It’s not intended as a pejorative, so its perceived weakness is irrelevant.

It’s a precise term with a very specific definition in international law, and that’s the point.

Israeli terrorists have just taken 1500 Palestinian hostages.

In the sense in which you’re framing it, it would likely be more accurate to think of it as spectrums and subspectrums, in the same sense as sets and subsets.

But it’s been about six months since Schumer decided that it wasn’t the time for a fight, that neither he nor the country was ready. Democratic leaders have had six months to come up with a plan. If there’s a better plan than a shutdown, great. But if the plan is still nothing, then Democrats need new leaders.

We already know the Democrats need new leaders. Or more precisely, they need leaders, period.

Schumer and Jeffries aren’t leaders - they’re high-ranking tools.

That’s what they’ve demonstrated with their treatment of Mamdani. They hold the positions they hold because they have no principles and no integrity - because they’re owned by the donors and can be counted on to serve the interests of the donors regardless of any other considerations.

And for the time being at least, the donors - even the most generally leftist of them - aren’t sufficiently opposed to what Trump is doing. They’d probably rather the tyrants have [D]s after their names than [R]s, and they’re undoubtedly personally offended by Trump, since he’s petulant and gauche and gross, but they don’t have any particular opposition really to a program to benefit the wealthy few (which necessarily includes themselves) at the expense of the common people (which is just a bunch of shabby people they don’t know), so while they’d certainly welcome efforts to make Trump look bad, they’re not really committed to stopping him. And I guarantee that some significant number of them are already daydreaming about what they’ll be able to do if/when the power that Trump has accumulated falls into the hands of a Democrat.

And again - Schumer and Jeffries are their tools. We already see that with their refusal to support Mamdani.

And I have little doubt that we’ll continue to see it in their failure to meaningfully oppose Trump.

It’s a bit late in the game for that isn’t it?

I mean - she’s right, but the SC has already cast aside law, precedent and the Constitution at this point, and is ruling almost entirely based on opinion. Or maybe it would be more accurate to say, “preference.”

In the book, set for publication on 9 September, Barrett asserted her belief that the June 2022 ruling that struck down abortion rights nationally “respected the choice” of Americans.

Ah… so she’s not just contradicting the plain reality of the current SC, but her own statements.

Or more precisely, just spewing whatever line of bullshit might serve her current purposes.

Which is undoubtedly the reason she was nominated in the first place, and the exact thing she was expected to contribute.

Helluva timeline we’re living in here…

Yes - that’s another good example.

Even on a very simple level, that’s harmful to oneself, because all time and energy spent vainly trying to control things one cannot control is necessarily time and energy not spent on the things one can control.

Stoicism, properly understood, is in my opinion the only possibility humanity has for survival.

Unfortunately, stoicism is rarely properly understood.

Virtually every institutionalized societal evil exists at base because some number of people are stubbornly clinging to the delusion of control over others.

As but one example, while the wave of trans bigotry exists because some number pf people believe that they should have the authority to control other people’s gender identifications, at heart it exists because those people believe that they can do so. That’s the foundation upon which their ever-more aggressive attempts are built. It’s really not a matter of whether they should or not - they literally can’t.

Stoicism would’ve already informed them of that fact, and would’ve informed them of the harm that’s done - not merely to others but to themselves - by ignoring that fact.

Reminder: class war isn’t something that might or might not happen in some speculative future - it’s already happening. The wealthy and powerful few are already fighting it. And we the people are losing by forfeit.

Huh… I should try that.

My standard response is to just leave the room.

The one that kills me - my brother does this - is framing it as a response to imaginary opponents.

He does these monologues about the libs or the woke mob or the city people or whoever in which he first mimics what they’re supposedly saying, then responds to it with some copy and paste bit of MAGA dogma.

He doesn’t even engage with actual people - it’s just the strawmen in his head.

Of course.

Even amidst the overt efforts to eatablish an authoritarian police state, this administration is most notable for being petty, vindictive and wantonly destructive. It’s as if even instituting neo-feudalistic/fascistic/plutocratic oligarchy is a secondary goal, and the primary goal is simply to be cruel, selfish, petulant and mean.

So of course those are the qualities one will find in its supporters. Most of them don’t even have a coherent ideology - all they have is hate and a petty and childish desire to make those they hate suffer.

Props to anyone who’d name a cat Ryo-Ohki.

If only it was a cabbit. Or better yet, a spaceship.

Ahhh… imagine the truly epic temper tantrums she’s throwing…

I’ve been especially impressed by the prescience of Bo Burnham’s line in Welcome to the Internet - “Obama sent the immigrants to vaccinate your kids.”

As far as I know, it hasn’t become a quote from an actual right-wing nonsense-driveler yet, but it might as well be.

Behind the password “SuperHacker123”

By design.

This is a deliberate offensive in the class war the wealthy snd empowered few are already fighting, and that we’re losing by forfeit.

I am so fucking tired of this government of not simply the most corrupt, but the most stupidly corrupt.

The kakistocrat.

Sure a good thing that the responsible and conscientious conservatives elected a right-thinking president who’s going to cut wasteful spending and balance the budget, hmm?

Imagine what it would be like if instead a rabble of petulant, frightened assholes elected a deranged overgrown toddler who pissed away billions on whatever idiocy happened to trigger his stunted emotions on any given day.

It’s cynically amusing that at this point Trump isn’t even doing any of the things his apologists pointed to.

Supposedly it was okay if he had some personal ethics issues, because he was going to drive down prices and inflation, cut wasteful spending, balance the budget and keep the US out of foreign wars.

And instead, he’s driving up prices and inflation, increasing wasteful spending, increasing the deficit by the greatest amount ever in history, and warmongering around the world. And his personal ethics issues have exploded into a veritable orgy of ridiculously brazen corruption.

And the apologists just keep shambling along, leading a parade of morons who still can’t see it.