Nearing the end of the non-DLC portion of Pokemon Scarlet. I’m trying to finish my Pokedex before I jump to the DLC here and just have a little bit more focused breeding/leveling up the babies before I’m all set. I forgot how much fun a mainline Pokemon game is as it’s taken up a lot of free time as I get towards the end. I do think this has been one of the better entries and the technical issues, while present, are nowhere near game breaking from what I’ve experienced.

The open world was a little daunting at first. They give you three “quest lines” you can follow right out of the gate and I was initially stuck trying to figure out where to go and what to do, especially since two of the quest lines are literally in two different directions. The region is basically a big circle/clock face. You start at 6:00 and the first things you can do when the game opens up are at 4:00 and 8:00. Once I got the hang of the travel down it was a lot easier to do, but they throw a lot at you to start.

OK, how do we know we’re “beating fascism” and can back off? What stops Democratic leadership from arguing that the most boring ass middle of the road fiscal conservative Republican on the planet is “Trump 2.0” and must be stopped?

I don’t disagree on what you said at all, but so much of this is a war of messaging and marketing. If an amorphous “leadership” just keeps arguing the Republicans are all fascists regardless of what their actions/deeds/etc…actually suggest, how then do we push back on that narrative without being called a Russian plant or Republican sympathizer? In an age of clickbait, outrage manufacturing and people isolating in their own news spheres, it’s super easy for those with power to just lie and stay in power.

So so so many people keep pointing at Trump and saying “But he’s the worst/we’re all doomed/holy shit you need to vote blue no matter who” and comments about “perfect being the enemy of the good” so we should hold our nose and support Democrats.

I feel like I’m the only person who remembers how hyperbolic we all were about Mitt Romney or John McCain being existential threats to democracy. South Park literally made fun of everybody at the time pointing at how running such a divisive campaign let them distract the public from their real goal of stealing the Hope Diamond (obviously). How many of us would BEG for Romney at the top of the Republican ticket at this point?

So sure, Trump is the threat now. When are we supposed to stop rewarding mediocre neoliberalism then? If it wasn’t 2016 or 2020 or 2024 then when? Trump will eventually die and some new Republican will take his place as the leader of the party. EVERY Republican will be the next existential threat and we’ll be scolded and told to hold our nose yet again and vote for the Democrat. If someone can tell me the “end date” where I don’t have to choose between the lesser of two evils, I’d love to know when that is.

I don’t blame other citizens for voting how they do. Everyone has to decide for themselves their red lines for support and in the privacy of the voting booth who they want to support. I do blame Democratic leadership for not learning a single lesson from 2016 about hand picking candidates and browbeating everyone into thinking that’s OK.