DarkGamer

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

That Gosar guy is a dipshit.

As signified by the (R)

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

Going to start running into cooling issues there as well.

Reinforced steel then? It both conducts heat and works as armor. I'm confident a technological solution exists.

I'm all for electrification in as many places as we can, but there are absolutely many military use cases where they currently aren't feasible.

Yes, and there are likely many circumstances where electric is preferable. With the right equipment this could allow military operations without supply chains delivering fuel. Batteries to be refilled by solar, or portable fission or fusion reactors, for example.

Not to mention lithium batteries getting blown up is significantly worse for the surrounding environment long term than a diesel vehicle.

I suspect a military that uses depleted uranium rounds and burns all its waste in massive fire pits doesn't prioritize pollution reduction.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

Cui bono if the US military is hamstrung? Answer that and you know who is sponsoring Republican actions.

Putin on the ritz
Helsinki made that plainly obvious to anyone who was paying attention.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

No need to feel dumb, be happy you're one of today's lucky 10,000! ;)

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

His deep-red district is in panhandle Florida, which has a reputation for inbreeding in the United States and is close to Alabama both culturally and physically. Evidently they like his abhorrent behavior.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

Some FBI agents want to uphold the law regardless of political party affiliation. Republicans, members of the party that's currently committing most of the crimes, don't like this.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago)

Some FBI agents want to uphold the law regardless of political party affiliation. Republicans, members of the party that's currently committing most of the crimes, don't like this.

Yeah, see, this is what I’m talking about. You have no data necessary to make that statement

Statements made:

• Republicans are committing most of the crimes
• Some FBI agents want to uphold the law regardless of political affiliation - That both Republicans and Democrats have both been investigated by the FBI seems to support this statement. Also, I said "some," i.e., >1. While I don't have a citation to show you that proves this, it is incredibly unlikely to be wrong.
• Republicans don't like this - evidence is in the article.

In fact we’re literally in the comment section for an article about the agency behaving exactly the opposite!!!

This article is about Republican officials threatening FBI agents to prevent them being investigated, and attempting to corrupt and politicize the organization by placing cronies in charge. I don't see any claims made about actual existing bias there, but rather perceived bias from Republicans. In fact it points out that the prosecutions of the Trump administration were performed by Trump appointees, which seems to imply the opposite of what you claim regarding bias. I'm not saying it doesn't exist but it's not in this article.

As for weaponizing the FBI against their political rivals, the GOP is super into that. They publicly announced their intention to do so well in advance.

Edit: Tsk, tsk, @AngrilyEatingMuffins. You've downvoted a good faith answer with citations, I guess you don't like being corrected.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

Marketwatch notes that “the rate of inflation in the Tampa Bay region was the highest in the country. Prices rose an estimated 7.3% from June 2022 to June 2023, well above the 3% rate for the nation as a whole.”
Last month as well, inflation was huge across much of Florida.
“Residents in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach area saw prices shoot up 9% in May compared with a year earlier. By comparison, nationwide inflation for the same period was less than half that rate, with prices rising 4% in May compared with a year earlier,” CBS News reported on Tuesday. “People living in the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater area have it slightly easier, with inflation rising at a 7.3% annual pace, but that’s still much higher than the U.S. as a whole.”
Why?
“Florida’s inflation rates are skyrocketing and the state now leads the nation thanks mostly to the rising cost of housing,” NBC Miami reports Wednesday.
In fact, many reports point to housing prices, which shot up 55% in Florida since the start of the pandemic, compared to 40% nationwide, CBS noted.

Ignoring real issues to scapegoat minorities and fight a culture war that alienates migrant labor and discourages business investment? Destroying his state's economy to throw off the national curve and own the libs? Either way, bold move, Cotton. How's that working out?

Among GOP voters, DeSantis is now at just 17%, which matches his all-time low says Morning Consult. He “is losing ground to Biden: DeSantis trails Biden by 5 percentage points in a hypothetical general election match-up, and hasn’t outperformed the incumbent since March.” source

Oh, I see.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

CPI is a better indicator for anyone who isn't living on trust fund growth, and that shit is up 12.3% since July 2021 nationwide.

That's unsurprising given how much of inflation was driven by food and energy costs. More info here for those who want to know more about the difference between these related metrics.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., has been removed from the conservative group, citing her repeated “attacks” on GOP colleagues.

The vile, stupid, shocking, racist, anti-American things that she constantly spewed didn't bother them, but criticizing fellow Republicans? Unacceptable! Narcissistic sociopaths can't have that.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago)

We eliminated malaria in the USA at great cost and effort in the 50's. Now this is all being undone by a GOP that would rather scapegoat drag queens and engage in a culture war than govern and keep Americans safe from disease. The pandemic, embracing of anti-vaxxers, scapegoating the CDC with conspiracy theories, an irrational hatred of Fauci, promotion of quack cures like ivermectin, and all the distrust in public health they have sown has made Republicans de facto pro-disease.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

So much for fully automated luxury gay space communism.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

Obviously he wants to pardon himself. Trump fancies himself to be above the law, and until now he hasn't had any meaningful consequences for his many illegal and immoral acts.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

I'm sure he will continue to spew self-justifying lies, but that's not how any of this works. The crimes he's accused of are a slam dunk, heaps of evidence, Trump was even bragging about having the classified documents and showing them off to others to self-aggrandize and gain favor, including Kid Rock of all people.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

The courts need to act quickly though, because obviously he will stall for time in the hopes he’ll be president again and able to pardon himself.

