That is very well put, and as far as I can tell it applies to all forms of conservatism, from monarchism where the king is above the law and peasants have no rights, to oligarchy where the rich are above the law while the poor have no rights, to fascism where the inner circle and the stormtroopers who serve them are above the law while minorities have no rights, or class-based societies where your laws and rights depend on your class or caste, and theocracy where the clergy decides your rights and obligations depending on your position.

the administration is “not going to ignore the rule of law.”

So why is Trump not in prison, then?

This administration has constantly ignored the rule of law.

What a bizarre, nonsensical waste of money. Can they at least postpone the auction until they have a superior replacement available? That should postpone it for a couple of decades.

I don’t think undermining the right to a fair trial is the prosecutor’s job. And public opinion shouldn’t matter in a court of law.

Putting some limitations on slavery.

I don’t see why not, but it’s a lot harder to make a good case against Vance than against Trump (where it’s trivial to find plenty of crimes).

Not the first time. In the 1980s, Israel sought to undermine PLO (which wanted a 2 state solution) and supported a group opposed to PLO called, I believe, Hamas.

I think they’re both right. The government should cut all ties with Musk’s businesses, and Trump should be impeached. That way everybody wins.

It seems he wasn’t aware that his cult following came from the other end of the political spectrum.

Well, not quite the other end, but environmentally inclined business friendly liberals are still not quite Trump’s crowd.

From what I know, those agents can be absolutely fantastic as long as they run under strict guidance of a senior developer who really knows how to use them. Fully autonomous agents sound like a terrible idea.

The American obsession with bathroom segregation is weird. In other countries, women will sometimes use the men’s bathroom when there’s a long line in front of the women’s and not the men’s. Fathers needing to change a diaper on their kid sometimes use the baby changing station in the women’s bathroom if that’s where it’s located (though that’s increasingly being fixed).

This is not something that requires excessive legislation if you can avoid obsessing over other people’s genitals.

The Tates sell their “be a man” coaching package

As if he’d know how.

Or is xAI paying for access to Telegram conversations to train Grok?

It’s worth remembering that there was a time when the highest US tax bracket was taxed at 90%, and that didn’t stop the US’s longest period of sustained economic growth.

Ridiculously high tax rates for ridiculously high incomes have been done before and are entirely feasible.

There are a few exceptions. JK Rowlings became a billionaire simply by writing some really popular books, and even stopped being a billionaire by giving much of her wealth away. As far as I can tell, she didn’t become an asshole until later.

I’m willing to say more positive things about him. His dedication to Linux is great of course, but I’ve also heard that people working for him get a lot of freedom to choose what to work on. And no crunch. In the games industry, that’s pretty good.

So yeah, he seems to me to be one of the better among the tech billionaires. But in the end, he’s still a billionaire, and he’s god that ridiculous fleet of super yachts.

There was a time the same was true for Elon Musk, before he suddenly decided to jump the queue. I really hope Gabe isn’t going down that path.

The parliaments don’t, and they don’t have the loyalty to the security apparatus that US Congress has.

Either way, this is a distinct and important difference between the US and the EU, and a frequent point of disagreement in treaties and discussions between the two. It’s silly to claim they’re the same on this.

Not “the EU”, but one particular group in the EU. This sort of thing pops up every couple of years, and unlike in the US, it always gets shot down. The current law says the exact opposite.

And he’d be right to, if the alternative is MAGA.

But this is the buf problem un US politics. Of course you should vote against Trump, and of course even the most questionable Democrat is preferable to Trump. But with only two options, that seems to have lead the Democrats to think they don’t even have to try anymore. They keep drifting further to the right, instead of running a credible opposition.

The US desperately needs more options, but the system is rigged to allow only two credible parties. To change, there are only two options: seize control of the Democratic Party, primary every lackluster candidate, until the DNC can’t ignore that people demand better. Or start a new grassroots party, but it would have to be universally seen as the only way to get change, it needs to be massively funded to take on the machines of the other two parties, and convince the American voter that they really can win in this system that’s rigged against the people.

Primarying is certainly the more likely option, but you need to do it everywhere.