as a threat BEFORE they gain that capability… what a bloody mess.

When the dollar has lost 99.9999% of it’s value, not just 97%. (as compared to 1970 vs. price of gold).

What KIND of liberal? There are several “liberal” variants and the two main defined variants are:

• Classic Liberalism - functionally the idea’s of the french revolution.

• Modern Liberalism - tack social justice into the mix, requiring government intervention to enforce it.

reality is, since about 1965-1970 left wing parties have been defined by the social justice bent. They have more or less been governed by an idea that they alone have the moral authority to define correct from wrong, that it is they that must define what is right wing - and over the years, a tremendous number of things, have been defined as right wing; we have seen a shift from Representatives defining laws and regulations - to regulatory agencies having the power to define the details devolved to them. We have seen the growth and bloat of bureaucracy, funded through increased taxes -and inflationary spending practices.

So the reason “liberal” is defined differently - is functionally that the definition of “liberal” has been redefined. And this reuse of terms - well: That has a storied history in a particular soviet nation. Political correctness has a very soviet history to it.

If you want to debate, and discredit a candidate based on their political stance/views and policies - ok: Do so. But maybe stop trying to define it as “nazi” - the term is ever more losing it’s weight in discussions, and that fact makes it very difficult to legitimately call out problematic entities. Because lets be clear: Trump is NOT A National Socialist - and that is a defining feature of the Nazi party.

Do you have one reason to not vote for Harris, or Many reasons not to vote? Lets say in this Trolley like problem scenario that Flipping the lever to run over one is voting for Harris, flipping it to roll over the list is voting for trump - and rejecting making the choice is walking away.

Thing is - this gets complicated: Just because someone publicly says they aren’t voting because of Gaza does not mean 1. they didn’t vote, and 2. doesn’t mean they don’t see all the other problems - because left organizations/groups have a tendency of vilifying anyone that opposes their view points excessively - because they have the moral high ground supposedly - the end result is: People won’t speak up about the real reasons, they will stick to the socially acceptable one and move on. It’s far easier, simpler.

So: What is on the long list of problems?

1. Biden ending the “Stay in Mexico” Agreement.

2. Tax payer dollars being sent to illegal immigrants in various ways.

3. The way deaths were assigned to Covid - even when the person had stage 4 cancer, and covid was maybe a contributing factor.

4. Catch and Release policies found in a number of Democrat stronghold cities - to a point that stores are giving up trying to operate in the regions. And I’m not talking small locations - I’m talking big businesses. Small ones end up going belly up because they can’t eat the costs, insurance premiums for protecting your inventory in the areas have gone up and that means small businesses can’t afford to insure, and that raises their risks.

Should I continue?

Trumps anti-sanctuary city, record on putting in effective policy to deal with the southern boarder problem, and take on the fact that US cities should be sanctuaries for US citizens - well: That resonates with people. It resonates in California (where voter support from previous years to today went up ~8%), it resonates in New york (comparing previous years to today is ~+7% over previous years), even in Texas (~3% uptick). Trump WON the popular vote with fairly high voter turn out.

The Truth is

No person struggling in their own life, cares all that much about people in another country. When the government can find money to fund a foreign war - people are going to start wondering why they can’t find money to fix roads, law enforcement, housing, and other issues back home: It would be far cheaper over all.

In a world where crime has gone up since 2020, while being down from 2013: People are going to see it. And if you live in Seattle, or New York it’s difficult to ignore massive stores closing locations and a growing number of vacant store fronts. And should that problem continue - it’s going to cause further knock on effects. After all: Blank store fronts are not attractive, and if you make them look full - those looking for space are going to presume it’s filled. And these buildings are often times leveraged - and if they reduce lease rates to draw in interest, they may very well have debts called in: And that will hurt the current owners. Worse yet - without revenue coming in, it’s very likely that SOME of the maintenance needed is being avoided.

So while some the Gaza issue is JUST the Gaza issue - my bet, is that to a lot of people, it’s just the socially acceptable excuse. But honestly - it has some legitimacy as well. After all: Supporting the war effort with a lot now, or a smaller amount over a bit of time nets the same result.

