This article appeared in my feed just above another article about how China has the world’s first operational thorium reactor. Meanwhile, the US is about to fight a civil war over whether vaccination causes measles and stripping away the last of our social programs in order to get our wealthiest people another 2% subsidy.

Well, it’s only constitutional this one time. Every other time, it isn’t.

It fucking kills me how judges will absolutely fuck every day people up, but then when it comes to the wealthy and well connected, it’s suddenly “oh, well, they only murdered two people, I think a fine is kind of crossing the line here, let’s be reasonable about this”.

It’s not that they’re strip mining it because the value proposition isn’t there. Generations past, towards the end of the guilded age, we saw that the wealthy could meaningfully invest in and elevate society and still be fabulously wealthy. We see as much in the modern day with McKenzie Scott. It’s more that ripping out the plumbing and wiring is quick and easy, and that’s all anybody cares to do anymore. Why make $100 in ten years when I could make $3 right now? This is the natural and probable outcome of the way we’ve allowed our economic system to run, especially but not exclusively since Reagan embraced supply side economics and rejected the Great Society view of America. It’s a race to the bottom, and always has been. That’s what’s always been lurking under the “bring manufacturing back from China” narratives, since Chinese factories have such fabulous features as unknown chemicals that make you just drop dead sometimes (electronics manufacturing), on-site bunk houses, and suicide nets.

The empire’s been slowly eroding since the Vietnam war, and especially since the end of the cold war was apparent. It finally ran out of other places to fuck up for cheap gains, and it’s turned in on itself to try and keep those cheap gains coming. We all know you can’t survive, let alone thrive, by eating your own flesh, but the wealthy are all so goddamn short sighted that they’re quite happy to try feudalism part 2: surveillance state boogaloo.

The thing that kills me is that we were the wealthiest nation on earth, we had it all, we could have had an absolutely outrageous standard of living for everyone in terms of healthcare, education, scientific advancement for the benefit of all mankind, etc. and we literally blew all of it out of our ass blowing up brown people and giving it away to like ten of the wealthiest people. It’s such a disappointment to think of what could have been.

This might be unpopular, but I don’t think HOAs should be banned. WAIT! I, personally, think HOAs suck and I’d never agree to buying a home in an HOA. That said, not everyone feels that way. Some folks genuinely like living in HOAs, and for all the horror stories, there’s at least a few where the HOA simply exists to provide amenities to the neighborhood i.e. playgrounds, walking trails, pools, etc. People should be free to choose the kind of housing arrangements they want, and if they want an HOA, then that’s their prerogative.

The real problem with HOAs is that we’re trying to solve the housing crisis exclusively with single family residential zoning, which means that HOAs are vastly overrepresented in terms of what’s available on the housing market. It’s fundamentally a zoning issue. People who don’t want an HOA or can’t spend $2,000/mo in mortgage plus another $300/mo or whatever in HOA fees should have options, but they kinda don’t. Ask your city why their zoning sucks.

Fair enough. I’m considering purchasing private satellite imagery from more high-res providers.

Edit: yowzers, minimum pricing makes any imaging worth a damn about $125. I’m pretty sure my SO would stove my head in.

I wonder if he’s part of that Quiver Full cult

Could be that CECOT is censored in bing data

Oh shit, glad to hear it. May the spirits be ever in your favor.

The FOIA staff got DOGEd real early on. They were one of the first people to get it.

Thank you!

Oh, shit! I’d really appreciate a source for that, if you have it handy

Damn, when did Jacobin get soft?

Wake me up when literally anybody in this administration gets anything besides a stern lecture.

Well, we do, but it’s for everyone else.

There is a way to remove congress people ahead of their term.

Wilmer Gutiérrez last spoke to his son on March 16 during a brief call allowed by police. He had spent days searching for information, visiting police stations and courthouses, only to be told there was no record of his son.

All these court orders don’t mean a thing, I piss on them, the courts have less honor than a goat. The courts are unwilling and/or unable to enforce their orders, and until they are willing or able, it’s just a show that’s wasting everyone’s time. The Trump administration is sending people to life in prison without a trial, without even charging folks with a crime, and the judges are standing on the side saying “but you can’t do that!” Well, guess what happy cappy, they’re doing it! So what now?

Yeah, I think it’s likely, but even if he isn’t, this is hella bad.

It’s more than the fact that he committed no crime, it’s that he wasn’t even given a trial; he wasn’t even charged with anything. He was just scooped up, declared a terrorist, and sent to life in prison in supermax.