Unfortunately, a felony conviction would not disqualify Trump from running. He could run from prison like Eugene V. Debs did. To disqualify Trump the best bet would be invoking the 14th amendment for having, "engaged in insurrection or rebellion," but that would be unprecedented, it's an open question whether congress could disqualify a presidential candidate, and that's a different matter than the classified documents scandal.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

I really hate people saying invoking the 14th for his insurrection is unprecedented like the act itself is the problem. It’s also unprecedented that we have a political candidate that tried to overturn the last election by force of violence (you know, an actual bonafide insurrection). ... The 14th established the precedent

That's not what's being said here, and the precedent regarding the 14th probably isn't what you're presuming. From the article I linked above:

The [14th] amendment was invoked one time in more than a century to bar someone from office
There is some historical precedent, as the amendment has been used to bar someone from office — but only once in more than a century.
In 1919, Congress used the 14th Amendment to bar Victor Berger, a socialist from Wisconsin and an elected official, from joining the House because he actively opposed the US entering World War I.
In that case, a special committee convened and concluded that Berger was unfit for office. He was then barred by a simple majority in the Senate and the House. Because of this, some believe congressional precedent shows only a simple majority is needed.
But Congress barring someone from joining its own body is notably different, Kalir said.
"To think that the US Congress could prevent someone from becoming president of the United States other than through impeachment is big — it's a big legal leap."
Berger's case was also 102 years ago, and there has been no use of this section since.
Kalir said if it were invoked today, it could be challenged in court and ultimately take years to play out.

It might be possible, but it's never been done before so it's likely to be challenged and appealed. Since Republicans have corrupted the supreme court I wouldn't hold my breath that this will work, nor do I expect majorities in both houses to uphold the law when it comes to Trump. It should certainly be attempted regardless.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago)

"We lost $100 million from attacks by the box stores, the shopping networks, the shopping channels, all of them did cancel culture on us."

Funny how when people show them the door for being lying antidemocratic assholes, that's "cancel culture." Meanwhile the right seems quite happy to exclude people from public life, refuse services to groups they don't like, make it easy for bosses to fire employees for unionizing or speaking out, and right wing media is quite fond of cutting mics or banning people when they disagree. They are quire happy to perform their own boycotts because they hate trans people and companies that don't. For some reason they don't call any of that 'cancel culture.'

Mike, people just don't want to support you and don't want you around because you're a dangerous, disingenuous, fascism advocate. Our nation would have been better off if he had remained a crackhead and never participated in promoting and amplifying Trump's lies.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

The schadenfreude from election deniers suffering the consequences of their own actions sustains me. 😌

Agreed. It feels a lot like watching Indiana Jones beat up Nazis, except Trump supporters' wounds are self-inflicted. I'm glad there are consequences for this, for a while there it seemed like we were rewarding the worst actors. Sadly, lying, narcissistic, boorish louts remain popular on the right.

DarkGamer OP , 11 months ago

Now I'm picturing Mike Liddell's face melting. Nice. XD

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

The GOP, where every accusation is a confession.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

Actually In hindsight, it is enormously optimistic to assume the ‘conservative’ party existed in more than name only by the time 2024 comes around.

Americans will have to choose between a moderate conservative party and a radical right party in the 2024 elections.
Thanks to Duverger's law and the moving of the Overton window rightward, we no longer have viable left-wing options. If we can get ranked-choice voting or similar, most of these problems with political parties will evaporate as viable alternatives emerge on both sides and elected officials are forced to work together and compromise.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

Children need to be protected. So it makes no sense to prevent the placement of police outside of schools.
The unfortunate truth is that you likely don't see it that way and will instead try to coerce people to give up their guns.

@Unhappily_Coerced I'm reminded of Uvalde, when the cops sat around while the shooter murdered children. If you want to keep people safe from gun violence, gun regulation is the obvious solution, one you clearly don't want to entertain despite bipartisan support for many forms of regulation.

Evidence shows police in schools do not make students safer, and they disproportionately harass, punish and incarcerate black, Latino, and disabled students.

I suspect you're not the type that cares about evidence as much as ideology given what you've posted. I'd be happy to be proven wrong.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

Fact-check: Do armed campus police prevent school shootings?

Ted Cruz: “We know from past experiences that the most effective tool for keeping kids safe is armed law enforcement on the campus.”
PolitiFact's ruling: False ...