Lets be honest: The Not trump vote, probably made the election results as close as it was. And that might be difficult for some to wrap their head around - trump is unlikable, but: To anyone dealing with the fall out of certain choices Biden made attacking trump era policies (I’m thinking of one in particular), it’s a bit of a no brainer. This brings us to three key issues that are causing problems in US politics, but western politics in general:

1. The Stay in Mexico agreement is the perfect example of how Opposing political representatives have a “everything the opposition does is mostly evil and bad, and it needs to be killed as soon as possible” - and this goes for EVERYTHING. If we could have sane, nuanced discussions and come to agreements and policies we would see a LOT less whip lash, and a LOT MORE cooperation. But people who think they have the moral high ground - doesn’t matter the side - uses that as a justification for their actions, no matter how harmful those actions are. To say that illegal immigration is a problem is an understatement - it creates downward pressure on ceertain wages, which is then used as justification because hard working americans don’t want piss poor wages.

2. We have seen migration problems bleed into regional crime issues, tent cities, and so on.

3. There are a handful of very democrat cities that are suffering dramatically from catch and release policies to the point that corperations that provide necessary essential services to make a city viable are leaving the city. They are simply closing up shop. And the attitude from the democrats is not to solve the underlying problem - it’s to try to make it illegal to close up shop in the city or area. Well: The only other option is to drive up prices, or basically make it impossible to get in and out without exactly what you have paid for.

All of this comes to a reality that we have seen a march towards Institutional Authoritarianism for DECADES, since about 1970… well, a little sooner, but if you look at a lot of shifts you are going to find that about 1965 through to about 1975 is a big shift in a lot of governance decisions, and this is no different. More, and more federal agencies were created - and laws were more and more written such that it was agency rules that dictated the specifics instead of clear written law by congress. In function, it was a divestment of power from Elected officials to Appointed agencies - and over time, the Bureaucracy has been ever more empowered to dictate the direction of many of these organizations, not the elected officials or congress: And yes, Democrats are the biggest fault in this, though republicans are… barely better in this regard.

So: How do we fix this?

The answer is: Smaller government. Simpler regulations are cheaper and easier to be in compliance with, and require less resources to audit. Simpler taxes are this with added benefits - in that, by simplifying, you crush the legal loopholes used to hide money from scrutiny. And part of the simplification is you remove basically everything that is eligible as a tax credit.

And this applies for EVERY SINGLE regulatory body, every government agency, all of it.

You can’t tax a nation into prosperity, you can’t regulate it into prosperity. You can tax a society into equality by making everyone miserable - but since the politicians are human beings as well, you can bet they will NOT be living a miserable life meaning it will never happen. Those two things are the core of stratifying a society - and again, they have increased in count and size consistently. And if you think taxing the rich is a great idea - income tax on the rich was the first income tax in the US, levied to pay the debts of the civil war. Pretty soon governments decided that taxing everyone else would be better then taxing just the rich: After all, it’s just fair… right? And pretty soon, the regulations, and rules shifted such that the rich pay significantly less as a portion of their income as does literally everyone else: Oops?

It’s almost like Equal opertunity serves society better then trying to force equitability. It’s almost like Free association, is better then trying to force everyone to associate. It’s almost like Freedom from government oversight is better then a government up in every bit of your business. And it’s like Free trade is good for the wealthy - and bad for about everyone else in the long term: Because it’s not about YOUR benefit, it’s a bout the owner classes benefit.

You can’t tax an economy into prosperity, you can’t regulate a nation into prosperity, and you can’t export your industry and become prosperous.

The Democrats and Republicans since about 1965 have worked in concert to offshore industry, tax and regulate domestic businesses out of profitability, printed more money then you can imagine - driving inflation. And the crowning jewel of all of this was killing to gold standard, with a nice improvement to the display of the crown through implementation of Free trade.

If we had a Fair trade arrangement - that allowed for Tariffs that explicitly were put in place to undermine the value of subsidizing foreign production that is exported to your nation, we would have a very different story. If we had an explicit way or costing up production that is done to the detriment of environmental standards - China and such would have had actual pressure to clean up their environmental standards.

Lets explore something that demonstrates the missunderstanding:

I want to talk about China, It’s National Security concern, and Renewables. And yes - these three things are linked HEAVILY.

