America can probably dodge fascists for a while yet but wealthy neoliberals have spent millions of hours and billions of dollars trying to ensure that anyone who might genuinely fix things never has the power to do so.

There’s the giant media companies looking to maximise their profits through manipulation and cronyism, rather than anything resembling actual journalism.

The legal system that’s reluctant to investigate, prosecute or punish corporations and the ultra wealthy at the head of them, but enthusiastic about throwing poor people in for profit prisons.

Tech companies that will platform any reprehensible views in exchange for a few dollars of ad impressions, pumping their users for pennies with an elaborate emotional slot machine.

Then of course the open political corruption. Gerrymandering, insider trading, disenfranchised voters, voting machines with no paper trail and a deeply flawed election system where any vote that isn’t for one of the two neoliberal parties is functionally thrown in the bin.

When we can’t stand it any more, we’re fed bullshit non-solutions instead, written and published by the problems themselves and designed to make them even richer.

“The free market will fix it. Buying more guns will fix it. Electing a man with the communication skills and emotional regulation of a toddler will fix it. Murdering people based on the amount of melanin in their body will fix it”.

Each one has already been tried and each one has failed to even dent the issue, because if they had any chance of succeeding then they would have banded together to undermine them in a bipartisan act of class solidarity.

And fuck, that’s just the politics. The same insatiably greedy, neoliberal trash is also responsible for the impending climate breakdown, endless wars and unprecedented levels of unemoloyment and homelessness because no matter how much we give them, they just can’t say “no” to profits.

We need to vote, but we also need so much more than voting. We need the entire world to unite in protest, demanding their governments either acknowledge the rights, freedoms and entitlements of every person on the planet, or be held accountable when they don’t.

So it’s not hard to see why people might get disillusioned when “maybe if we abuse minorities more, we’ll be able to own homes again” still seems to be an idea people want to explore.

I also have to subscribe to and use Adobe software but suggesting it’s less buggy and less expensive than other apps is delusional.

The moment you try and do anything outside of basic image editing, Photoshop immediately shits the bed.

It’s riddled with features that were half developed or half removed. Tried using any of the 3D stuff? It pops up a box saying “We’ve abandoned this and it probably won’t work, but go ahead and try because we haven’t properly removed it”. Using artboards? Probably not, since half the app seems to break with them, including their brand new features like Live Gradients that rearrange themselves when you save.

Looking for a filter? Well there’s 2 places to look since they seem to have lost interest in the filter gallery half way through, then piled mediocre AI filters on top. It’ll be a slow search, since for some reason some popup windows take fully 3 seconds to open, probably due to their 4 different UI systems in various states of abandoned.

Photoshop is widely used today because it was good 15 years ago. If someone hasn’t already creating a leaner, more stable, better designed, more ambitious piece of software, it’s only a matter of time until they do.

Yep. We need more headlines that end with “despite GOP opposition”.

You can take your Mein Kampf conspiracy theories and fuck off.

We can see who America arms and your bullshit doesn’t even hold up for the Israeli rulers responsible, let alone an entire race of people scattered all over the world.

We also have no idea what measures they take to stop the system being manipulated (if any).

The far-right could be working to ensure they’re recommended as often as possible and if it just shows up as “engagement” or “impressions” on their stats, YouTube is unlikely to fight it with much enthusiasm.

But he was naive thinking he could store that much data with a tech giant, his “life’s work”, risk free.

Google made a promise they didn’t keep and articles like this are the consequence of that.

It’s not ideal, but it still feels better than “let them lie and then blame their victims for believing it”.

Sterile-ish

It’s the neoliberal way.

A few hundred dead Palestinian kids isn’t going to worry a wealthy neoliberal. Not their kids, not their country.

But “bombing targets going unbombed” fundamentally means “profits going unprofited” and that’s an idea that brings a neoliberal out in a cold sweat.

Ultimately, Biden’s statement is just his part in the pantomime. He’s doing the “left-wing neoliberal” thing where he does exactly the same horrific shit as the right-wing neoliberals, but he frowns while he does it.

If he doesn’t frown hard enough, he might lose the election, but it’s not going to stop the children being blown up or the neoliberals profiting from it.

Unfortunately, that’s not how greed works. They’ll never say “no thanks, we’ve made enough profit from Ukraine”.

Because it turns turns billions in public funds into billions in private profits.

The fact that those profits come at the expense of children’s lives doesn’t worry the oil and gas industries, so why would it worry weapons manufacturers?

It’s almost like it was just a lie they told to make all the school shootings sound worth it.

Don’t worry, gun owners have pinkie promised they’ll overthrow any tyrants, right after they’ve finished enthusiastically voting for them.

It seems that way because it is. It’s a for-profit media company, owned and run by rich neoliberals, who are shareholders in other for-profit companies owned by neoliberals, reporting on someone who is a genuine threat to that system.

Most of the “left vs right” in politics and media is just an elaborate pantomime to vie for market share. The moment someone is a genuine threat to neoliberalism, watch them all unite to take them down.

Because it’s one of the most effective ways to turn public funds into private profits.

Throw it on the massive pile of election reforms that are desperately needed but will never happen because it will lessen the power of neoliberals and the far-right.

Every person over the age of 18 should be eligible to vote in their district and “moved” or “died” should be the only mechanism for removing a voter from the roll.

America also needs ranked choice voting, the removal of electoral college and protections against gerrymandering (such as multi member districts).

Unfortunately any change that is suggested breeds a new reactionary cult that for some reason we’re supposed to politely listen to as they delay progress forever.

If it means race traitor it must have to do with the fact that the Bull is typically a large black man in the porn.

That is exactly the reason.

The obsession with calling everyone “cucks” comes from the white supremacist scene that created the “alt-right”. It’s intended to mean “race traitor” more than it’s intended go kink shame.

They’ve crunched the numbers on fascism and it turns out that a slave workforce you can execute for not hitting KPIs is great for businesses.

Then they promised billions of dollars of orphan killing aid to Israel, because they just can’t resist being neoliberals.

Yes, they’re better than a party full of fascists and fundamentalists, but so is a suit full of roadkill and excrement.

That doesn’t mean people need to enthusiastically cheer as we hurtle towards oblivion.

Because he lets them say slurs.