Broader research provides not much support for Cruz’s claim that armed law enforcement officers on school grounds are the "most effective tool" for keeping kids safe from mass shootings.
A 2021 study conducted by researchers from University at Albany and RAND examined data from U.S. schools between 2014 to 2018 to evaluate the impact of school resource officers. It found that school resource officers "do effectively reduce some forms of violence in schools, but do not prevent school shootings or gun-related incidents."
In addition, that study found that school resource officers appear to protect students from "a non-trivial number of physical attacks and fights within schools," which could have long-term academic and psychological benefits for students. But schools with resource officers also report more suspensions, expulsions, police referrals and student arrests — and those harsher disciplinary punishments disproportionately fall on Black students, male students and students with disabilities.
Another 2021 JAMA Network study conducted by researchers at Hamline University and Metropolitan State University in Minnesota examined a total of 133 school shootings and attempted school shootings from 1980 to 2019.
It was limited by the availability of public data and the inability to measure deterred shootings, among other factors, but researchers found that, controlling for other factors such as location, school type and region, the data showed "armed guards were not associated with significant reduction in rates of injuries" during school mass shootings.
Further, when researchers controlled for location and school characteristic factors, "the rate of deaths was 2.83 times greater (emphasis added) in schools with an armed guard present."
Pete Blair, the executive director of the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training Center at Texas State University, said armed individuals can play a role in stopping school shootings in progress but cautioned against any claim that it’s "the most effective tool" or that it prevents school shootings.
In Illinois in 2018, for instance, officials credited an officer with avoiding a potential school shooting involving a student at the school. The shooter’s mother said she thought her son was trying to get the police to kill him. Only the shooter was injured.
Blair said the ALERRT Center is part of a group that works with the FBI to release annual active shooter data. The FBI defines an active shooter as "one or more individuals actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area."
That data shows that from 2000 until 2021, there have been 434 active shooter incidents, Blair said. This includes shooter incidents in schools and elsewhere.
"The most common resolution is for the attacker to flee," Blair said, which happened in about 25% of all cases.
In about the same number of cases, the shooting stopped when a responding on-duty police officer, armed security or off-duty officer shot the attacker, he said.
Blair said the data isn’t specific enough to break down whether police officers who used force to stop an attack were already stationed there at the time — as a school resource officer likely would be — or were called in specifically to respond to the incident.
Dewey Cornell, a professor of education at the University of Virginia who studies school safety, bullying and student threat assessment, said he has seen research that suggests school resource officers "can be valuable in building relationships with students and working with threat assessment teams, but not as armed guards protecting the campus from a shooter."
"I know of no scientific evidence that having armed law enforcement on campus by itself keeps kids safe at school," he said. "We have prevented school shootings by identifying threats and working with troubled students before they make an attack."

There's even more to read for those who wish to see Ted Cruz's disingenuous argument thoroughly debunked.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

False dichotomy: The article presents the argument as a binary choice between armed law enforcement on campus and restricting the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens. This oversimplifies the issue and ignores other potential solutions or approaches to school safety.

Cite where it does this. The only dichotomy presented there is whether Cruz is lying. (He is.)

Anecdotal evidence: The article relies on specific incidents, such as the Uvalde and Santa Fe shootings, to argue against the effectiveness of armed law enforcement in preventing school shootings. While these incidents are important to consider, they alone do not provide a comprehensive assessment of the issue.

WTF? As you acknowledge yourself, THEY CITE MULTIPLE PAPERS IMMEDIATELY AFTER THIS. This article/argument does not rely on anecdotal evidence to make its case, even if it includes some.

Cherry-picked evidence: The article selectively presents examples and studies that support the argument against armed law enforcement on campuses while downplaying or omitting evidence that may contradict it. This creates a biased view of the topic. ... The article quotes experts and studies to support its claims, presenting them as the definitive authority on the matter. However, there are conflicting studies and opinions on the effectiveness of armed law enforcement in schools, and relying solely on one set of experts or studies can be misleading. ... Lack of counterarguments: The article does not present counterarguments or alternative perspectives to the claim that armed law enforcement is an effective tool for keeping kids safe in schools. This one-sided presentation of the issue limits a comprehensive understanding of the topic.

So present them. You have yet to present links to any studies or experts to refute these many papers presented, just a video of constant liar Ted Cruz spewing more lies.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

"I love how he commits crimes openly and shares American national secrets with anyone he can aggrandize or enrich himself by."

Trump supporters really are just the worst people.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

As usual, the GOP agenda is scapegoating and hatred of (brown) foreigners.

DarkGamer , 11 months ago

Meanwhile, Trump says he'd appoint, "maybe nine judges," to the supreme court if reelected.

DarkGamer , 1 year ago

Roe should've never happened, it needs to be decided by the states.

Do you feel the same way about slavery?

DarkGamer , 1 year ago

Inspiring? Elon Musk's cost cutting strategy was he just decided not to pay people, not to pay his landlord, not to pay his janitors, not to pay his hosting companies, not to pay many Twitter employees, and not to bother following laws, because, presumably, "fuck you, I'm a billionaire." If that's inspiring to spez, I'm feeling really good about leaving his platform. Aaron Swartz must be spinning in his grave so fast we could generate power from it.