A lot of people who are pro Renewables will point to China: They can do it. And sure - they can. But what they entirely miss out on, is that to China Renewable energy is THE ONLY OPTION FOR ENERGY INDEPENDENCE. And Energy independence is ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIALLY if you want to be a global power. Energy independence allows the nation to be more aggressive without risk of embargo - for if China were to engage militarily in Taiwan, the shipping lanes in and out of china could be put under blockade, western insurers would basically kill the option to use them to ensure the ships going to/coming from the region - and that would dramatically reduce the amount of oil/gas coming into the nation. It would also limit food entering the nation.

See: A Nation like Canada, or the US, who are each are (or capable of being) food AND energy independent - you can’t exactly siege them. While the last several decades manufacturing in these nations has been lacking, these nations also have tremendous mineral resource availability if they ever choose to start exploiting it at scale again: China has none of this.

Traditionally, this is why China has a strong incentive to facilitate the power of their Empire through Trade (ex. Silk Road). Because they have such need of importing food (especially over the last couple of decades), trade is the only option China has for expanding it’s influence. China CAN NOT use military force without fear of retribution that literally starves out it’s populace of energy, and food. Basically: China is vulnerable to a nation wide siege. And China’s potential greatest Rival: The US, has the absolute means to do this.

So, in order to solve ONE of these problems, China needs Energy Security through renewable. Oddly enough - in the mid term, as China’s populace begins to shrink it will become feasible for China to become food independent as well. Once that occurs, we may very well see China become more aggressive militarily.

Now: Take that same principle and apply it to EVERY SINGLE POLITICAL ISSUE.

When you start to see the agenda’s being pushed - and start ripping down and looking at the underlying motivations which come down to “we don’t want to die” and a couple other core ideas - each of which is very immediate - what we find is both Republicans, and Democrats are prone to ignoring the details in favour of pushing their agenda.

See: Climate change is very much real - the only question is, how much is it human caused? See - the big forest fires in Western Canada/US come down to a couple of things that are piling up over the last 5 or so years. 1. Beavers killed in massive quantities through the 1700’s and 1800’s. 2. Then we have massive fire suppression. 3. Then we have clear cutting of forests. Beavers seems odd - but beavers build damns out of wood, wet wood takes A LONG time to dry, like - from green wood to dry we are talking a year of air drying in near ideal conditions per inch of thickness and the beaver damns are… wet, covered in part by silt, and it’s deep. From the time the water ways start re-routing we are probably talking like 100-150 years for that material to dry out, break down and rot, and otherwise cease helping to maintain moisture in the area. When you suppress fires heavily - underbrush builds up and as it dries, becomes perfect fuel for a forest fire. Then you have the clear cutting which accelerates the drying of the area out. Look at the time lines and: Yep, forest fires will probably remain a problem for another decade or so.

What is going to fix the forests is: Removal of artificial damns (more fish in the water ways), Recovery of Beaver populations (they slow water ways and redirect them - they don’t stop them and control them the same way artificial ones do), and ceasing clear cut in favour of selective cuts and thinning (doing it this way does cost more per log, but - it actually can help the forest grow more lush, and a more limited area of forest support more life as more shrub and such is capable of growing in a way that allows safe spaces for wild life while providing food sources in the form of berries etc).

You know what WILL NOT fix the forest fire situation? Fighting carbon emissions. But that is exactly the argument.

I don’t see republicans, or democrats arguing for sensible long term models for dealing with the problems in a sensible way that can actually solve the problem. I see radical climate denial, and radical human caused arguments - and they aren’t useful, nor helpful but it’s what the media focuses on, it’s what gets spouted, because: It’s easy.

It is ABSOLUTELY functioning as designed. But you have to understand - Tyranny of the Majority; the threat of Religious Despots: Those two things were VERY MUCH in the minds of the founding fathers.

The argument is sometimes said as “they can step in” but in reality, that is up to the rules regulating how votes are cast based on state rules.

But you must first understand: The Founding fathers understood that Tyranny of the Majority could be a serious threat (see religious Tyranny and conflict that has lead to all kinds of problems and persecutions throughout history). It’s complicated.

