frezik @ frezik @midwest.social

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5,366

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2 yr. ago

What the actual fuck? Trans people get bullshit from people like you. They are not getting "special treatment". Fuck off.

We can measure its gravitation.

You're thinking of the 3/5ths compromise, which is a separate though related thing to the Electoral College.

The EC tended to favor non-plantation slavery states (only Maine and Massachusetts had zero slaves at the time, though several others were close to zero). Virginia was by far the biggest state by population, and it had tons of slaves. Without counting its slave population, it would still have been the largest. The Electoral College, at least at the time, favored small, relatively slave-free states like Rhode Island and Vermont. The 3/5ths compromise does give some extra power to the larger slave states in the EC by way of added population, but not proportionate to what small states get out of it.

Federalist 68 gives the official reasoning behind the EC:

Nothing was more to be desired than that every practicable obstacle should be opposed to cabal, intrigue, and corruption. These most deadly adversaries of republican government might naturally have been expected to make their approaches from more than one querter, but chiefly from the desire in foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils. How could they better gratify this, than by raising a creature of their own to the chief magistracy of the Union? But the convention have guarded against all danger of this sort, with the most provident and judicious attention. They have not made the appointment of the President to depend on any preexisting bodies of men, who might be tampered with beforehand to prostitute their votes; but they have referred it in the first instance to an immediate act of the people of America, to be exerted in the choice of persons for the temporary and sole purpose of making the appointment. And they have excluded from eligibility to this trust, all those who from situation might be suspected of too great devotion to the President in office. No senator, representative, or other person holding a place of trust or profit under the United States, can be of the numbers of the electors. Thus without corrupting the body of the people, the immediate agents in the election will at least enter upon the task free from any sinister bias. Their transient existence, and their detached situation, already taken notice of, afford a satisfactory prospect of their continuing so, to the conclusion of it. The business of corruption, when it is to embrace so considerable a number of men, requires time as well as means. Nor would it be found easy suddenly to embark them, dispersed as they would be over thirteen States, in any combinations founded upon motives, which though they could not properly be denominated corrupt, might yet be of a nature to mislead them from their duty.

Another and no less important desideratum was, that the Executive should be independent for his continuance in office on all but the people themselves. He might otherwise be tempted to sacrifice his duty to his complaisance for those whose favor was necessary to the duration of his official consequence. This advantage will also be secured, by making his re-election to depend on a special body of representatives, deputed by the society for the single purpose of making the important choice.

In other words, the EC existed precisely to stop someone like Donald Trump from taking office. Or more accurately, stopping a populist, corrupt nitwit was the reason it was justified to the American people at the time. Back then, they were trying to head off criticism of democracy from supporters of constitutional monarchy. That is, democracy would be vulnerable to takeover by a populist, corrupt nitwit.

Obviously, it has failed at its one job. That doesn't mean democracy itself is vulnerable. On the contrary, the EC is a specifically anti-democratic concept that has been abused by exactly the sort of populist, corrupt nitwit it was supposed to guard against.

What is observable is constrained by cause and effect. To see something, information must come from there to us. That cause and effect relationship cannot happen faster than lightspeed.

We therefore have no evidence for anything other than the observable universe. Claims about anything else run into Russell's teapot issues. We can speculate, but it's ultimately nothing more than a story.

Dark Forest Theory is probably wrong. In-universe, the series unknowingly undermines it with communication tech that can transmit instantaneously. That would take away the assumption that civilizations can't effectively communicate over interstellar distances and build trust.

In reality, it's something of an extension of the "every individual for themselves" mindset of evolution--something White Supremacists have loved. Kin Selection Theory does away with that. There is a basis for building trust and working together within evolution. The precursor ideas were even done in Peter Kropotkin's "Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution" over a century ago. Kin Selection Theory put a mathematical foundation on it.

I like the book series as literature, and the Netflix series has been OK so far (not great, but OK). Liu Cixin himself, however, has some really shitty opinions that come through the text.

That entire phone call was probably the two of them laughing at people who asked to take people out.

Fuck you. Trans people are moving because of what's happening. Just fuck right off with your bullshit.

. . . "some leeway". That's a nice way to say "this never should have fucking happened, ever". Legal paperwork my ass.

Edit: how about this? We toss you in prison for a few months while "legal paperwork" is in motion. Would that be alright with you?

We should believe him because DJT is an expert on grift.

No, I mean people who have green cards and married to citizens.

Did other administrations pickup people on the street and send people to El Salvador?

every waking hour hating people because of different opinions

You're talking about the Trump Administration, right?

Oddly enough, Trump's DOJ did straight up admit they sent an innocent guy in to El Salvador, and said they can't get him back.

Be the reason someone had to make a sign.

That's why you reduce the number of hours.

Couldn't you get some kind of medication to help with that from our wonderful healthcare system . . . ah, yes, I see the problem now.

I like to look at the employment population ratio of those 25-54. We don't need to count college kids, and we don't need to count retired folk. This is a nice, easy measure that doesn't need many judgement calls on who has a job and who wants a job.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12300060

And yup, it's as close to the high as it ever was.

How about we all spend 20 hours a week doing actually important jobs, not 40 hours on frivolous bullshit jobs?

They messed with gamers.

Gamers.

On the contrary, this is pretty close to what we have right now. Companies don't like to spend much on R&D once they're out of the startup phase. A good chunk of that startup phase R&D was actually taking place at a university with public funds. This is especially true of pharmaceuticals. So the answer to the question of "when does it get handed off to private industry?" is to just look at what's happening already.

The exception is big monopolies. AT&T's Bell Labs is a legendary R&D department. IBM, Microsoft, and Google all likewise have significant pure R&D going on, and even engineers who don't like those companies salivate at the opportunity to work in that capacity for them.

But then you've got big monopolies on your hands, and that's a whole other problem.