firebyte @ firebyte @lemmy.world

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2 yr. ago

I've been thinking about this a bit, I'm not sure it's been considered and I may be going out on a random tangent...

Isn't this whole 'immunity' decision just another power grab, or rather further cementing of their power, by SCOTUS? Think about it. They're essentially the arbiter of 'right' and 'wrong' now, as there's no further avenue of appeal save for amending the U.S. Constitution.

Put aside the vagueness of 'official' vs. 'unofficial' acts for a moment.

• Trump did something definitely illegal, and Trump argues was 'official', like his classified records case. Immune.
• Biden did something questionably legal yet unofficial, such as forgetfully retaining classified documents after his tenure as VP (which he immediately returned). Supreme Court decides 'not immune', and some idiot decides to prosecute.

Trump might end up as a king, but the conservative majority of SCOTUS are the kingmakers and protectors.

Diesel burns slowly, though petrol makes diesel easier to ignite.

We mix them 3:1 Diesel/Petrol (called 'driptorch' fuel, used in 'driptorches') to safely put fire to the ground when we need to.

Source: am firefighter.

Yes, but only for one term. He is eligible again after sitting out for one term, unless of course they manage to change their Constitution.

https://ballotpedia.org/Governor_of_Florida

Or remaining seated whilst the judge leaves the court.

Problem lies in the 'first-past-the-post', aka 'winner-takes-all' system. There are others, like the electoral college, but I digress.

Third party candidates only ever bleed votes from another in FPTP. Assuming RFK is going after Democratic/'swing' voters he'll potentially end up costing the Democrats votes in key states which, at the margins we're currently seeing, would potentially allow Republicans to win, holding slightly more votes to be 'first-past-the-post' at the end of ballot counting even though a majority of people would've preferred a Democrat representative anyway.

Under the FPTP system, voting for RFK as a protest vote, at his 10% margin, becomes a wasted vote because of how FPTP works.

The only true way to fix this is 'single transferrable vote', or 'ranked choice' voting. Voters simply rank their preference from most desired (1) to least desired (n) on a single ballot.

If the first round of counting doesn't yield a winner (usually 50% of ballots + 1 ballot in a candidate's pile), the candidate with the least amount of ballots is eliminated. Ballots are then redistributed from the eliminated candidate, according to the voters next preference on their ballot, amongst those candidates who remain.

Process continues until a candidate has 50% of ballots + 1 ballot in their pile.

The best version of this is 'full' preferential voting (every candidate must be numbered), rather than 'optional' (number at least one candidate; better versions of this are 'number at least n candidates'). Optional preferential votes 'exhaust', potentially becoming wasted, if the voter didn't number all the boxes.

This will allow people to protest vote, without actually wasting their vote.

One better:

Donald J Trump's Orange County Jail.

I was horrified when I first heard about this, though it actually seems to be a good strategy, if risky and ballsy:

Prop up an opposing candidate in the primary, who you project (the risky part) will poll worse against you in the general election.

It seems to be working...

https://youtu.be/K-UG88yoF0M?si=waPJ6WO29tQo2uJb

Given that Democrats this time around are out-fundraising the Republicans, it could be a really smart strategy.

https://democrats.org/news/rnc-statement-on-the-rncs-desperate-financial-situation/

I was skeptical at first though let me tell you, Kagi is so much better. I get exact search terms, which is immensely useful as a programmer, rather than providing results for what Google thinks I want to search for. It's also really, really nice not seeing ads as search results anymore, ad blocker or no ad blocker.

Is it as comprehensive as Google search? It meets about 95-96% of my needs. I still use Google very infrequently for some really obscure domain specific searches if Kagi doesn't find anything useful, though that's getting rarer and rarer.

It's also easy to block AI generated sites that pop up providing just enough likeness, but really are regurgitated AI trash, or are 'Wikipedia clones'.

I have no financial interest in Kagi, other than paying to use it. It has certainly been worth it for me.

Don't feel bad. When he fucked off to the U.S he renounced his Australian citizenship.

Clearly being a megalomaniac was more important to him.

Same here, and additionally NTLite.

Having the ability to build custom Windows installations, including 'in-place' editing, and the ability to update Windows without Microsoft silently reinstalling shit I don't want or need, with NTLite's 'Host Update' wizard, it has been well worth the 40€ for each version (no subscription too!)

I really don't want to sound like an ad, though NTLite has really made Windows a decent operating system again.

It certainly notable that Windows, once all of Microsoft's crud is stripped out, doesn't touch the CPU at idle, whereas a fresh install of Windows without customisation always consumed 2-3% of the CPU at idle.

Same with Inkscape vs Affinity Designer.

I really wanted Inkscape to work for me, though I was constantly fighting the UI and some weird artifacting Inkscape produced exporting SVG files.

Affinity Designer was, and still is, especially since their licenses are perpetual/non-subscription, well worth the price and is a dream to use.

The actual report is linked in the article.

There's a lot of redaction in it...

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23886219-integrated-risk-assessment-for-chevron-waste-plastic-fuels

Best program I've bought was NTLite, which allows you to customise a Windows ISO before installation, or edit a 'live' environment though this isn't recommended. It takes a bit to get used to, though it's incredibly powerful.

You can strip out pretty much all of that crud, including Edge, and prevent it from coming back using NTLite's Host Update wizard, rather than Windows Update.

I have no financial interest in NTLite, I hope this helps someone make Windows decent again. It's worth the money (about $50 if I recall correctly).