Now: If you want to argue that election reform is needed in the modern day: I ABSOLUTELY 100% AGREE. I would LOVE to see an abolishoning of first past the post, and party centric electoral voting - in favour of Ranked Choice Ballots where it all pans out through one single vote. But who benefits? Well: It’s not the DNC, and it’s not the GOP: SO good luck getting the constitutional amendment needed to make that a reality.

Thing is: We COULD start - at municipal elections, elections for small positions. That is the BEST place to start but odds are, even there, you are going to have the DNC, and GOP fighting it at every step of the way, because that is a DISASTER for party control over elected officials: After all, in a world of Mass to Mass communication, you don’t need a big party to organize campaign drives - you can set up your social media posts, you can do a tonne of efforts and coordination remotely which means you can be out and talking to people basically anywhere in the country, and still be able to work to coordinate efforts directly.

Just remember for much of the Post WWII era, Congress AND the Senate, and fairly often the presidency was held by the Democrats. It is only really in the wake of the post end of gold standard that the Republican party saw growth in it’s numbers, basically in lock step with inflation. And I don’t mean inflation approved by government made up CPI numbers that are doctored through changing methodology to promote as close to the supposed golden value of 2%, when if we look at most of history the real golden number for inflation was somewhere around 0%. The only benefactors of ending the gold standard were the wealthy. The major benefactors of free trade agreements were the wealthy. The only benefactors of shipping manufacturing to China was Western Governments hell bent on isolating the Soviet Union, when - that was hardly necessary, and practically speaking ineffective.

When people talk about gerrymandering, and so many other issues: What I start to see is a planned distraction, one masking a much older, deeper, and more fundamental truth that eats and rots the foundation.

Pure Fiat has been disastrous for productivity in the West. And that too has been disastrous for birth rates that again, fall in lock step starting with the oil crisis - and continuing on with disastrous fiscal policy, followed by export of good well paying blue collar jobs to foreign nations - removing the value creation from the local economy, and handing it to nations who politically are opposed to the wests way of life.

The only people who were wanting to change that in some way - got assassinated.

I swear, marriage would be easier dealt with if both parties opted to incorporate a business, and put their relevant assets in the name of the corporation. Then at least separation would be pretty clean cut and dry. The Irony is - this is basically what marriage is.

If you are Caffeine Sensitive, and Like Coffee…

There are a few brands out there that make a really good Decaf Coffee and some roasters and Coffee Suppliers are actually giving more of a shit about their Decaf offerings. It does get a little pricier per bag of beans, but - might be worth shopping around if you have some independent shops/roasters around you.

Once upon a time, stoves had a dial you set, and it was basically a resistor and some wires. Today, a stove has a computer built in it that operates the entire thing.

While the computer in a modern oven is simple - it is an illustration that more, and more of what we have is computerized. When you add in reinforcement learning algorithms to adjust factors like say, If the fridge is aware of what time you generally open the fridge it can opt to kick on the heat pump a little before that to bring the temperature down and avoid running while it is open. This could save pennies of electricity in a year. But more importantly - could lead to less duty cycles on the condesor that could cause a fridge to say instead of lasting 10 years, last 12 years.

If you are starting a car company today, what you have to be thinking about is a reality where we move to “Humans don’t drive, the cars drive you” - I mean even a manual control situation could have the AI actually being a watcher in effect we “Let” people drive, but if the AI detects an unobserved obstacle etc it immediately takes over and adjusts. Well: You need to build that - and that, is AI.

If a company isn’t thinking about AI, and makes anything but basic appliances - they are likely on a limited time window because at some point Autonomous cars WILL be good enough, and the safety consideration will make both people, and governments, along with insurance companies to eliminate human driven vehicles.

Apple isn’t looking next year, or a year after. They are looking 5 to 10 years out and they don’t see a path where they can effectively compete in the car industry and make the profits they are after. However, if they can solve the AI driving problem - they don’t NEED to make a car, they can sell the brains and system that drives the car.

It’s also worth noting the term is “capture”. And outside of rare instance - you didn’t really want to kill knights and the like: You captured them, and ransomed them back to their family/liege lord etc.

And there is a reason the term “Kings Ransom” exists. John the II of France for instance was captured, and Ransomed for something like 300000 gold coins of the day - something like 300 million or up to about 3 billion in today’s dollars (conversion is a little fuzzy but to put it simply: A BLOODY TONNE OF MONEY).