They're trying to line up the next minority to be sent to the Salvadoran torture prisons.

I don't know - how many?

Serfs get the benefit of living in a hovel on their lord's manor so long as they continue to work to expand their lord's fortune.

Or if they're not willing to do that, they get the benefit of a burial.

You will slave for your neo-feudal overlords or you'll be sent to prison, where you'll slave for your neofeudal overlords.

Or you'll die. That's okay too.

I have zero doubt that:

1. They're going through the motions of kissing his stinky ass because they know that's the secret to manipulating him.
2. They still hate him and are laughing at him behind his back.
3. He's too stupid and too blinded by his gargantuan ego to realize it.

I don't think it's so much that he doesn't care as that he's so enslaved to his ego and so oblivious to the whole concept of sincerity that the form of ass-kissing is enough all by itself.

Oligarchs gonna oligarch.

Unfortunately, what it's likely going to take, just as it has with past civilizations, is complete collapse.

Our descendants will hopefully build something better in the rubble we leave behind.

Imagine being such a psychopathic piece of shit that you would unironically complain that telling people the truth about what you're doing to them is a hostile act.

It's easy - you just have to be a psychopath.

Like Trump, Musk, Vance, Homan, Noem, Rubio, etc., etc.

I got all the way doen to "One trump son, who asked not to be named, said, “This is bullshit. Eric and I work really hard and we never get chosen to be pope" before I realized it was the Onion.

Everything up until then was believable. Well - even that was believable, but he wouldn't have said it on the record.

even if it’s not quite as open as the alternative social network Mastodon, another decentralized X rival.

Mastodon can't be "another" decentralized X rival, since it's the only one of the two that actually is decentralized. BlueSky just pretends to be.

Or more accurately, he embezxled $10 million and funneled it through a slush fund.

That's the correct choice.

Granted, China cannot be trusted. But China cannot be trusted in the same sense that a used car salesman cannot be trusted. The US, by contrast, cannot be trusted in the same sense that a rabid weasel cannot be trusted.

I still... maybe it's my years working construction, but when I look at RFK Jr. - his mannerisms and gestures and speech patterns and connection (or lack thereof) to reality - I see a tweaker, clear as a bell.

It can be - certainly.

One of the basic dynamics of partisan politics, and one of the main reasons that parties decline, is that people wear a party label as a substitute for more meaningful action.

In this case, people who want to project an image of progressivism without actually doing anything practical to advance the cause adopt (or adopted - more so in the past) the "Democrat" label as a way to signal their progressivism. The fact that they wear the label is then folded into their self -image - they can be proud that they're progressive, because after all, they're Democrats, which proves it.

One problem though is that that only works as long as the Democrats are seen to be progressive. If they're no longer seen that way, then by extension the party faithful are themselves no longer progressive either.

So effectively, a criticism of the party is a criticism of the individual, so they have a vested interest in defending the party from criticism.

Example:

"Republicans are corrupt weasels."

"Democrats are the same."

I see only three options there. Either:

1. You understand and admit that they mean "the same" in the sense of "also corrupt weasels."
2. You're a liar
3. You're a moron.

I'm so fucking tired of this argument.

It's the same fucking bullshit loop every goddamned time. Somebody will say that the two parties are "the same" clearly meaning "the same in [this] particular sense, and then the pedantic assholes will all come swooping in and start nattering on about how that's completely wrong because they're not absolutely 100% identical.

Here's a fucking news flash for all you binaristic pinheads - there are more than two possibilities. We aren't just limited to "they're 100% the same" and "they're not the same at all." It's not only possible but certain fact that they ARE the same in many, many ways, and the fact that they're not the same in ALL ways doesn't change that.

Anyone who can't envision more than two diametrically opposed possibilities is a fucking moron, and I'm sick and tired of this argument being driven by fucking morons.

A high tech variation of "the Devil made me do it."

That's what I've used for years now, and I have no problems with them.

I actually have three of them, of varying ages, all of which still work fine. The older ones have simple switch shoulder buttons and the newer ones have analog triggers, and that's pretty much the only notable change they've made over the years.

The only "problem" I've run into with them is that the buttons and/or the pad will accumulate dust over time and stop working dependably, so I have to take them apart and clean the contacts every year or two. Which is very easy to do.