PaintedSnail

Both the student loans and the ACA were actively gutted by Republicans, so they are a perfect example of why getting Republicans out is beneficial to you. You want student loan forgiveness? Get rid of the Republicans that are blocking it. You want single-payer or socialized medicine? Get rid of the Republicans that are blocking it. Both have been introduced by Democrats, both were voted on along party lines and failed due to Republicans.

You are missing my point: you are only hurting yourself and your goals with that strategy. Voting third party only helps Republicans and isn’t seen as any kind of protest by anyone who matters. No one says you have to LIKE voting for either of the parties, but only one party is closer to your goals, is actively trying to achieve your goals, and has a chance of actually getting elected so your goals can be achieved.

Why engage with people you don’t agree with? Because they will get you closer to what you want. What you want is voting reform, so vote for the people who are pushing for voter reform:

https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/3313/text

https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/senate-bill/5048

https://raskin.house.gov/2024/9/raskin-beyer-welch-bill-would-bring-ranked-choice-voting-to-congressional-elections-across-america

And not just federally, but locally as well:

https://fairvote.org/ranked-choice-voting-legislation/

It’s no coincidence that these bills are being introduced by Democrats. If you want these bills passed, they also need support to get them passed. As long as the house and senate are split between the Democrats and Republicans, these bills will not get passed. Simple as.

I’m not saying that voting Democrat will make them reverse course. I’m saying that voting Democrat so they have enough control to get these bills passed will let them complete the course they are already on so that you can get what you want.

And what happens in the mean time? Third parties almost always take votes from the Democrats. (That is to say, most of the people who vote third party would have voted Democrat if the third party was not on the ballot.) This gives a huge advantage to the Republican party on close elections. The result is further entrenching of the party that has the larger vested interest in not reforming the system. As a result, any generational movement has no chance of succeeding because the party that directly opposes their goal is always in power.

(To expand: since Democrats lose votes to third parties, they are the ones who would greatly benefit from any kind of ranked choice voting, so they tend to support such reforms. Since Republicans benefit more from FPTP, they tend to oppose such reforms.)

It’s all well and good to send a message, but that message will be received by the people who benefit most by ignoring that message.

The better method is to get people in power now who support election reform, get those reforms passed, then third party candidates become viable.

I would suggest doing so anyway. If they come across a firearm by happenstance then they at least won’t panic and will know what to do to be safe.

The metrics are the only important part! How else are we supposed to know how good the line is unless we constantly stress test the line by collecting data? Your ability to use the line is not a useful metric, so we don’t worry about that.

We know when you lie. We can see uptime stats.

Basically, yes, though I think they have special hydraulic pullers, too. I forget the exact name. They have to take special measures if the day is too cold.

https://youtu.be/zqmOSMAtadc?si=FCG7HxiPWXNQY6Uj

According to Practical Engineering, tracks are no longer given a gap. The gap causes premature wear and excess noise. Instead, they lay the track under tension, and weld the joins between sections.

There is still a limit on how much heat they can handle before buckling, of course. I just thought that was a neat innovation.

And now you compare the Republicans to some natural force, as if they are inevitable and inescapable. Gravity has no will, no plan. It just is. Republicans have a will and a plan. Getting mad at the Democrats for not being good enough to stop that is akin to victim blaming. The Republicans should never have gone down this road in the first place.

Do you blame the thief, or do you blame the homeowner for not having better locks? Who do you hold accountable?

We’re not talking about a diseased animal, we’re talking about people who are making conscious decisions knowing what the results will be. I can and so absolutely blame people for that.

Your metaphor insinuates that Republicans are unable to control their actions. If that were the case, that’s all the more reason to vote and get them out of positions of power.

Because the Republicans control Congress, and at this point only an act of Congress can restore it.

It comes down to this: a Republican president would veto any abortion protection law, but a Democratic president would pass it. But the law has to get to his desk first.

And it took a lot of hard work by a lot of people to adopt new date standards to avoid that problem. Now it’s time to adopt new IP standards, and it’s going to take a lot of hard work by a lot of people.

Time management is different for everyone, and when you’re on a deadline, or just dealing with a one-off situation, the extra research has no value.

Sometimes you don’t need to know how the clock works, you just need to know what time it is.

Focusing on the general idea of the last statement of your first paragraph, I completely disagree. I would much rather have a smart evil person in charge over an evil idiot.

A smart evil person will, at the very least, work for their own self-preservation. They can be negotiated with, even reasoned with, because they know that some give and take is required to meet their own goals.

An evil idiot will just break everything and take everyone with them if they don’t get what they want simply because they don’t understand what it is they are breaking.

Correct. Infant botulism can result from bacteria in raw honey that is otherwise harmless to anyone with a developed immune system.

ZZ

Eh, maybe? Personally, I wouldn’t consider a love triangle enough to be a harem, and I don’t see that any of the remaining girls see themselves as a love interest, just platonic. “Harem” as a genre is rather vaguely defined, though, so I won’t blame anyone for seeing it as one.

It might be overplayed, but Re:Zero does fit that bill. There is a romance, but only one, and it doesn’t play off the ecchi comedy tropes. It still is based around an oblivious boy, but it’s used as one of his major character flaws, and he has actual character growth.

It had a huge following when it was airing (still kinda does) to the point where it got annoying, but don’t let that color your perspective of the show.

Unless you’re someone who tends to B-negative anyway.

You know, I’m sure I came across one earlier, but I can’t find it now. I did find https://git.sr.ht/~kline/firebee now though, but I don’t think that’s what I had found before.